More Term Highlights
IPSHA Debating – Junior School
On the 9th of September Ms Dean took 2 debating teams to Sydney. We went to St Ives Grammar School in Sydney, where we debated against other schools from Sydney and the Central Coast. We were welcomed by the Principal and the person who organised the day.
Then we went to watch our first teams first debate about ‘that face to face learning is better than online learning.’ We were the affirmative team. This was a hard fought debate that we narrowly lost, receiving valuable feedback from the adjudicator.
Then we had morning tea, after that my team ( Team 2 ) had our debate, we lost. This was the same topic although we debated as the negative team.
Then we had lunch, after that we watched the 1st teams 2nd/last debate, ‘ All Year 5 & 6 should be forced to do Community Service’ as the negative team. Once that was over we had our 2nd/last debate of the same topic but changed to the affirmative side. We lost that debate aswell, but overall we had lots of fun.
Students should be proud of their preparations, participation and conduct representing our College. It was a valuable experience.
Annabel Lotz and Ms Dean
Tournament of Minds
This term, TRAC entered three teams in the Riverina division of Tournament of Minds (TOM), a problem-solving competition where teams of seven students responded to 1 of 4 challenges relating to Language and Literature, The Arts, STEM or Social Studies. Students had six weeks to prepare a response to their selected challenge and this involved training sessions at lunch time and after school. They also completed a spontaneous challenge on the day of the competition.
The students who participated in the competition were:
| Language and Literature (Secondary) | The Arts (Secondary) | Language and Literature (Primary) |
Karin Rezkalla Vinudi Rathnayaka Max Harris Hansa Rathnayake Quinntesaa Sankar Sofia Chacon Wafik Zaman | Caitlin Cumberlege Dylan Chacon Felicity Bacon Elizabeth Buckley Jaiden Cherian Lucy Hannaford Daniel Rezkalla | Talitha Nixon Eva Petts Mahdi Hussain Emily Taylor Hudson Roberts Raymond Gao Chenxi Zhu |
All teams conducted themselves admirably and received excellent feedback from the judges, particularly regarding their collaboration skills. The Arts (Secondary) team were awarded challenge winners and were invited to compete in the NSW Branch Finals in Sydney a fortnight later.
At the Branch Finals, students had three hours to design a response to an unseen challenge called “What’s Mime Got To Do With It?” It involved a protagonist and antagonist who lost their voices for at least 5 minutes of the 10-minute maximum performance, and a mystery object students needed to create from clay. TRAC’s response centred on the Gem of Persuasion and featured dance, song, and humour. In the spontaneous challenge, students had five minutes to discuss the creation of a new emergency service that would be accessed by calling Quadruple Zero (0000). TRAC designed ‘Vacant’, a mental health service that provides face to face and phone counselling. The team was awarded honours (second place) in their division which is an outstanding achievement in a highly competitive field.
We are incredibly proud of our students and the exemplary creativity, collaboration, and perseverance they demonstrated throughout the competition. Congratulations on a fantastic effort!
Special thanks to Mrs Diana Ganapathy, Ms Alana Poirier, Miss Belinda Siebert and Mr Samuel King for their facilitation and mentorship of the teams.
2022 Henty Field Day
Year 9 and 10 Students from TRAC were asked to model the Fashion on the Fields at Henty Field Day's. Year 9 student Mabel Meckiff, featured in the winning dress from the Henty Natural Fibre Fashion Awards .
