I would like to thank all Language teachers for their amazing effort this year. Thank you for covering during my extended absence in Term 1, for organising additional opportunities for students to participate and compete in and going far beyond what can be expected. Thank you also to our Language assistants for supporting our Year 12 students throughout this challenging year.

And thank you to all parents for supporting their child's Language learning, not only during the remote learning period.

I wish the McKinnon community a well deserved break and enjoy the festive season!

Andrea Fowler

Head of Languages

DEUTSCH LESEN - READING GERMAN

This website for young readers or beginners of learning German provides new stories weekly.

It is available without registration, also as an App for tablets and smartphones.

AGTV SCHREIBWETTBEWERB - AGTV WRITING COMPETITION

Late this year, students were encouraged to participate in this year’s AGTV Writing Competition with the topic: Zukunftsträume - nah oder fern (future dreams - close or far away).

Well done to the Year 7 finalists Thea Dodos (7C), Christina Tan (7I) Ava Muelu (7A), Charlie Redman and Leonardo Goldberg for being recognized as State Finalists. Students created an ´Elfchen´- a German poem of eleven words - experimenting with words to the set topic. Special congratulations to Charlie Redman who received an Honourable Mention in this competition.

Charlie Redman, Year 7, ein Gedicht (Elfchen)

Zukunftsträume

Utopie

Frieden, Wohlstand

Vorurteile, Gewalt loswerden

Ressourcen, Reichtum weit verbreitet

Vereint

Utopia

Peace, prosperity

Get rid of prejudice, violence

Ressources, wealth wide spread

United

Sophia Diegelmann in Year 11 wrote a poem with the title ‘Meine Träume´ - my dreams, that reflected our current time. She also received an Honourable Mention in this competition.

EDUCATION PERFECT - LANGUAGES VIDEO-MAKING COMPETITION

In October the New Zealand company Education Perfect ran a video-making competition for Languages students for the first time. The set theme, which could be interpreted quite broadly by students, was "My Life", and had to be made in the language being learned by the students.

At McKinnon SC the Year 10 students of German planned and produced films a few minutes in length. We are excited to announce that two of the films that students submitted have been recognised with certificates of excellence by Education Perfect. Persephone Gardiner produced her film as a solo effort, utilising animated illustrations. The group of students consisting of Kyrin Shizas, Ethan Stefanou, Peter Menko, Leo Lee and Leo Gering produced a film contrasting the life of someone in West Germany with the life of someone in a Stasi detention camp in the former East Germany. They will receive their certificates in 2021.

Well done to all the students for their creative film-making efforts in a language other than English!

David Nutting

German Teacher

NAIDOC WEEK - POSTER COMPETITION

During NAIDOC WEEK this year, from Sunday 8 November to Sunday 15 November, students were encouraged to research indigenous languages and to create a poster with words and images. With the help of the 50 Words Project website by Melbourne University, students created their posters for this competition.

Congratulations to our top three prize winners for 2020: Tanvi Patil (7J), Emily Liu (7J) and Maddie Stancheva (7J)

Andrea Fowler

Head of Languages

MY INTERVIEW WITH SBS FRENCH RADIO

On Wednesday 25 November, I was interviewed by SBS French radio to discuss the National Young Hope French Teacher Award of Excellence I received.

For seven minutes, I spoke with Christopher Mallet in French about the challenges and the rewards of being a French teacher in Australia.

You can listen to the interview here: https://www.sbs.com.au/language/french/audio/histoires-de-profs-cedric-chamontin

For those who do not speak French, you can find the translation here:

Cedric Chamontin

French Teacher

YEAR 9 GERMAN

WERBESPOT COMPETITION

“Kommen Sie nach Österreich!” – Come to Austria! That was a successful call for a group of four students from Year 9 German, whose 60-second promotional video (Werbespot) won First Prize in this year’s competition run by the Association of German Teachers of Victoria (AGTV).

For several years now the Association has run this competition for school learners of German in Victoria, with entries coming in from around the state. In 2019 a McKinnon group won Second Prize. This year the set theme was “Deutsch schmeckt”, where students had to promote a food or foods from German-speaking countries in an ad lasting 60 seconds. 2020 brought with it naturally the added challenge of filming during lockdown in Melbourne, so the students had to ensure that their individual contributions of scenes blended neatly into each other to make a coherent advertisement in spoken German.

The Werbespots are assessed by the AGTV according to set criteria and according to the age-group. The Languages faculty and the students were excited to learn recently that two of the four ads submitted to the competition won First and Second Prizes for their category, the first time that this has occurred for McKinnon SC.

Josie Giantsos, Kayce Tyzack, Hadyn Collier and Yael Greenberg promoted the Austrian delicacy Vanillekipferl in their First Prize winning ad, and Meenakshi Abhilash Nath, Betty Zhang, Ariel Golembo and Keya Desai won Second Prize with their ad demonstrating the baking of Bienenstich.

Congratulations to all students in the Year 9 German classes on their efforts in filming their various ads!

David Nutting

German Teacher

INTERNSHIP REFLECTION

After scoring over 30,000 points in this year's 2020 Language Perfect Championships, I got emailed regarding the opportunity to apply for a student internship at the Education Perfect headquarters.

The offer featured many things that enticed me; for example, the fact that it was an all-expenses-included trip worth $5000; or how it was an opportunity to travel to the EP headquarters in Dunedin to meet the team that keeps the platform running. I opened the application and was immediately greeted by a question asking me to write a short story representing my personality. Then followed by even stranger questions to answer such as, "Which famous person would you want to have dinner with?" and, "What three dishes would you give to an alien race to represent human cuisine?". After over 3,000 words and a paragraph on why crème brûlée is the superior dessert, I submitted my application and thought nothing of it.

A few weeks later, my French teacher informed me that I got shortlisted for an interview due to my essay allegedly blowing away EP staff. I was both happy and nervous at the same time. When the date of my interview finally came, I was practising some typical interview questions to myself to ease the anxiety. I joined hesitantly and put on my best smile. However, to my surprise, the interview was exceedingly enjoyable as I got along well with the EP staff on the call. I used this opportunity to find out more about the company and ask about their motivations to work at such a welcoming and fun workplace.

Awaiting the results, I know that whomever is accepted will be exceptionally fortunate and content to have this chance.

Luka Magee

Year 9 Student

DATES TO REMEMBER

DECEMBER

JANUARY

FEBRUARY