Our newsletter is brought to you by the Grade 6 Public Relations leaders: Bella, Jack, Charlie and a number of others for our Canberra Camp Report .

Important Reminders

Government high school acceptance forms are now overdue. Please return them as soon as possible.
Thank you for getting the sports uniforms washed and returned. The process will continue across multiple events in Term 3.
Student Led conferences Tuesday 10th September.

Upcoming Dates

Friday, September 13th - School Disco

Monday, September 16th - Inquiry Celebration Open Morning

Friday, September 20th - Last Day of Term (2.30 dismissal)

Monday, October 6th - First day of Term 3

Learning in Action

Students from our school have recently undertaken an education tour of the national capital. Students were given the opportunity to participate in a variety of educational programs with a focus on Australia’s history, culture, heritage, and democracy.

The Australian Government recognises the importance of all young Australians being able to visit the national capital as part of their Civics and Citizenship education. To assist families in meeting the cost of the excursion the Australian Government is contributing funding to our school in the amount of $30 per student under the Parliament & Civics Education Rebate program towards these costs. The rebate is paid directly to the school upon completion of the excursion. (Please note, at our school we already allocated the $30 rebate to the overall charge for camp).

Canberra Camp Report:

Australian Institute of Sport: Lachie C

We walked into the AIS with buzz and excitement in the air. We sat down and met the athletes. We met a long jump athlete! First, we saw the volleyball facility and we watched them practise for 10 minutes. There we saw all the serving machines that shoot out volleyballs at 90 kilometres per hour to the players.

Next, we walked into the basketball facility. We saw the players practising. We saw one of the local knox players whose name was Che Brogan. We learned that there was a chip in the basketball. It changes how the ball bounces and you can see how they shoot the basketball and how they dribble the basketball. There were cameras on the ring so they can see everything when they shoot.

Lastly, we went to the swimming pool. Unfortunately, there were no athletes training, but we did learn some interesting facts. We saw a room where you can go under the pool to watch them swim, but it was closed and only the coaches could go in. There were cameras at the bottom of the pool to watch the athletes train.

Australian War Memorial: Edward B

The Australian War Memorial was the best War Memorial I've ever gone to but

also the only one I've gone to! It was so interesting to see all the different wars that Australian soldiers have been in. We visited the unknown soldier section which you had to be very quiet in to show respect. We were lucky enough to be involved in the Last Post ceremony and we got on TV! My favourite place was the World War 2 section; it was really interesting.

Questacon: Indi R

At Canberra camp 2024 everyone was excited for Wednesday! Because we were heading to Questacon!!

Everyone was stoked with Questacon as it is one of the few interactive places in Canberra. Throughout all the galleries, there was a different theme to each room. Some of the rooms had Lego, there was an earthquake room where the whole room shakes, and the lights flicker, and it was so much fun! There was caged lightning every 15 minutes, plus there was a construction room which looks like builders had just made a mess everywhere!

Then came the slide. Everyone was so EXCITED because you get so much airtime. When you drop and fall down it feels like your stomach drops! At 4:00pm we headed to the shop and spent our parents' well earned $. This was the best time we had at the camp, well in my opinion, the best visit for the trip.

Night Activities: Ava P

Night one, everyone was a total wreck! After setting up our cabins, we all headed up to the dining hall, we put on a movie as well as having free time until we had to go to bed. The first night was easy going as we had a big day on the bus.

The second night was a lot crazier, we had trivia night. It was teams of 8, with 3 rounds led by Mrs Higgins and Mrs. Philipp. Everyone was yelling and cheering as their teammates got up to participate in just dances for extra points. The 3 rounds were: sport, music and movies, including an extra guess the celebrity round which we could do whenever we wanted throughout the night. The winning team got the prize of a mini lolly bag and a mini trophy.

The third night was by far the favourite of the crowd. The teachers surprised us with a fun night of “Minute to Win It”. The aim was not to come first but to win the challenge before the timer goes out to get a little lolly prize as well as 10 points for your team. The challenges were hilarious! It made us all look silly and have a laugh. Each round we had to nominate one person to do a challenge without knowing what it was, until everyone had a go.

The fourth and final night was a lot more calming, as we had to get good sleep, so we were alright for the bus and early morning. We could get changed into our pyjamas then head upstairs to lay down and watch a movie. We then got ready for bed by 9:15.

National Art Gallery of Australia & Canberra National Arboretum: Pippa L

For lunch, our groups stopped by at the National Arboretum.

We sat down on benches and began to eat. We saw a massive view of the arboretum and saw hills that most people wanted to roll down so badly. As we scanned the area, the top of the hill had letters planted on top that said, “Wide brown world” which was probably talking about the wide hills except they were green, not brown.

After we ate, we went for a bit of a hike. At first, Mr Mac and Mrs Harvey led us down the hills. We saw how steep the hills were and they looked like it would be pretty bad to roll down and you might end up with a pretty bad headache or injury rolling down those hills. They were like wavy bumps, going up and down.

We thought we had to go down the hills so we started running down, whenever you’d go down one of the bumps it felt like you were suddenly dropping. It felt pretty weird and it gave you a jump since it was pretty deep.

Once we got back to the top, (on the other side) we were given the opportunity to roll down the giant hill and the bottom was a giant pit. This hill, however, was much safer because it was a straight trip down to the pit with no bumps. When most people got up they felt like the whole world was spinning. Imagine spinning around in circles and you’ve got that dizzy feeling. Now imagine that it's ten times worse and it goes on for longer.

At the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra, the first thing that got our attention was probably the ice-cold small fountain with water calmly flowing on it. When we touched it, it was freezing.

A lady introduced us to the gallery, and we were asked to take a foldable chair along with us so we could sit down as the lady talked about the paintings. We first took an elevator to the next floor and hoped no one needed to use it at the time, because no one wants a whole bunch of kids coming out of the elevator at you, right?

The lady showed us a painting and said there was a story to it and asked us to find “five clues” or five odd things about the painting. We found three but the lady had to tell us the remaining two. She then told us that the painting had to do with a man who stole things from other people and he was hiding out in an icy area. She said that he was being hunted by the police.

Our final place we looked at was a weird sculpture that no one actually knows what it is. To most of us it looked like a crab, but from different sides, it looked completely different. Finally we got out of the Art gallery and took our bus to the next stop.

Food Review by Chef Adrian D

Night 1 we had pulled pork burgers, which were pretty good and for dessert we had disgusting vanilla jelly. Some people liked it but me, not so much thank you. Brekkie was scrambled eggs and soggy sausages.

The second night we had nachos. I was scared and haunted from the nachos we had at grade 4 camp! But they were okay! Happy days! Breakfast menu was consistent with the eggs and soggy sausage option. There was also toast, juice and cereal available.

Night 3 really lifted the game serving up hot dogs and ice cream - you beauty! Hands down best dinner. They mixed it up this morning with pancakes that unfortunately were a tad chewy, but I still ate them anyway.

Night 4 much to our surprise was a tuna bake, oh no. Lucky there was another option!

Overall, a 7 out of 10 for food quality, thanks Canberra.

The Royal Mint: Alicia T

When we got to the Royal Mint factory we were greeted by this lovely man who was giving us the tour that morning. He gave us a little talk about respecting the area before we headed up some stairs to go to our first place.

The first place was where we got to see all the different coins that they used back in the olden days. The man showed us all the coins like $1 & $2.

The second stop was where we saw how bronze coins could turn into bronze medals. There we got to see how all the coins were made. The man showed us the different robots that they used to make all the different coins.

We were finally done with all the learning part of the Mint factory

After all the learning that we did, we were finally allowed to go to the gift shop. They had awesome things like footy coins, mini piggy banks, and we got to customise our own coin.

The Museum of Democracy at Old Parliament House: Amy O

When we (bus 1) arrived at the Old Parliament House, they told us to put on gloves to stop our greasy fingers from touching anything. The employees showed us a different room with lots of artefacts behind glass. Then we had to do this activity where you run around the room and answer questions on a tablet on the history of Old Parliament House.

Next, we sat in the original House of Representatives, and they told us who sits where. The staff talked about all the different bits and bobs around the room. The speaker’s chair was a gift from England! It was also an exact copy of their chair. Some of the timbers were 600 years old so we couldn't sit in it. When Westminster burnt down, Australia made an exact copy to replace England’s.

We had great time and learned a lot. It was also exciting to be joined by a small school from Albany, WA.

Literacy

Preview for Learning:

Moving forward as part of our writing program we are planning, revising and producing an information report on our chosen inquiry work. The subjects the students could choose from are Women Suffrage, Federation, The Constitution, The Great War, World War 2, Indigenous History and The Great Depression.

Our reading program consists of work on compare/contrasting and Authors Purpose/ Attitudes towards Indigenous populations in Australia. We will also be looking at how propaganda has played a part in certain issues over Australian history.

Maths

Preview for Learning:

Our maths program will continue with work on decimals. Our students have their own personalised decimal maths goals they get time to work on each session and improve. Our applied unit is on mapping and grid coordinates. The students are learning about ordered pairs (coordinates) on the Cartesian plane. The students will learn about how to use cooridnates and plot them on a graph using the (x,y) axis. In the final phase students will complete is a drawing on a cartesian plane and a partner will follow the instructions and plot the coordinates accordingly.

Inquiry

The Grade 6 students are currently completing their inquiry projects on the history unit. The student are working in small groups and creating presentations on their chosen area. The topics the students can choose are Women Suffrage, Federation, The Constitution, The Great War, World War 2, Indigenous History and The Great Depression. From these they must choose a specific event from these topics. For eg. The Bombing of Darwin from World War II. These will be shown on the Open morning on Monday of week 10.

Wellbeing

The Grade 6 students have continued the wellbeing rotations each Thursday between Rock and Water and Respectful Relationships unit. The focus is on Personal Strengths, Problem Solving and Gender and Identity.

The selected group of students have continued their involvement in 'Girls Zone', which aims to achieve the following outcomes:

"This program is based on Friendship Saver, now called Social Stencil. Social Stencil is an evidence-based program for teachers and counsellors that offers young people practical social and communication skills to build peer relationship skills, and a culture of respect, understanding, care and collaboration. It helps young people to develop a shared language and shared concepts to support their friendships, manage conflict, and gain understanding of themselves and others. The program uses peer-to-peer learning, group work, games and supported discussions about our collective strengths and differences."

Sport

Grade 6 students completed their last day of Summer Round Robin today competing in Volleyball, Handball, Cricket, Softball and Tennis Hotshots.

Look forward to the next issue where we will have some student reports from day 2 of the round robin.

Next week (week 9) we have Division Athletics and state netball competing on Wednesday. Goodluck to all the students involved.

Parents Association