McKinnonNEWS

HEALTH

FAMILY PLANNING VICTORIA

Every year, Family Planning Victoria come to visit our school to speak to our students about respect for self and others and the changes their bodies are going through or will soon experience.

 

This week, as always, we found their visit to be very valuable, interesting and relevant to our students.

 

We discussed some of the physical, emotional and social changes that adolescents will go through. We chose to separate the male and female students and to present this information in smaller groups as it provides a safe and comfortable environment.

 

We believe it is very paramount to include the topic of respect for self and others and for our male students, in particular to recognise the importance of respect for women. 

 

We were very impressed with the maturity of our students and the sophistication of the questions that they asked the presenters.

 

Here are a few comments our students made about the talk:

 

“It was very helpful and informed me about aspects I had not heard about before”.

 

“Being in a single gender group, gave me the confidence to ask questions as I felt comfortable”.

 

“I learnt a lot, especially about respectful relationships”.

 

The talk helped to inform me about puberty and relationship changes before they have occurred to me”.

 

“Although I had heard some of this information before, it reinforced that what is happening to me, is normal".

 

Susan Wilken

Health Learning Area Manager

FOOD TECHNOLOGY

All of our Year 7 students have now completed a semester of Food Technology. It is very interesting to see the progress they make in their skill development with cooking techniques and their organisation. Their ability to overcome challenges when working independently and as a member of a team in the kitchen, often increases significantly for some of our students. These skills are vital across all subject areas and also for their social and emotional development.

 

Every picture tells a story and as you can see, they have had fun in the kitchen for the last practical class of the year. We made Gingerbread!  Although gingerbread became associated with Christmas tradition in 16th century Germany, it dates back to ancient Greece and Egypt.

We decided to make it a ‘holiday’ tradition’ at McKinnon and our students enjoyed the baking, decorating and the eating experience.

 

I would like to acknowledge our team Ms Evans, Ms Robinson and Ms Stott who are our wonderful and helpful Food Technology Assistants and our teaching staff, Ms Gamble, Mr Lynch, Ms Moloney and Ms Zikou, who by the way, are also awesome!

 

I have shared the recipe with you if you would like to have some fun in the kitchen too!

 

We wish you all the best for the holiday season.

GINGERBREAD

INGREDIENTS

  • 60 grams butter 
  • 1 tablespoon golden syrup 
  • 1/3 cup brown sugar 
  • 1 egg 
  • 1 ¼ cups self- raising flour
  • Pinch of salt 
  • 1 teaspoon ground ginger 

METHOD

  1. Collect all ingredients
  2. Heat oven to 160c 
  3. Melt the butter and golden syrup in a medium saucepan and add the brown sugar. 
  4. Stir until sugar has dissolved.
  5. Allow to cool for several minutes.
  6. Beat egg in a small bowl.
  7. When butter mix has cooled add beaten egg. (Do not add if mix is hot as egg will curdle).
  8. Mix well.
  9. Sift flour, salt and ginger into a large bowl.
  10. Add combined wet ingredients to the large bowl and mix well to form dough. 
  11. Knead dough lightly until smooth (approximately 10 times only) on a lightly floured bench.
  12. Place the dough between 2 pieces of baking paper and roll out to 1 cm thick.
  13. Cut with gingerbread/cookie shape cutters.
  14. Decorate with M&M’s, smarties, choc chips etc if desired.
  15. Transfer very carefully to a lined baking tray.
  16. Bake for 10-12 minutes, or until golden brown.
  17. Remove from oven and cool for 2-3 minutes on the oven tray on a cooling rack.
  18. Transfer gingerbread from tray to cooling rack.

Susan Wilken

Health Learning Area Manager