Balwyn North Primary School

Strive. Inspire. Belong.

Our School

Principal's Welcome

Thank you for your interest in Balwyn North Primary School, and a very warm welcome to all future and prospective families. BNPS has a proud history and an exciting future.  Families can approach our school in the confidence that their children will be cared for, challenged and celebrated.

We work as a collaborative school community to ensure every child's full academic, social, and physical development and enrichment.  Our academic and co-curricular programs aim to develop the skills, knowledge, and understanding our students will need to be effective 21st-century citizens, empowered to engage in our global community fully.

At Balwyn North Primary School, we have developed an agreed set of values for our school:

These values underpin all that we do and promote a culture of learning and living together. Through these tenets of learning, we pride ourselves on our family approach to education and welcome and encourage the involvement of parents in the education of their children. All students are offered an extensive curriculum program at Balwyn North Primary School and are expected and encouraged to make the most of all opportunities provided within and beyond the classroom.

We look forward to sharing your unique learning journey at Balwyn North Primary.

Tony Stokes – Principal

School Vision

In the welcoming environment of Balwyn North Primary School, everyone has a place to be. Our engaging and progressive approach to education ensures all students work towards achieving and enjoying the high levels of expectation and output our curriculum offers. We foster strong relationships based on mutual respect with an appreciation for our cultural diversity. We value quality teaching and deep learning to build caring and independent future thinkers.

School Context

Balwyn North Primary School enjoys a proud history of academic excellence, with students benefiting from effective teaching and learning programs within quality buildings and grounds. Situated in a quiet suburban location, away from main roads, BNPS shares boundaries with the highly regarded Balwyn High School and The Merrell Kindergarten. The school grounds provide high-quality play spaces for the students with basketball courts, sandpits and Tiger Turf on all other surfaces.  Our maintenance staff and school community members keep our quality grounds in excellent condition through our regular ‘working bees.’

Balwyn North Primary School aims to provide a holistic learning and teaching program, including a complete specialist program, which enjoys specialised, dedicated learning spaces for Music, LOTE (Mandarin), Physical Education, Library and Art. In preparing our students for their future, the curriculum incorporates a global perspective supported by our Sister School relationship with Suzhou Pingjiang Experimental School in Suzhou, China. 

Balwyn North Primary School has a strong commitment to meeting the needs of 21st-century learners, with high levels of learning technologies throughout the school. ICTs are used to support innovative teaching and learning practices. Resources include class sets of iPads (Years F-2), school-owned netbooks, interactive whiteboards and projectors and an optional 1:1 device program in Years 4-6.

Guided by our school’s values—Strive, Inspire, Belong—our caring and dedicated teaching team staff support, develop, and encourage student growth. Our learning community believes in investing quality time and care into creating a learning and teaching program that meets every child's needs, strengths, and challenges. 

A strong home-school partnership is encouraged and valued at BNPS, where there are endless opportunities for parents to be involved in the life of the school and their child’s learning.  Regular parent information sessions, learning expos, student-led conferences, music soirees and concerts provide parents with a window into their child’s education.

Excellence in Learning

Balwyn North Primary School is an authorised International Baccalaureate (IB) Primary Years Programme World School. IB World Schools share a common philosophy: a commitment to improve the teaching and learning of a diverse and inclusive community of students by delivering, high quality programmes of international education that share a powerful vision.

Guided by our school’s values—Strive, Inspire, Belong—our caring and dedicated teaching team support, develop, and encourage student growth. Our learning community believes in investing quality time and care into creating a learning and teaching program that meets every child's needs, strengths, and challenges.

Balwyn North Primary School enjoys a proud history of academic excellence, with students benefiting from effective teaching and learning programs within quality buildings and grounds.

We aim to provide a holistic learning and teaching program, including a complete specialist program, which enjoys specialised, dedicated learning spaces for Performing Arts, LOTE (Mandarin), Physical Education, Library and Visual Arts.

A strong home-school partnership is encouraged and valued at Balwyn North Primary School and there are endless opportunities for parents to be involved in the life of the school and their child’s learning.  Regular parent information sessions, learning expos, student-led conferences, music soirees and concerts provide parents with a window into their child’s education.

Our Students

At Balwyn North Primary School we have a student centred philosophy to teaching and learning, where student driven inquiries go hand-in-hand with explicit focused teaching, to offer learning experiences that are truly meaningful to each child. Our students are encouraged to have agency in their learning and pursue new knowledge and understandings that are personally relevant to them and their impact on the World.

This level of student agency allows for many informal leadership opportunities in day to day learning. Every child has the opportunity to be elected onto our Junior School Council where representatives from all year levels and meets regularly throughout the school year.

Our Year 6 School Captains perform a range of duties including running assemblies, conducting school tours, organising school events. We are so proud of our students! 

Our Learning Spaces

Situated in a quiet suburban location, away from main roads, Balwyn North Primary School shares boundaries with the highly regarded Balwyn High School and The Merrell Kindergarten.

Our learning spaces are thoughtfully designed and offer flexibility for students to work in a variety of ways ranging from independent classrooms to open plan collaborative environments.

The school grounds provide high-quality play spaces for the students with basketball courts, sandpits and Tiger Turf on all other surfaces.  Our maintenance staff and school community members keep our quality grounds in excellent condition through our regular ‘working bees.’

School Hours

At 8:45 am, the school bell rings, alerting students that it is time to line up outside of their classroom areas, ready for the 8:50 am bell which signals the commencement of the day before learning begins at 9 am.

Our regular school days are structured with six 50-minute learning sessions, with breaks for recess and lunch:

9.00 - 10.40 am

Learning Sessions 1 & 2

10.40 - 11.10 am

Recess

11.10 - 12.50 pm

Learning Sessions 3 & 4

12.50 - 1.50 pm

Lunch eating and play time

1.50 - 3.30 pm

Learning Sessions 4 & 5

3.30 pm

Final bell

School Policies and Reports

Policies

Reports

 

School Bulletin

Every Thursday afternoon, Balwyn North Primary posts our weekly digital bulletin to our families, staff, and members of the community.

The BNPS bulletin features weekly updates and wonderful happenings around our school: student learning, items written by our junior- and senior-school leaders, a principal’s report, key information and news, as well as lots of photos. It is a great way for our community to stay updated, share, and celebrate our school. 

Parents and carers can find a link to our bulletin on Compass.