Feathers and Fur
semester 1 & 2
This elective is centered around working safely with live animals in class. You will have the opportunity to work within each of our animal groups throughout the semester, rotating through: rabbits, guinea pigs, rats, chickens, birds, goats, sheep, pigs and alpacas.
While working within your animal group, you will then learn the necessary skills to care for them and to keep them healthy and happy. This involves feeding, cleaning, health checks, providing enrichment, enclosure set-up and maintenance, and much more.
To help you, there are experienced students who have done this subject before! They will happily teach you everything you need to know – from how to harness and take an Alpaca for a walk, to checking a chicken for parasites and how to correctly cuddle a bunny. There are many skills to learn and we work with care and consideration for the animals at all times.
As well as working with the animals, you will take on personal or group projects during class time. Projects are very flexible and in the past have included:
Designing and building enclosures;
Adding new animals to the program
Creating photo displays of our animals;
Organising excursions for the class;
Raising money for endangered species;
Being interviewed for television by the host of Pets Practice; and
Getting the local paper out to raise community awareness of an endangered species
What will you think of that you can add to this list?
*Extra-curricular fun!*
All students enrolled in the Working with Animals Program have an opportunity to apply for our three school camps. These are Farm Camp, Zoo Camp and Turtle Camp!
All students enrolled in the Working with Animals Program are welcome to attend our weekly Animals Committee Meeting, where students get to take the floor and share their ideas and proposals for changes to our practice, or to share important updates on our animals health or training progress. It is a great place to meet like-minded animal lovers.
All students enrolled in the Working with Animals Program are invited to help us plan and run exciting and fun school events. Students enjoy volunteering for a number of roles to share our amazing program with the school community. These events include our annual Animal Expo and Trivia Night to name a few!
See what all Animals electives get up to on TC Animals Instagram! Templestowe College Animals (@tc_animals) • Instagram photos and videos
