Reptiles
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 through the semester, rotating through: Snakes, Skinks, Dragons, Monitors, Amphibians, Turtles and Invertebrates.
Reptiles is a Student-Led Elective. This means that some of the more experienced students actually do the vast majority of the teaching in the class. Students are put into small groups, 3 to 4 students in each. They are given a Class Leader who will take them through how to care for the animals in that particular section.
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, health checks, cleaning enclosures, providing enrichment, enclosure set-up and maintenance and much more.
To help you, there are experienced students who have already cared for the animals before. For example, they will happily teach you the fine art of taking a snake out of its enclosure. You may want to become a snake specialist: someone who can handle JP (our jumpy Jungle Python) and knows how to tell Sid from Boston (a Woma python and a Carpet python) or just how to hold the enormous Athena - our Olive Python. You may prefer our aquatic species, and be the master of turtle water chemistry and tank maintenance. There are many skills to learn and we always need to be able to do them with care and consideration of the animals.
As well as working with the animals, you will take on personal projects during class time. Projects are very flexible and in the past have included:
Building a snake enclosure
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
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
