One, two, three, four ... While kindy kids across Bathurst are busy learning to count and spell, one special class is having a lesson in double trouble.
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Four sets of twins started kindergarten at St Philomena’s Primary School when school resumed this year.
It’s something assistant principal Louise Davies said she had never seen, until now.
“It’s very rare,” she said. “We haven’t experienced this sort of thing before. Maybe one [set of twins] on occasion, but never four at once.”
Twins Giordan and Lorena Dionigi, Hannah and Ruby Dunn, Lachlan and Mitchell Ellery and Stevie and Troy Webster have a lot of things in common: noses, toys and lunch boxes. But according to Ms Davies, they are all as individual as their singleton classmates.
St Philomena’s is a single stream school, which means all four sets of twins are in the same class.
There are 30 students in kindergarten this year. The twins make up more than a quarter of the population of the class.
“It’s one of the biggest classes to start at the school for a number of years,” Ms Davies said.
Face shape and hair colour have been useful tools in identifying the twins.
Kindergarten teacher Sallie Delaney said her students were unfazed by the presence of four sets of siblings.
“I was a little worried at first, but it’s had no impact,” she said. “They don’t sit together or cling to each other. They have their own little personalities.”
Ms Delaney said it was easier to tell the twins apart inside the classroom.
“With Hannah and Ruby [Dunn] and the two boys [Lachlan and Mitchell Ellery], it’s harder to tell them apart with their hats on,” she said.