Middle School 

From the Head of Middle School 

NAPLAN

National literacy and numeracy assessments will be undertaken for students in Years Three, Five, Seven and Nine and will be conducted in May this year. Tests for students in Years Seven and Nine will all be done online. 

Your child will receive a handout explaining more details about NAPLAN, so please look out for it in your child’s school bag. You can also access a copy of the NAPLAN details here.

NAPLAN is one assessment tool that we can use to monitor each child’s progress. Students will have some practice for these tests in their regular classes. On Thursday 24 March, all students in Years Three, Five, Seven and Nine will do a practice test with the aim of testing our IT network. This test will not be marked but is a good practice for next term. After reading the handout, if you have any queries about NAPLAN, please feel free to contact me at school via email adam.scott@gsg.wa.edu.au

Mr Adam Scott | Head of Middle School 

Year Eight Excursion Days

We arrived at school at normal time, we started in homeroom passing around sunscreen and talking about the fun day ahead at Camp Quaranup. We were all excited until only one bus turned up, Baudin and Camfield got to Camp Quaranup as we were just leaving the school, Mokare and Wilson shared the 40-minute bus drive by singing well known childhood songs. 

When we got to Camp Quaranup, we were fed recess that the camp had provided, when we finished recess, we had a little bit of free time. Before we knew it, we got into our first activity, I’m in Mokare and the first activity we did was raft building. We were taught knots and if we could perform those knots to our instructor, we could get more rope to use. 

The supplies we were given were; 6 large chemical drums, 5 pieces of rope, x2 1.5-metre planks of rope and a milk crate. I was in a group with Tom Witham, Tyler Germain, Coby Ravenhill and myself.

We were given 25 minutes to construct our raft, we thought our raft was the strongest and sturdiest because we survived the drop test, but as soon it touched water, it collapsed. We took our own chemical drum and started paddling but we ended up last. We stopped to have lunch of salad and meat wraps that were very nice. 

Our second activity was archery. I was in the left handers group with Matthew Kay, Venja Ruggera, and Grace Bessen. Let me just tell you I’m not the best but we finished second with 69 points. We went home to rest and share stories with our friends and family. 

On our second camp day both busses were on time and the singing was very loud! 

When we got to camp, we had scrolls for recess, a little free time and we were back into activities. The first activity for me was geocaching. I was in the same group as raft building, we had a little talk on how to use the GPS and we were off, my group found about five locations. We got scared by some kangaroos on the way to one geocaching point. 

We stopped for salad rolls and played in a tree house for 20 minutes. My next activity was a blind folded maze where we used each other and all of our senses. 

Everyone had a brilliant time having fun and interacting with our peers we don’t know. 

Louis Ford | Year Eight