Hosted by Reconciliation NSW, the students participated in creative writing workshops to ready themselves for the School's Reconciliation Challenge and before NAIDOC Week next week.

Students began writing creative writing pieces for the challenge based on this year's theme of Speaking and Listening from the Heart.

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"It was a good avenue to open a discussion and dialogue between students as we have a few Indigenous kids in our class," Boggabri Public School's assistant principal Jacqui McImerney said.

"It was good to have an open and frank discussion about the past and how we can move forward.

"Next term we'll revisit it and refine them as part of the poetry unit and then they can submit their entries online."

Ms McImerney said some of the Year 6 students "didn't even know what reconciliation was" before the workshop.

"Now they're learning about what reconciliation looks, sounds, feels, tastes, and smells like, what it means to them and what they can contribute towards it," she said.

Gunai poet and author Kirli Saunders and best-selling children's author Yvette Poshoglian presented the workshop, where they discussed family history, and educated students about country, culture, language and identity.

The Schools Reconciliation Challenge is a program and competition developed to engage teachers and students in reconciliation and provides resources and activities to develop cultural competence and to promote inclusive classrooms.

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