Connect Crew
What Makes a Great Connection?
This is the question we’ve been exploring in Connect over the past six weeks. We’ve been looking at the different ways connection shows up in our lives, through our families and friendships, our school and wider community, and the interests and activities that give us a sense of belonging.
A big part of building meaningful connections is understanding that we’re all different, and that’s what makes life interesting. Perspective, or as we’ve been calling them in Connect, “hot takes”, has been a big point of conversation over the last few weeks.
For our students, learning to understand perspective is an important part of building healthy relationships. It helps them recognise that two people can experience the same situation very differently, and that disagreement doesn’t necessarily mean someone is wrong.
Being able to listen, ask questions, consider another point of view and disagree respectfully are skills that support friendships, communication, conflict resolution and empathy.
Using “hot takes” has given us a fun and relatable way to practise these skills. Students can share an opinion, hear completely different opinions from others and, most importantly, explain why they think the way they do.
A few hot takes we’ve discussed so far:
“You’re never too old for a Happy Meal.”
“Being good at Fortnite is a genuine life skill.”
"Pizza tastes better when it's burned."
"Maths is fun."
“Crocs are appropriate footwear for every occasion.”
“Sometimes being a good friend means telling someone something they don’t want to hear.”
“You don’t have to like someone to be kind to them.”
The actual hot take isn't really the point. What matters is what happens around it: students listening to each other, being curious about why someone sees something differently, challenging their own thinking and learning that they can disagree with someone while still respecting and connecting with them.
Hot takes aside, our groups have been busy! The Connect kitchen has been in overload as we have worked through plenty of cooking. Some groups have participated in cooking challenges (like the deaf, blind and mute cooking challenge) while others have been busy cooking up a storm to provide some delicious snacks for their school community.
Two groups made a banana choc chip loaf which was handed out to the Wellbeing and Principle Teams, a small gesture to say thank you for the tireless work they provide to the students.
Our hands on crew had a very successful day as they headed out to Bunnings to buy supplies they needed to begin decorating and refurbishing a bookshelf which will be donated to a local kindergarten when completed - we can't WAIT to see the end result! (Any guesses which theme the boys have decided to paint the shelf?).
One of our crews got busy in the gardens in preparation for the production, raking, pruning, cleaning. They did a fantastic job in shaping up the garden just in time for the production opening night!
It’s been a busy six weeks in Connect, with plenty of conversations, cooking, creating, gardening and, of course, some questionable hot takes along the way!
As we continue exploring “What makes a great connection?”, it’s been great to see our students putting some of these ideas into practice without even realising it. Working together, doing something for others, sharing a laugh, listening to different opinions and contributing to their wider school community.
We’re looking forward to seeing where the rest of the term takes us (and what hot takes come up next!).
Courtney Moran
Connect Crew