Curriculum
Year 12-2022 HSC Assessment Information Assembly and Parent Information Evening
In Periods 1 and 2 on Wednesday 6 October, Year 11 will have a special online assembly where very important information about the 2022 Higher School Certificate course and assessment will be addressed.
The students will receive the HSC Assessment Handbook, which includes the College’s HSC Assessment Policy and a set of HSC assessment schedules for each subject. An HSC Assessment Tasks Calendar for Term 4 will also be issued. These documents will also be posted on the Canvas Year 11 page in the first week of next term.
It is expected that all students would thoroughly familiarise themselves with this information in order to plan and prepare for the rigours and demands of the HSC year ahead. I would also urge parents to read this information with their sons.
In addition, an online information evening for parents of Year 11 will be held on Wednesday 6 October via Microsoft Teams commencing at 7:00 pm and concluding at 8:30 pm. A link to join the information evening will be emailed to Year 11 parents the day before.
Year 11 Changes to Program of Study for Year 12-2022 HSC
I will address Year 11, as part of the above presentation on Wednesday 6 October, regarding possible changes to their senior program of study prior to commencing the HSC course next term. Parents and their sons are reminded of the following points:
- HSC students at St Patrick's College must undertake a minimum of 10 units of study.
- The total number of units undertaken must include mandatory course units in Religion and in English. Most students will have 11 units of study for the 2022 HSC as most will undertake 1-unit Studies of Religion I.
- The 1-unit courses in Sport Lifestyle and Recreation and Visual Design will discontinue. Students will automatically pick up study periods.
- Depending on their program of study, students may:
- drop a 2-unit subject (except English)
- drop a course or level within a subject, i.e., drop Mathematics Extension, drop English Extension, change from English Advanced to English Standard, change from Mathematics Advanced to Mathematics Standard 2, change form 2-unit Studies of Religion II to 1-unit Studies of Religion I.
A few students will be invited by the College to undertake additional HSC extension courses in English, Italian, History, Mathematics or Music. Enrolment in these courses is by invitation only and is based on demonstrable academic excellence in related courses.
Year 12 Academic Reports
By the end of this week, Year 12 final academic reports will be issued online via the Sentral Parent Portal. The period applied to the attendance record on the report is from Monday 15 March up to and including Friday 3 September.
Please note that it is a ’signing out’ requirement of all school leavers to have downloaded, saved, printed, and kept securely all school academic reports from Years 5 to 12. Once Year 12 have left the College, access to the Sentral Parent Portal will be closed to Year 12 parents.
Michael Cutrupi
Director of Curriculum
Major Work = Major Effort
Congratulations to the students from Industrial Technology Timber and Design and Technology for successfully completing their major work projects for 2021. In what has been a very difficult time, students were able to come to the College outside of normal school hours and work on their projects. The TAS staff took turns to open the workshops and assist students. Masks were mandatory, as was hand sanitiser, and students were required to sign in when they arrived. As the due date approached, students in LGAs of concern were required to present with a negative COVID-19 test every three days. There are some stunning projects being submitted this year and although we cannot proceed with our usual Major Works Evening as planned, Mrs Fochesato has taken an array of photos of the students’ major works. These can be viewed below.
Year 12 Major Works - Industrial Technology Timber
Year 12 Major Works - Design and Technology
A huge thank you to the TAS staff who gave up many weeknights and had many COVID-19 tests to ensure the boys completed their projects. I particularly recognise the efforts of Mr Tennant, Mr Calavassy, Mr Fontana, and Mr Herro.
Well done boys.
Andrew Viney
TAS Faculty Leader
Year 10 Student Research Project
Physics Student Research Project: To investigate if speed of an object is impacted by its mass.
During Term 3, Year 10 Physics students have conducted student research projects in order to test Newton’s laws of motion. In my experiment I tested the jump speed of two paper frogs (A4 and A3). After several repeats of the experiment, I was able to calculate that the smaller frog (A4) had a faster jump speed of the two frogs at a speed of 0.54 m/s compared to a speed of 0.18 m/s for the larger frog (A3). This was due to the heavier mass of the A3 frog compared to the lighter mass of the A4 frog. Overall, this task was highly successful during remote learning as it provided an insightful, hands-on experience to students.
Daniel Alafaci
10 Coghlan 2
Chemistry Student Research Project: Does the temperature affect the rate of Chemical reactions?
This investigation aimed to test the effect of temperature on the rates of a chemical reaction. Using standard home equipment, I tested different variations of temperature, on the time taken for salt to dissolve in water. The three trials appeared to fluctuate in results but were relatively close. It appeared that the higher the temperature the quicker the rate of the reaction, thus inherently proving that the temperature of a chemical reaction affects the rate at which it occurs, as the highest temperature resulted in the lowest recorded time.
Matthew Selim
10 Hickey 2
