Year 9 News

Welcome back to Term 4! It’s hard to believe we’re already in the final stretch of the school year. This term will be a busy but exciting term filled with celebrations and assessments!

School Wide Positive Behaviour Support (SWPBS)

It has been fantastic to see students working hard and showing determination to display all of Kurnai’s four pillars to spend their hard earned KPA’s at the KPA shop. Keep up the great work! 

KPA Data Term 4 – Weeks 1 - 2

9A- 1359B- 989C- 1109D- 115

Gumbuya World

Our Celebration Day at Gumbuya World is a fantastic opportunity to celebrate all your hard work throughout the year and enjoy a fun day out with your friends!

As we get closer to the big day, we encourage everyone to keep making positive choices at school, showing respect to staff and fellow students, and demonstrating our school values. We want everyone to have the opportunity to attend, so please remember that students who continue to make poor behaviour choices at school may miss out on attending Celebration Day.

Let’s finish the year on a high note, look out for one another and make sure we all have the chance to enjoy a well-deserved day of fun at Gumbuya World!

History day

On the final day of Term 3, it was fantastic to see so many students getting into the spirit of History Day by dressing up and enthusiastically participating in the festivities! Students enjoyed a variety of medieval-themed activities, including feasting, jousting and a range of fun challenges that brought the Middle Ages to life. The day was a fantastic opportunity for students to celebrate their learning, enjoy time with their peers and finish the term on a positive note. A big thank you to all the staff and students who helped make Medieval Day such a memorable and enjoyable experience!

“History Day for me was fun and full of activities. I learnt how to play Dungeons and Dragons, and it was extremely fun learning how the game works. After Dungeons and Dragons, we had some free time hanging around with my friends. After free time, we played some puzzles that I almost won, but just barely lost, sadly!

When we finished the puzzles, we had the feast. The feast was full of amazing food like pork belly, beef, mushrooms and chicken. It was amazing to eat all this food with my friends!

Then, at the end of the day, we did tug of war. Of course, Red House won! We are the best and will always be the best out of all the colours!”

- Declan M

“History Day was a full day of fun activities and fun challenges. I remember the first activity of the day was trench warfare with Nerf guns, where we were shooting each other behind the oval. It was a team game where each team had a medic, and we shot at each other through the trees. In the first match, we won, but sadly, we lost the second match. After that, we had a free-for-all before having to pick up all the Nerf bullets.

Next, we got to meet some animals, including snakes, and I even got to hold one! There was also a possum and a baby kangaroo. After that, we had a break before our next activity.

The next activity I remember was archery. I was terrible at it, but it was still fun! Then we had lunch, and the food was really good.

The best part of the day was definitely tug of war! I won one of my 1v1 matches, and everyone was cheering each other on. Some little personal grudges may have even been settled during the matches!”

- Xavier D

School for Student Leadership Community Led Project

Our students are looking forward to putting their Community Lead Project (CLP) into action later this term! As part of this exciting initiative, they will be working alongside Grade 6 students from Churchill Primary School to organise a visit to a local retirement village. This project is a fantastic opportunity for students to develop their leadership skills, build connections across generations and make a positive contribution to the local community. We can’t wait to see their hard work come to life! 

“Charlotte, Hunter, Blake, Cameron and I recently spent eight weeks at the School for Student Leadership (SSL). During our time there, we worked together to build our leadership, teamwork and communication skills. We also took part in lots of different activities and challenges that helped us become more confident and work better as a team.

While we were at SSL, we started planning our Community Learning Project (CLP), which we are really excited to put into action soon! For our project, we will be working with the Year 6 student leaders from Churchill Primary School to visit a local aged care home. We are planning to spend time with the residents, play games, have conversations and hopefully put a smile on their faces!

We think this will be a great opportunity to use the leadership skills we learnt at SSL while also doing something positive for our local community. 

- Georgia D

Tech School Visit

Mr. De Souza, Mr. Rodriguez and a group of year 9’s had the opportunity to head over to Morwell Tech school to complete days on Cyber Security and Extended reality design. The students had a great time learning about hacking and augmenting reality. 

“On Thursday the 15th of October, a small group of Game Maker students went to the Gippsland Tech School. We participated in a Cybersecurity program, we learnt about the difference between the types of hackers, black hat hackers and white hat hackers, before trying to hack into a website ourselves, a fake school gradebook. Once we finished, we had to write a detailed report. Then we had to access a camera overlooking a Lego city, we accessed it using the Google web manager. Afterwards we did an investigation about digital footprints which allowed us to find the owner’s names after seeing a photo of a chocolate bar using only public information. After every activity we had to write a report about the activity. For the last activity we had to implant poisoned AI chat bot prompts to get a bot to talk about Winnie the Pooh. At the end of the day the Gippsland Tech School teachers gave out medallions and I won all three. Overall, it was very fun.”

- Will B

“Friday tech school was all about using VR and AR for commercialized creation uses. Students were educated about the foundation and how VR and AR are and operate. They were guided to a VR room where each student was seated and taught to learn how to operate a VR headset and create visual sketches and concepts that were viewed as 1:1 human size. Even though the objective for the use of VR was to create headphones, yet the biggest highlight was when Mr. Rodriguez created a vibrant and realistic tank. Furthermore, students were taught to utilize AR to create projects that allow the learning of skills that has the potential to benefit their careers in the long term. AR included the use of a merge cube that enables the camera to read and make magic. During break, pupils enjoyed local utilities like the arcade and played competitive ping pong or table tennis. There were also board games and more. Near the end of the day, the group were tasked to combine VR and AR to create projects to fulfill fake company projects (VR to make models & AR to create visual concepts). Then we set up stations like an art gallery to the group to share and enjoy each other’s creation.” 

- Jun Wei T

Outdoor Education

Surf Lifesaving Skills

This term, our Outdoor Education students are completing their Surf lifesaving skills program. They’re learning vital water safety, rescue, and first aid techniques while building confidence in the water. It’s a hands-on and exciting way to stay active and develop important life skills.

Upcoming Surf Camp

Our upcoming Wilsons Prom Surf Camp is a fantastic opportunity for students to enjoy the outdoors, try new activities, spend time with friends and create some great memories!

As we get closer to camp, we want to encourage everyone to keep working hard and making positive choices at school. We would love to see as many students as possible enjoy this experience, so it's important to remember that attending Surf Camp is dependent on students consistently meeting our school's behavioural expectations. Students who are having ongoing difficulties meeting these expectations may miss out on attending.

Our message to students is simple: give yourself the best chance to be part of this amazing experience! Come to class ready to learn, treat others with kindness and respect, listen to your teachers and make positive choices each day.

Parent Teacher Conversations

A huge thank you to all year 9 parents and carers who were able to make it to parent teacher conversations last term. If you were unable to make it, feel free to contact someone from the year 9 team asking for feedback.

Expectations 

As a cohort, we have been focusing on key expectations for our Year 9 students. The three main areas we are working on are: arriving to class on time, bringing all necessary equipment to class, and wearing the correct uniform.

Over this term, the year 9 students have been struggling to bring all necessary equipment to class. 

Just a reminder that students are expected to bring books, pens and a device to class.

If students are struggling to achieve this, you may receive a text message or call home to ask for support. Thankyou for your continued support of our year 9 students. We are proud of everything they have achieved so far this year and look forward to a strong finish!

Art News

Our Year 9 students have been showcasing their creativity and imagination through a diverse range of artworks. These photos celebrate the ideas, skills and techniques they have explored, highlighting their individual styles and artistic growth.

Contact Details

If you have any concerns regarding Year 9 students, please don’t hesitate to phone me on (03) 5165 0600 - option 3 or email at ryan.mayo@education.vic.gov.au

Ryan Mayo

Year 9 Team Leader