Discover True North Where The Footy Field Meets Victorian Classrooms

Footy asks a lot more of players than skill with the ball. They have to read how a teammate is feeling, stay composed under pressure, back each other after a mistake and work through disagreements on and off the field. Those same skills matter just as much in the classroom and the playground.

True North brings those skills into the Victorian schools. Developed and delivered by The Huddle, the North Melbourne Football Club's community impact team, it is a free social and emotional learning program that gives teachers ready-to-teach learning materials to build students' social and emotional skills and support healthy, respectful relationships.

Schools that have taken part in True North before will find it has grown well beyond its original form. The program has been completely overhauled and expanded into a full pathway from Foundation to Level 10, while keeping the same purpose at its core: empowering students to discover who they are by understanding how their values and attributes shape their identity.

What makes it different

North Melbourne players appear throughout the program, sharing their own stories of courage, conflict, teamwork and setbacks, so students learn through familiar faces from the football world. Many activities borrow from footy too, from handball challenges to a classroom draft. Behind the fun sits solid teaching: lessons follow an explicit teaching model, use Project Zero thinking routines, align to the Victorian Curriculum 2.0 and are designed to complement the Department of Education's Resilience, Rights and Respectful Relationships resource.

A pathway from Foundation to Level 10

Each unit builds on the last as students come to understand themselves and others and learn to work effectively together.

Discovering True North (Foundation): settling into school alongside others. In their first year of school, students learn to name their strengths, look after their own and others' personal space, practise kindness and work out a compromise when friends want different things.

Exploring True North (Level 1-2): putting words to feelings. Students learn to notice feelings in themselves and others, tell the difference between a skill and a quality, understand how friendships start, grow and recover, and see courage as trying something new even when it feels scary.

Team True North (Level 3-4): learning that differences make a team stronger. Students discover what similarities and differences bring to a group, recognise the link between social situations and emotions, build strategies for different types of conflict and practise the skills behind good collaboration.

My True North (Level 5-6): knowing what drives you. The focus turns inward. Students build the persistence to keep going when things get hard, explore the values that guide their choices, learn how the way they talk to themselves shapes what they believe they can do, and develop a clearer picture of the many parts that make up who they are.

Our True North (Level 5-6): taking self-knowledge into the team. Taught after My True North, this unit turns outward. Students explore how their connections with others support their wellbeing, learn to name complex emotions with precision, discover how personal strengths can become leadership qualities, and practise sharing roles and working through setbacks as part of a team.

Your True North (Level 7-8): holding your ground. The early years of secondary school bring new friendships, more independence and stronger peer influence. This unit helps students understand how social pressure works, see situations from other people's points of view, set boundaries and respect the boundaries of others, and recognise that they always have a choice in how they respond. The focus is on acting on their own values rather than reacting to the people around them.

Finding True North (Level 9-10): preparing for what comes next. As students move towards senior school, expectations rise and relationships become more complex. This unit strengthens their sense of self as a guide for decision-making, builds practical ways to manage stress and support friends under pressure, develops clear communication of consent across all kinds of relationships, and encourages them to think about their responsibility to themselves, the people around them and their community.

Bringing True North to your school

True North is free. Teachers can create a free account on The Huddle's True North page, choose the unit for their year level and download the teaching materials and slides with attached curriculum map. Each unit has four lessons that can be taught in a single block or split across several sessions.

Primary schools in Wyndham, North Melbourne and Moonee Valley can also have The Huddle's facilitators deliver True North in person from Foundation to Level 6, at no cost to the school. For bookings or planning support, email education@thehuddle.org.au.

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