Year 6 Reflections

Charles

On March the 2nd years 5 and 6 went on an excursion to one of the most beautiful places in Melbourne: State Parliament House Victoria, and Cook’s Cottage in The Treasury gardens.

Firstly, at Parliament House, we learnt about the roles of Parliament and about the history of Parliament. We had an amazing tour around the House! And had so much fun doing the roleplay there!

Secondly, we visited Cook’s Cottage. To get there we walked through the magnificent Treasury Gardens! We saw Captain James Cook’s telescopes, books, and clothes. Some of us also tasted the Scurvygrass that was for fixing broken bones back then. Overall the excursion was beautiful!

Noah

On Wednesday, our class took a bus trip into the city to see Parliament House and Cook’s Cottage, exciting! I was lucky enough to get some footage of the cottage garden and interior which I’m hoping to make somewhat of a documentary of. Year 5 also tagged along with us although we didn’t exactly cross paths with each other considering we were in Cook’s Cottage when they were in parliament and the other way around. Overall I’m pretty sure I saw zero frowny faces!

After we finished at the cottage, we walked back to Parliament House and began our tour. As the Year 5’s finished up we were led into the Lower House room for a role play. Most of us were given a role to play, some of which happened to be very important. I was given the role of the speaker, pretty cool huh? I even got to shout “Order!” and wore a cool cloak. The person giving us a tour even gave me permission to kick the teachers out if I wanted to! I have to say I was tempted, but I resisted. Once we finished the role play we moved to the upper house discussion room where everything was red velvet and covered in gold. The guy who gave us the tour even said it’s one of the most expensive rooms in the world!

Once we got back to school there happened to be a Federal Member standing right outside the church, coincidence? I think not!

Aston

Firstly the Year 6s visited Cook’s Cottage because we had a lot of time on our hands. We took a walk around the Fitzroy gardens, there were really cool plants all over the place and also about six fountains, but soon it was time to go inside.

As we walked in, the first thing I noticed was the giant statue of Captain Cook next to the herb garden. Then once we were all focused on the people guiding us through, they just said we could walk around and have a look. The house itself was very tiny, the beds would barely hold you and the floorboards were so old they creaked loudly. There were many memoirs (you could say) spread out around the house, telling us about the house.

After a while, we had to leave and go to Parliament House. When we walked in there was a massive reception, the roof was decorated with angels and painted tiles. A man led us through the place, first, we went to the Lower House, all of us got to sit on these really comfy chairs, and some of us role-played what would happen if a bill was getting passed through parliament.

After we finished our role-playing we went to the Upper House, I could tell that it was going to be fancy by the chairs on the way, they were gradually getting more glamorous. When we went inside the whole place was decorated with gold, real gold! Above the speaker’s chair, there was a massive (I don’t really know what to call it) but it was kind of an arch with a unicorn and a lion on top, holding shields. The whole place was decorated with everything fancy that you could think of, and the guide told us about the history of parliament, but sadly soon after we had to go :(

Overall I really enjoyed this trip, I'm sure that the rest of the class feels the same!

Giulia

I really enjoyed everything we saw. Captain Cook’s cottage was really cool to see and looked very cosy and old. The Parliament House was really wonderful. The walls were beautiful and you could get dazzled by the ceiling. When we role-played at the Lower House, it was really a fantastic experience! I was the State Premier and the Upper House was amazing. I am very grateful I went on this amazing excursion!

Year 5 Reflections

Christine

Years 5 & 6 went on an excursion. It was incredible. At 10:30 am we left to go on the bus. It took thirty minutes to arrive in this city. We walked into the Parliament House of Melbourne. It was so huge, It looked like a mansion inside. It had such beautiful walls. Did you know some of the walls were painted with real gold from 1770 -1899? The first room was the green, Lower House. It had some seats that Daniel Andrews had sat in.

After we looked around the room, we met Michael O’Brien. He told us about Parliament House and that he talks to people to solve their problems. Fun fact: I actually live near Michael O’ Brien. I'm about one to two streets away from his office. It was amazing. He told us everything that he does. We then visited the red upper house. It was all red and it had so many different things from the green room. We even saw a royalty chair where Queen Elizabeth the 2nd sat when she was twenty. We weren't allowed to sit in it. We talked about how they made the colour red. It was mashed up with red beetles. And in red M&Ms they have 0.00001% of crushed red beetles. Anyways we then left and had a snack.

After we finished up and went to Captain Cook's Cottage, we did a scavenger hunt finding things all around the garden and house. Also, we walked into the real Captain Cook’s Cottage House from 1775. It was amazing that we walked into the real house. After we did that we explored the fairy houses and a fairy tree. It was very exciting!

Nicholas

I couldn't believe it. I was standing right outside Parliament House Victoria, a $674 million dollar worth house built of solid gold. The gold was mined out of the Ballarat mines to show their riches. Stepping inside we got to see the green pathways and the walls were built in 1855. We walked through stepping into a green room explaining the seats of the Premier, Deputy Premier and Opposition Leader. Michael O'Brien stepped in saying he used to be Opposition Leader and Treasurer in Victoria. We got to debate over the law of banning gambling ads as I was Mildura's representative.

After that we went to the red room in the Upper House, meaning royalty. Parliament was made after Henry VIIas used the citizen's taxes to pay for equipment in wars against the French. People got fed up with Henry as they protested for the right of people to make their choices. After Parliament was created and green was a choice for people and red for the rulers. Red was a really hard colour to find after you had to find specific bugs to crush and a chance they would drop red dye. On the other hand, green was easy to come by as it came from leaves.

A mace was held by the Serjant. The mace was used in the ancient Parliament in England as Parliament was a dangerous place then. They hid a soldier with a mace under the floorboards in case any ruckus happened. A mace was also a sign of royalty as the top of the mace has the same pattern as Queen Elizabeth's crown. After Parliament, we went to Captain Cook’s Cottage in Fitzroy Gardens as it was published on 15 of October 1934. It was brought to Melbourne to celebrate the anniversary of Melbourne for 100 years.

Luca

On Wednesday we had an excursion where we went to the city to see Parliament House and Captain Cook’s Cottage. At 10:00 am we went down to have a snack and go on the bus to get to the city. The bus ride was about 30 minutes but it felt like forever to get there, when we got to the city there were so many big buildings.

We arrived at Parliament House at around 11:00 am. Parliament House was really big in person, it was my first time seeing it so I was surprised. We entered Parliament House but before we could go in we had to go through security but that didn’t take long. First, we went to the green room, the room was covered in gold everywhere and there were cameras everywhere as well as tons of microphones. There was a golden mace at the top of the table and a massive chair at the back where the speaker sits. While we were there we met Michael O'Brien and he talked to us about what his job was to do and that he works for all of us. Next, we went to the red room where it was basically the same but there was a throne at the back of the room where either the governor or royalty would sit.

Then we went on a walk to go to Captain Cook’s Cottage but along the way, we stopped for lunch. Then we arrived at Captain Cook’s Cottage only to see how small it was compared to the size of our house now. We got to go inside and see what Captain Cook did while he was at home, for example, his toilet was a pot and his bed was tiny yet he was 6 foot 3.

His parents owned the Cottage and lived there but Cook didn’t stay there most of his life. An Australian man bought the cottage for 800 pounds and got it shipped back to Australia where it was a present for Victoria for celebrating the 100th year. We explored and then went back to the bus to go back to school and then home where we would tell our parents how good of a day we had.

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