This is the main page for the Blogging Superstars in Stage 3, Mount Annan Christian College. Our aim is to achieve our best and grow in the challenges we face!
The College Church Service will be on Saturday the 29th of August, starting at 5.30pm. Students can be in Mufti Clothes for the occasion. We encourage everyone to be there, but if you are absent, a note explaining your absence needs to be provided on Monday.
There will be a Sausage sizzle held afterwards and we look forward to catching up with lots of families for the evening.
Each year my family has the pleasure of being able to
host a Japanese student at our household. Each year we have a wonderful time. I
am Nikita, and this year I have a girl student named Eriko. My classmates Lily
and Jack are also hosting some students this year. Lily is hosting a girl named
Rio. Jack is hosting a boy named Shuhei.
When the students first arrived we were all very
excited. Everyone couldn’t wait to meet their student. When they first came out
of the bus, a lovely lady named Julie approached us and asked us for our last
name. We told her. Then out of the crowd she called out Eriko. We took her to
our car and hit the road.
She told us she has been looking forward to meeting us
and can’t wait to get to know us. We told her that we were looking forward to
meeting her too. She told us that she will share things about Japan to us while
we show her about Japan. She is a lovely girl. When we got home we had some
friends come over with their Japanese students. We all had a wonderful time and
I can’t wait for the rest of the week.
Jack took his student to Wollongong when he got home
and lily played some games (monopoly) at her house with hers.
Having the Japanese students is always great fun! Who
knows what might happen in the rest of the week! I would defiantly recommend it
to anyone.
Have you ever had someone from a foreign country stay
at your house? If you have, what did you do?
There are many aspects to the Dairy Industry. For dairy product to arrive on our tables, involves a lengthy process, starting with life on a dairy farm. The milk that a cow has produced must be carefully stored so that its quality is maintained and contaminant-free.
This week the students have been set a STEM-ed challenge of creating a package that can hold 500 ml of milk. They are to think as an engineer would to solve the problem of creating a waterproof container that can transport milk. The closest design to the 500 ml capacity will gain extra points. The students only have the following items to use for the challenge.
The students have had to draw their ideas first before constructing their designs, discussing the different options, as part of the challenge is that they will not receive any replacements if the items fail in some way. They will need to modify their design. Often projects in life will mean working with the resources that we have, rather than an unlimited budget.
The students will complete their designs and then will reflect on them as a group. They need to be able to explain how their design achieves the brief. The design that achieves the highest score will receive a prize.
It will be interesting to see the designs that the students come up with and to see how they go about solving the challenge. Stay tuned!
Last night, I went to showcase and it was fun. If you are wondering what showcase is well its mainly to show our singing, dancing and dramatic talents. We started off with a dance that was AMAZING! Then there was a few songs that were awesome and then stage 3 did a song called. HEROES
It was no ordinary performance. Let me just say for the record that there were a few glow sticks and glow paint involved It was awesome!
Not that I could see because I was performing. we did a few more songs and then it was intermission. when it was time to do the show again we started with some more awesome songs and then my favorite act besides HEROS was when the teachers started lip syncing.
Back in the room I was in it was a total dance party, one word to describe what was happening is CHAOS it was a mad house in there. Grace R, Rhiannon, Mackenzie and myself were dancing with eachother when Mrs Downs started to lip sinc. last night was so much fun and I can't wait until next year.
P.S.The year 5 girls were so AMAZING, AWESOME, FANTASTIC and MAGNIFICENT! I hope everyone agrees!
A hero could be defined as someone who overcomes great trial and tribulation in order to achieve his destiny. He is courageous and is the epitome of all that is good...
In English this week, we have exploring what makes a hero. We have been creating our own superhero's and then considered some of the reasons why they are used in stories. Superhero's help us to see some of the best qualities that exist in people and to help teach us that we can be better people.
An author named James Campbell has written a book called "The hero with a Thousand Faces". He analysed many different stories about heroes including superheroes, and found that there were similarities in the stories. The following video shows the outline of what has been called the "The Hero's Journey".
It explains that the Journey has twelve parts as shown by this diagram:
To help understand how this journey is represented in a story, we watched the movie "Big Hero Six". This is a story about a young boy who becomes the hero of the story. This comes about as a result of his brother's death. His brother was creating a robot, Baymax that would help people. The outcome is that Baymax helps Hero to not only learn to forgive but to realise his destiny.
It was encouraging to see Years 5 and 6 students start to apply the stages of the story to the Hero's Journey model. As we discussed the story, we also discovered that their was a back story of the villain or the antagonist. The students were able to give other examples of how in the hero's story that there is another story being told too.
At the end of the discussion, one student's comment was "that it was all really interesting!"
The next part of this will be to have the students map the story on a story map and then discuss what they felt the different phases of the story were.
Who is your favourite hero? What was his or her journey?
The opportunity to combine Art and Mathematics came about while looking at Two dimensional shapes. This aspect of mathematics lends itself to some creative exploration, through repeating shapes in many different ways to create patterns.
Two dimensional shapes can be reflected, rotated or translated so that a pattern is formed.
We created a grid consisting of 7cm squares. This took some time as we needed to be accurate so that the pattern would be effective. We then created a 7cm square grid. Shapes were drawn on two of the sides and then cut out. They were joined back to the grid. This formed our tesselating shapes.
The shapes were then traced around on the grid. The shape was translated or moved forward to the next square and then traced around again. This was repeated until all of the grid was filled.
The students then used coloured markers or pencils to colour their tesselations in. The activity took a little longer than expected but the results have been worth it.
The students have been able to see how a square can be turned into a tesselating shape. They also had the opportunity to know how to translate a shape in a hands on way.
What do you know about tesselating shapes? Do you know of an artist that uses tessellations in their artwork?
Learning Grammar and Punctuation is generally regarded as being somewhat of a boring task, but in Stage 3 we think we have overcome that issue by practicing "Kung Fu Punctuation". Please watch our video for a demonstration.
Thank you to all of our students who showed their fantastic skills, with such wonderful enthusiasm.
Included below is the power point of "Kung Fu Punctuation", so if you wish to practice at home and show your Kung Fu Punctuation moves then its available!
What is the best thing about Kung Fu Punctuation? Are there any other Punctuation moves we could add?
The next part of our Picasso Cow Project is designing how our cow is going to look. It needs to reflect the research and discussions that have been occurring through the previous weeks about the Dairy Industry.
Picasso Cow Project - Created with Haiku Deck, presentation software that inspires
The students showed enthusiasm and came up with a lot of great ideas. They discussed and drew how milk moves from the paddock to the being on the supermarket shelf. A great idea was to create a milk powered Backpack...powered by Calcium. Another idea was a Milky way filled with Dairy products. It will be very hard to choose a design.
A key part of the project is to keep a journal of all that we are learning and doing about the dairy industry and our Picasso Cow project. We have a special blog that has been set up so that we can keep track of the great work that our students are doing. Please take time to visit and feel free to leave a comment on the blog. Please click the photo below to visit our Picasso Cow Project learning Journal.
A leader is someone who knows how to listen and serve those around them. Jesus Christ demonstrated this when he washed the feet of the disciples. Leadership and public speaking are skills that we can all acquire.
Last term, we focused on what makes a confident public speaker. When we are confident with our voice and make eye contact, then we know we are engaging our audience. These are skills that were developed last term, but came to the fore for one of our students.
Each year, Camden Council offers Year 6 students from around the area the opportunity to give their thoughts about why they would like to be "Mayor for the Day", The areas that they were being judged on were not just their presentation skills, but also their knowledge of local government and the issues that they face. Only one student is able to represent their school to speak and must be nominated by their principal or teacher.
Nikita Elliot was given this daunting task to represent our school and give her thoughts about why she should be chosen to be Mayor for the day. Nikita spoke about how each one of us can be make a difference, no matter how young or old they are. She also said that to be a good leader, is to be a good listener as well.
She was one of twelve students from many different schools who spoke. There were many different topics from environmental issues to raising awareness about bullying. Every student spoke with confidence and were to be commended for the thought that they gave about the topic. The Winner was a student from Cobbitty Public School and the Runner up was from Macarthur Anglican College.
Thank you Nikita for the way that you represented our school. It is true that we can all make a difference!
