Year 9 News

We are coming to the end of another busy term for Year 9 students. Students are currently in the process of completing their Common Assessment Tasks (CATs) and working hard to finish off the term on a positive note. With CAT and learning tasks results being published shortly and the release of the next round of Learning Behaviour Updates (LBUs) I’m looking forward to our students being rewarded for the work they have done and pushing themselves to continue to improve during feedback week.

Year 9 camp to Melbourne 

The Year 9 camp to Melbourne has come and gone. 50 of our year 9 students got the opportunity to participate in this amazing camp, full of new experiences and once-in-a-lifetime events. It was an enjoyable experience for everyone involved and can’t wait to build on this for next year. Beyond the fun of visiting lots of exciting locations and enjoying some peaceful downtime in the city, there was lots of growth and personal learning we saw from our students as well. As a group, we averaged in excess of 20,000 steps per day with most people’s total step count being well over 100,000 at the end of the 5-day experience. By the end of the 5 days, we had a very happy group of students with many great new memories, although maybe a little bit tired, and if they were anything like me would have definitely enjoyed a sleep-in on Saturday morning.

Lots of our students have talked positively about the experience and among the many experiences we got to enjoy I know there were lots of highlights. Some faced their fears when we visited the Eureka Skydeck and traveled almost 300m up to the viewing deck to enjoy the views of the Melbourne landscape from the viewing deck, with a few even braving the edge experience and getting to enjoy the views from a more unique perspective. Others enjoyed the peaceful stroll through the Melbourne Zoo getting to see their favourite animals and learn lots of new facts about creatures from around the world. 

Then there was the once-in-a-lifetime experience, where we got to enjoy the atmosphere of AAMI park while watching the Matilda’s play on the big screens. While Australia didn’t get the result we were hoping for, the moment when Sam Kerr kicked that goal for Australia was truly magical, and being there and experiencing the celebrations of 24,000 people at AAMI Park was definitely something that will stay with myself and many of those there, for the rest of their life. This night was followed up by visiting the hallowed turf of the MCG the following day and getting to not only walk on the field but have a look behind the scenes, this was another eye-opener for those who enjoy sports and music concerts alike. There were many more highlights across the week we spent in Melbourne, some of which will be explored below, and look forward to providing this experience to our students in the future.

A big thank you to the staff involved as well for giving up their time and being away from home to help support our students to have a really successful camp. 

Year 9 camp to Melbourne, a students perspective

Thank you Lily for providing us with a summary of the year 9 Melbourne camp experience.

On the 14th – 18th of August, 50 students from the Year 9 Churchill cohort took a train to the city of Melbourne, where we stayed in Miami Hotel. The objectives of the camp were to build healthy and active communities, learn new things, improve social skills, learn independence, and have new experiences. The camp was organised by Mr. Suter and others, and we had a lot of activities in store for us.

Although students were accompanied by several teachers in 2 groups, the Doxa Youth Foundation were conducting and leading all activities.

Most of the students were excited to get to Melbourne when we were on the train. We got on the train at approximately 7:55am and arrived in Melbourne at 11:30am. When we arrived, we dropped off our suitcases and any other luggage at the hotel, as we could not enter our rooms until 3pm. The Doxa staff gave us a quick briefing of what the rest of the day would look like and went over some quick rules. They then gave us our coloured groups, and we were also divided into two separate groups. In group 1, we quickly headed off to the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, also known as ACMI, where one of the workers gave us a quick run-through of what the experience would be like. We then split up into our own groups to explore the centre. Different things inside the ACMI were a games lab, a red room where you could control a character, stop-motion film areas, and many other things. 

Afterwards, we went to the old Melbourne Gaol where we explored the cells and learnt the gory, ghastly stories behind them. We were able to get lunch ourselves afterwards, before continuing our adventure and going to The Big Issue office, where we were able to learn more about homelessness and the cruel realities of the world. We also learnt more about future job choices. Afterwards, we walked around and looked at different varieties of street art, then went into Culture Kings along the way. We then went to The Crane to eat dinner, a Chinese restaurant which served us dumplings, beef, honey chicken, and other things. For our last adventure, we went to the riverfront where we were able to buy ourselves ice cream and explore around the shopping centre a little. When we were done, we all caught a tram back to the hotel, took our luggage up to our rooms, and got ready to go to sleep for the night.

We woke up at 7:00am on day 2 for a 7:30 – 8:30am breakfast. The Doxa staff supplied lunch for us, along with some other snacks. We left for the Queen Victoria Markets around 8:45am and were there for 30-ish minutes. We were low on time, as we had other places to be. We went to the Australian Music Vault, where we learnt about old Australian music and artists. We were then taken to a park to eat lunch, before returning to the Music Vault, where we were taken to the other side of the building and into a computer room. It looked fancy, and we were taught how to make music on the computer. We paired up into multiple groups, with 2 people in each group, and played around with the program. We shared our songs to the group when we were finished, and then we left. We then went and explored other things around the city, including going to visit the ArtVo 3D illusion gallery. 

We browsed around The District Docklands shopping centre when we had finished in ArtVo. We stayed browsing around the shopping centre until we had to go upstairs to eat dinner. We had dinner at Yassas, a Greek restaurant located in multiple areas of Melbourne. After dinner, we were given time to wander around the shopping centre a bit more before going to our evening activity, which was ice skating at O’Brien Icehouse. We were at the icehouse for a good 2-3 hours before returning to the hotel and going to sleep for the night.

We woke up at the same time as the previous day for breakfast at the same time as day 2. We left the hotel at the same time as the previous day as well and went back to The District Docklands shopping centre. Afterwards, we made our way to the Yarra River to go on an afternoon cruise, where the person leading the cruise made lots of jokes and was overall funny. The cruise went for 30 minutes or an hour, I honestly lost track of time. Afterwards, we went to the Eureka Skydeck, and stayed there until we had to have dinner. We went to Grill’d, a healthy burger place with heaps of stores around Melbourne. Our evening activity was supposed to be a movie, although it was changed last minute to watching the Matilda’s game, which we ended up staying there extremely late. When we went back to the hotel, we were told to go straight to sleep.

On day 4, we were allowed to wake up a little later than usual due to the previous night being so late out. After we had breakfast, we left to go for a tour of the MCG and National Sports Museum. The MCG was humungous, and it was exciting to be in the MCG. Most of our day afterwards was just a free day, we went to some more shopping centres, and the day was overall good. For our final dinner in Melbourne, we went to Blue Train and had pizza. Our evening activity was exploring the Southgate shopping centre, getting ice-cream, and just some other things. We got back to the hotel approximately 10:30pm and went straight to sleep.

The final day of camp was slightly rushed. After waking up and having breakfast, we went back to the Queen Victoria Markets to have more time than what we had. We were given about an hour to walk around and explore, to buy things and more. We then caught a train to another train station and spent about 15 minutes walking around the station before we had to go to our final train. We were on the train to Morwell for about 2-3 hours, and when we arrived back in Morwell, we were waiting for our parents to pick us up. That was the end of camp.

Morrisby testing

Over the last couple of weeks our Year 9 students have been completing the Morrisby online testing. This will help them to build an online profile and support them in exploring numerous job opportunities and career pathways. In Term 4, once students have completed their testing, they will have an interview with an external advisor to further build their profile and identify potential pathways moving into future careers. This is a great opportunity to help our students not only identify a possible career pathway but also explore alternate options that they may not have been previously considered or known about. As our students begin to move into a new stage of their education and start to make decisions around subject selection, which could include starting their VCE journey early by studying a unit 1 and unit 2 subject in their Year 10 year, they will be able to make an informed decision for their future.

Learning Behaviour Updates Reward Lunch

Recently we acknowledged our students who have achieved an LBU of above 3.5 with a certificate at assembly. We had many students across the year level achieve above a 3.5, or very close to, which is amazing to see. As well as being acknowledged at assembly and receiving a certificate to put in their professional portfolio; students who achieved a score above 3.5 also were rewarded with a hot chip lunch and a can of drink. The next round of LBU’s are due out shortly and I look forward to seeing the amazing effort our students have put in recently be acknowledged in those reports. 

Community Project

On Monday 21st, 12 year 9 students went to Lumen Christi Primary School to install garden beds. Finishing off a project in memory of Glen Stephenson, former Year 9 coordinator. They are to visit again on Monday 28th, to finalise and fill in the garden beds with soil ready for the Primary School to plant some plants of their choice in the upcoming spring. 

Art

Students have been working on a range of issues and themes affecting society, from discrimination to biohazards. Currently, students are working on a 3D city model that includes buildings from Chernobyl and the township of Pripyat, just north of Chernobyl. The class also discussed the ethics around experimentation with hazardous materials in populated areas. This artwork explores the effects of biohazard through human choice and will be displayed along with information students have collected on the event and its effects. 

Students have spent time measuring buildings to be in proportion and scale to one another. 

Concerns or queries

If you have any concerns or queries about any of the items mentioned above, Year 9 student matters, or just general inquiries, please do not hesitate to give the Year 9 team a call at (03) 5132 3700 or email Matthew.Suter@education.vic.gov.au

Matt Suter

Year 9 Team Leader