Student News

Year 7 Camp 

It has been an exciting and busy start to the year for our newest Wheelers Hill Secondary College students! On Wednesday 7th of February, the Year 7’s farewelled their parents as they headed off to Alexandra Adventure Resort for their first Wheelers Hill Secondary College camp.  

The students got to meet students from 

different home groups in their cabins and activity groups, where they had the opportunity to challenge themselves with a range of activities, such as an orienteering challenge, canoeing, low ropes, rock climbing, flying fox, and the popular gaga ball.  

Our trivia competition on Wednesday night was a highlight, where students showed their knowledge of movies, songs, and their teachers. Bonus rounds included a wall sit challenge and paper plane competition that had the whole year level cheering and laughing. Congratulations to the winning team, ‘Team 4 in the first place!  

After a busy day of physical activities on Thursday, students were able to catch a bit of much-needed downtime with a movie night. Students were also lucky enough to experience an interactive wildlife show on the last day of camp, where they had the opportunity to see and touch a range of Australia’s diverse fauna, including snakes, lizards, and birds.  

Thanks to Mr. Woods for his coordination of the camp, and to Mr. Max Ellis, Mr. Michael Mariani, Ms. Corina Toon, Ms. Melissa Mandarino, Mr. Pedro Mello, Mr. Nicholas Gramatakos, Ms. Fei Hu, and Ms. Asha Lal for attending and supporting the students throughout the camp! 

Here are some of the highlights of camp from our students: 

“My favourite part of the camp was the flying fox over the lake, it was a really fun experience. It was an awesome opportunity to make new friends. I felt a lot more comfortable on our first day back at school as I had already met most of my class and teachers.” – Skye M 

 “I loved the swimming pool and gaga ball. My favourite part was getting to know new people in my year level” – Leilea C 

“My favourite part was the swimming pool, canoeing and the flying fox. It’s a great camp and I think all future Year 7 students should definitely go!” – Alyssa D 

“My favourite part of camp was flying fox and archery. The camp food was great! They had a lot of activities that we could do on the side while we were waiting as well. The trivia night was really fun and I loved the bonus round of the wall sit competition.” – Jovi T  

“I loved hanging out with mates and new people. I really enjoyed canoeing and playing gaga ball. My favourite part of the camp was racing in the canoes.” – Tom M  

“My favourite part of the camp was canoeing. The highlight of camp for me was the high ropes course because some of the platforms were really shaky and challenging.” – 

Noah G 

Mr. Ryan Joyce,  

Year 7 Coordinator  

Year 12 Camp 

On Monday 7th February, Year 12 students boarded a bus headed to Grantville for a 3-day camp. The students enjoyed a range of camp activities including a giant swing, high ropes, canoeing, archery, initiatives, team building, and much more. Students stayed in cabins complete with ensuites!  

On the first night, students had a speaker talk to them about life choices and how spinal injuries can happen all too easily. On the second night, students had a speaker to educate them about drugs and alcohol and make a choice to not even try them once. Students also enjoyed a lovely campfire that night.  

Students also had the opportunity to learn from ‘Lucky’, a martial arts instructor, who taught students invaluable Tai Chi and mindfulness techniques to help calm the body and mind. After three eventful days, students headed back to school rather exhausted! 

Here are some of the highlights of the camp from our students: 

“Canoeing, raft building and campfire”. Mitchell Wills 

“My personal favourites were the giant swing and high ropes course that allowed us to work together as a team but also enjoy individually”. 

Maryam Asad 

“The giant swing, I think I stopped breathing for a solid 3 seconds. Also, walking around the place and interacting with all the horses and sheep”. Renae Volk 

“Most of the activities. But mainly just being able to go – as a last time experience. A last camp forever (in school)”. Khan Sek 

“Creating memories with friends and bonding with teachers”. Maddie Collins 

Ms. Michelle Galli 

Senior School Leader

Year 8 Monash Tech School SuperCities Program 

This term, students in Year 8 linked their

 learning in their Humanities classes and attended an excursion to the Monash Tech School to solve the question - “How might we shape our cities to be resilient to a changing environment?” 

Students focused on major city-shaping projects that are underway that will strategically impact the Monash Precinct. With the aim of strengthening our transport, health, energy and housing infrastructure, the Supercities program challenged students to engage with the city and its activity centers from an urban planning and engineering point-of-view. Students learned to design with a range of new technologies such as augmented Reality, Machine Learning and Robotics applying these technologies to the big question. 

Thank you to all the staff that worked with the students in their Humanities classes and accompanied the students to Monash Tech School. Well done to all the students for their hard work! 

Mr. Pedro Mello 

STEM Learning Specialist 

Judy Anderson - Assistant Principal’s Message 

I would like to extend a very warm welcome to all members of our community in 2022!  

I sincerely hope that the holidays were enjoyable and that they provided the opportunity for everyone to relax and spend time with family and friends. 

As means of introduction, my name is Judy Anderson and I oversee the Senior School at WHSC. I also oversee and lead a range of other areas within the college, including Grounds and Maintenance, OHS, Program for Students with a Disability (PSD), Middle Years Literacy and Numeracy Support (MYLNS), Tutor Learning Initiative (TLI), and Professional Learning Communities (PLC Program).  

The start of the school year has started off incredibly well, and as we welcome the class of 2022, I am hopeful that all members of our community appreciate the part that we all need to play to work towards our shared direction of ensuring a respectful, safe, engaging and connected learning community.  

Our senior school students are now ready to continue their high school journey, and it is important that from the outset, they are encouraged to establish sustainable routines around sleeping and eating habits, time management, homework, and are able to appropriately manage their competing demands outside of school. I encourage students to make every day count!  

Further to this, I encourage families to support their young people by speaking with them on a regular basis about their learning, which can initiate a broader dialogue to assist a greater understanding of where they are REALLY at.  Asking open-ended questions such as, what did you learn today? What was one thing you were most proud of achieving today? What type of feedback did you get about your learning? What was challenging today and how did you overcome this? The positive impact that family involvement has on children’s learning is significant. The partnership between home and school cannot be underestimated. 

As mentioned earlier, as part of my portfolio, I also oversee several DET-funded initiatives. These include the Tutor Learning Initiative (TLI) and also Middle Years Literacy and Numeracy Support (MYLNS).

The Tutor Learning Initiative which ran in 2021 will continue into 2022. Using a variety of data, students will once again be selected and invited to be part of the program.  This program will allow students to access targeted support. This support will be provided via a tiered approach either in regular classes or as part of a withdrawal model. 

The  Middle  Years Literacy and Numeracy  Support (MYLNS) will also continue in 2022  to support students who are at risk of not meeting the  National Minimum  Standards in Literacy and/or Numeracy. This program supports students across years 8 - 10. The college also offers a range of other programs to support all students on an ongoing basis and these include, but are not limited to, the Independent Reading Program, Common Factors Program, and Motivational Mondays for our year 12 students.   

SENIOR SCHOOL TEAM 2022 

The Senior School Team who is led by Michelle Galli are looking forward to working with students and their families this year.  

Date for your calendar: 

Monday 7th March 6.30 pm VCE and VCAL information night  

Judy Anderson 

Assistant Principal  

English and Literacy News 

Congratulations to the Class of 2021 

Although our 2021 Year 12s have moved out into the world, we would still like to take the time to congratulate them for their amazing English and EAL results and to acknowledge the incredible hard work and diligence they demonstrated throughout last year. 

As a College, we were thrilled with the growth in results and are so proud of our students’ work ethic and skills. The Class of 2021 were offered a range of supports and incentives and they embraced everything we provided.  

As the Literacy Learning Specialist, I would also like to thank the English and EAL teachers for going above and beyond to help our students reach their potential and strive towards their goals. We are looking forward to building on these successes and creating another impressive year of learning in Year 12 English and EAL. 

ACE English 

The Year 7 ACE English class has begun the year strongly with an impressive array of Comprehension Strategies to document their understanding of their chosen reading books. Miss Fei and 7 ACE have been finding engaging and stimulating ways to learn about the exciting world of English at Wheelers Hill Secondary College. 

Personalised Learning 

As you may be aware, the Year 7 and 8 English and Maths programs at Wheelers Hill Secondary College have been revamped and are now called Personalised Learning. This approach focuses on the skills required in the Victorian Curriculum and makes them explicit to the students, so they have more agency over their learning. The purpose is to ensure that students feel empowered to understand where they are currently sitting in their learning journey and how to continue improving and stretching their skills. This is made clear to students through developmental rubrics that articulate each step involved in building skills from Level 5 through to Level 10 and beyond. We are excited about the direction this will take the College as we progress to Personalised Learning in Years 9 and 10 next year and all other Domains follow the lead of English and Maths in Years 7 and 8 in 2023. Please have a conversation with your Year 7 or 8 students and ask them about how developmental rubrics are being used in their Maths and English classrooms! 

The Independent Reading Program 

We are very pleased with the beginning of the Independent Reading Program which now ranges from Year 7 to 9. Students have settled in well with their chosen books and are utilising their Reading Logs to record their comprehension. We have published the schedule to families on Compass to ensure that students remember which period they’ll be undertaking the Program. Thank you for your support of this important literacy initiative which has contributed to the growth in student learning outcomes over the last few years.  

Felicity Graham-Prowse 

Literacy Learning Specialist and English Domain Leader. 

Maths News

Nery Soto

Numeracy Learning Specialist 

Art News 

Art Club @ WHSC – starting Monday 21st March from 3-4 pm in A01

We are very excited to announce that WHSC is starting our very own student-run Art Club! If you are interested in Art and would like to explore your artistic abilities in a safe space, then why not try out Art Club! 

Art Club is run by students, for students and is designed to allow students time and space to explore, create and inspire through art. 

Sounds like something you might be interested in? All you need to do is fill in the form and come along to the first meeting. Art Club is not a compulsory weekly attendance but students are encouraged to attend as much as possible. 

The first meeting will start on Monday 21st March from 3-4 pm in A01. See the attached poster for more details. We hope to see you there!

Amazing 'Jackson Pollock' Art by Year 7D 

Recently, 7D completed this AMAZING Jackson Pollock “Blue Poles” inspired image in Art class. It was so good that the school hung it up in the foyer of the Front Office. Well done to all students who created this masterpiece! 

Performing Arts News 

Science News! 

Year 7E Bunsen Burner Class. 

Our Year 7 young scientists have been diving straight into learning all about the Bunsen burners and their operation safely. As a head start of their learning, they boiled the water on blue and orange colored flames to investigate the difference between the two flames. They recorded the temperature from time to time and inquired about the difference between the two flames. How fortunate are they to have such a wonderful facility to have learning on hand!

Students were asked the questions "How do they feel about Science?" Here is what they said: 

"I find Science fun and interesting, I like that we actually do physical stuff in science rather then just writing on paper. I like that Science in high school we actually do science rather than just play games like we did in primary school." 

"I love Science, especially doing experiments. I also have the opportunity to do it with my friends and peers and expand my knowledge in physics." 

"I enjoy doing Sceince because it is hands on and really fun. I like using the bunsen burner because it is fun lighting it and changing the flame colours."

"I enjoy doing science because the experiements are very fun. I like using the Bunson Burner and I'm excited to do more Science during the year. Science is fun!" 

Languages News 

Lantern Festival 

Tuesday 15 Feb is the traditional Lantern Festival.  Lantern Festival marks the end of the Lunar New Year celebration.  People in Asian countries celebrate this day by lighting up lanterns at night, eating “tangyuan” – sticky rice flour balls with usually sweet fillings such as red beans and sesame paste, which means reunions.  In the old days, some streets would hold a riddle guessing game and game activities on streets for the neighborhood to participate and have fun. 

Wheelers Hill Secondary College language faculty and international student program organized activities for students to take part in today.   

Firstly, students took part in a Kahoot game in Home Groups to test their knowledge about Lunar New Year; the winners were given a $5.00 canteen vulture.  At lunchtime, some traditional activities were held in Library, students guessed the riddles, did calligraphy, made lanterns, and participated in a chopsticks competition.  There were also some traditional costumes there for students and staff to dress up and take photos. 

Students and staff had lots of fun as shown in the photos below: