English 

Everyone has been very good in reading my thoughts all year, so I thought we might change it up a little bit for our final newsletter of the year and hear from some of our students! 

Recently at school we have started a new assessment type which aims to test the writing ability of our students. Following a NAPLAN style, students are given a set amount of time (around 50 minutes) to write a narrative or other text type. The students are then assessed on their spelling, grammar, ideas, text structure and more! 

It can be tricky to plot out a whole narrative when only given a short amount of time but our students have done a wonderful job in crafting short entertaining pieces! Please enjoy reading through some of these examples below, stemming from different writing prompts. 

Prompt: Write a narrative (story) about a curious potion.

Who creates the potion, and what are its unusual effects?

Who drinks the potion, and how does it change their life in unexpected ways?

How do the characters cope with the potion's effects, and what discoveries or challenges do they come across?

The Wizard

A 1000 years ago there was a wizard who wanted to be immortal. He kept making potions that had random effects. After 20 months he had the right ingredients! He brewed the potion and put it to his lips. He didn't know that right behind his back was a person who killed him and the glass broke. The liquid was absorbed by the carpet. 1000 years later Eric read this inside the history library.

Eric is a 16 year old person who wants to do historical things. After Eric read the book he went to his potion lab and started to brew. Every potion he failed! After 3 months of not succeeding he went back to the library. He found the book and found all ingredients except one because the page was ripped. Eric went home and asked his friend Harry,"Hey can you go to the potion ingredient shop and get 5 random ingredients?”

Eric waited till his friend got back and asked his friend Larry to start brewing. His other potions were not harmful but he put it to his lips and drank it. Eric moaned out,"Ooo it tastes like dog poop ooo." Then he fell onto the ground. 

He woke up with a huge amount of pain in the hospital. His relatives and friends were there looking at his face. Eric asked," what happened?" His friend, Larry replied ,"you drank a potion and fell to the ground."

All of the sudden he felt a lot better. He was feeling as good as having a trillion dollars. The next day he felt a huge amount of pain again. This kept happening for 18 months till they decided to go to the doctor. The doctor said he will die in one week! Eric would die on his 18th birthday. He was super sad and his relatives and friends were crying.

His dad read his potion book and found a cure for the fundamental pain. One of the ingredients were to take a relatives limb off. His dad chopped his limb of but re-grew it. He gave the potion to his son and his son still wanted to finish his quest. He made the potion but it only lasted 5 days. 

Samuel, Year Five

Charles' Morning Coffee

*Knock Knock* Someone was at the Royal Bedroom Door, "Come in!" King Charles III said cheerily.

It was the Royal Butler, Ted. Now, Ted wasn't your average run-of-the-mill, dopey, old butler, oh no, he was the fattest, biggest & meanest butler you have ever met. When Charles asked for his morning coffee, he would put arsenic in it, but just a little bit so King Charles didn't suspect a thing. However, Charles was smarter than that, he had a hunch there was something going on with his morning coffee.

Ted had Charles' morning coffee and placed it on his bedside table. "Good morning Ted" smiled Charles, "It would've been a good morning" He grunted, "If your face wasn't in it." "Right. Sorry." Sighed Charles. This was a typical morning now that his mother, Queen Elizabeth II had died, it was the same every day…

Ted traversed out of the room leaving Charles alone, again. He picked up his coffee, sniffed it and put it back down again. "I think he put something in my coffee again." He moaned, "I JUST WANT A NORMAL COFFEE!"

Once he was up and dressed, he took his drugged coffee with him to his mother's grave and sat down beside it. He poured the coffee on the flowers beside her grave then all of a sudden the top of the coffin began to move. "AHHGGGGGGG" He shrieked, "WHAT IS HAPPENING" The top of the coffin had now fully slid off and lying inside was his mother, Queen Elizabeth II. Except, something was a bit off, she didn't look like her usual self, she was quite frankly, green.

Elizabeth started to rise out of her coffin, "The coffee must have been a secret potion" Thought Charles, still frozen in fear "That turns people into ZOMBIES!". Elizabeth was now standing up and had started walking out of the graveyard. "Stop, stop, Mum STOP!" He screamed, but it was no use. Now curious to see where she was heading, he started following the zombified Queen Elizabeth. She was headed to Hyde Park where there would be lots of people.

A man rode past them on his bike and Elizabeth picked the bike and the screaming man up, popped them in her mouth and ate them in one bite. Charles was horrified.

As they reached Hyde Park, Charles noticed some Royal Guards running towards them. "Yes, please, over here, HELP!" The Guards drew their spears and circled Elizabeth, who was starting to get tired after her walk but also didn't look like she was going down without a fight. The Guards were now closing in on her and she was starting to get agitated. She tried to bite one of the spears but it cut through the back of her throat and she fainted. Swiftly the Guards picked her up and carried her back to her grave where she is believed to be to this day.

But I can tell you that she isn't always in her grave. That sneaky shadow you see as you put your bins out is not a bat, if you look closely, I'm sure you will see a little old lady zombie!

The End 

Fiona, Year Six 

Prompt: Oh no....some brand new neighbours have moved in. What a catastrophe! 

Write a short narrative that explores why this is a problem.

Are the new neighbours annoying? Scary? Are they normal people or something else? Monsters? Animals?

Write a short story explaining the problem with the new neighbours and then how this is solved. Be as creative as you would like!

The Bill

I was in the backyard playing soccer, when suddenly I heard a big noise so I went to see what it was. Oh no! It was our new neighbours. I was so worried. Then I saw my mum talking to the neighbours. She said,"Hi. I'm your next door neighbour! If you need anything just knock.'' I hate new neighbours. I think they are really scary….

The next day when I was walking to school I saw my friend Sam! We knew each other since childhood. I told him about what happened last night and he said,'' It is fine to have new neighbours. Once I had a neighbour who had a snake as a pet! Then I felt a little bit relieved! I said thank you to Sam.

After school when I got home. I went next door and took a deep breath. I knocked on their door. My heart was beating. They opened the door and they said hi! I said hi back. I also asked if they wanted to come to dinner tomorrow! They said sure! Then I went back to my house and told mum and mum said it was fine!

Tomorrow night.... 

They came and ate and we all chatted and the neighbours introduced their son, Tom and talked about him. A few hours later the neighbours went back to their home. But suddenly my family heard a thud. We all checked what happened. I saw Tom on the floor with blood on his chest! Then my family saw the rest of the neighbours! They were crying. We immediately called the ambulance. They came and took Tom. We also came! We all were worried including me! It was the first time I've been in a really bad situation! I was really scared.

The doctors came and said Tom was fine. The doctor also said that Tom needs rest and some medication that I'm going to give you! Then we all were relieved! But then I realised that We need to pay the bills! I also remember a long time ago, mum gave me a credit card with 50 000 dollars. But after that, mum and dad didn't have enough money so we all stayed at my aunty's! Then I told the neighbours that I'll pay. Everyone was stunned! The doctor said the bill is $50 000. I paid and we all went home!

The next day my dad told the police and took everyone to lunch! Suddenly my dad got a call that they found the attacker and put her in prison. I said to the neighbours please put Tom in my school. So the did! so Tom, Sam and I walked to school! The end!

Maya, Year Three

Uh Oh

My Mum and Dad went to greet them but I tried stopping them because the neighbours could either be evil or good. Instead, I said to look through the window but I think they realised what I was trying to do. I mean with my teeny tiny muscles I couldn't kind of make a barrier with my force/body. I had to let them through. 

They walked out of the house while I spied on them through the window. I was looking at their house but then I suddenly caught something at the edge of my eye. It was a mysterious book with a fluffy look of texture. From that time I was getting more and more suspicious.. could they secretly be mythical creatures?

After several minutes my parents finally came back. In my head, I was thinking, should I tell them about the book? I was going to leave that until later but then I had an idea. I could move into the room with the window so that every night I could spy on them. They said that I could but they made a good point; who was going to sleep in my room then? I thought about that for a little while, but I made my decision, I'm going to have both rooms. one for studying and one for sleeping or napping. Anyways, my parents agreed to my decision and so life was all back to normal except I was still worried about the neighbours.

The next morning I woke up with messy hair. I forgot about our neighbours so I only realised till school time I knew this day couldn't get any worse. But it did, first of all, I forgot to pack my water bottle so I had to drink from the taps, I tripped at snack time and now I have dried blood on my leg and now there was no way this day could get any, any, uh huh, I said it, it-could-not- get-any-better. 

When I came home I rushed to my new room and searched for our neighbours, I don't think they were home. But then, for no reason, my mum came into my room holding up a miniature refractor telescope roaring "WHAT IS THIS!" I was dead. I forgot to tell you but I stole a mini telescope from my grandma. Let's say long story short, I went to my nana's house yesterday and stole one of her miniature telescopes. 

I told my mum..."Mum, let's say that I went to Nana's house and searched for a telescope, at the square cube of my eye I saw a telescope so I took it and went home, but that was yesterday so we don't need to worry about that". I walked out of my room calmly and sat on the couch, turned on the TV and relaxed.

When I saw her exit my room I saw her place the telescope on the table on my desk so I sneaked into my room and spied on my neighbours then I saw them come in normally as humans but I saw them go in a machine and they magically transformed into a creature, they paused for a second so a took a photo of them and showed my dad, (because my mum is angry so I would not take the risk), he was surprised he showed my mum but my mum ignored me. Phew! She and my dad were traumatised, so they called the police and after several minutes they arrived. They put them in other cars and if I am right they let them in the wild woods. The End.

Andy, Year Four

How impressive are these stories!! 

We look forward to more great learning in English in 2024! Take Care!

Tim O'Mahoney

English Leader