success and at this conference the Dialogue Australasian Network was established. Since then four more very successful national conferences have been held at Melbourne Grammar School , Prince Alfred College Adelaide, Newington College Sydney and most recently our first ever New Zealand Conference at King's College in Auckland. Each conference has attracted large numbers of delegates. Membership is open to any individual, school or organisation who would like to be part of this exciting and important initiative. Together with the periodical 'Dialogue Australasia' this website is intended to provide the basis for a planned curriculum extending from Prep to Year 12. If you would like to join the network please fill in the form by clicking on the box below titled 'application form for DAN' .
A new vision has recently been adopted by a significant number of Australasian schools and educational authorities called the 'Five Strands' approach. This is a rigorous and critical approach to values education including 5 essential areas; -Philosophy of Religion -Silence and Stillness -Theoretical and Applied Ethics -The Biblical and Christian Tradition -World Religions These strands were outlined by Dr Peter Vardy from the University of London at a national conference in 1997 for Heads of Independent schools and then later explored in a series of conferences for Headmasters, Heads of Curriculum and Heads of R.E. in Adelaide, Brisbane, Cairns, Melbourne, Newcastle, Sydney, Toowoomba, Perth, Christchurch and Auckland . More recently John Redden from Geelong Grammar School followed up this work by in-servicing teachers in 26 independent schools in Western Australia,South Australia, and Victoria. The first national conference at Canberra Girls Grammar in April 2002 was a great
