Year 11 and 12 Students explored the best art produced by graduating secondary and tertiary students today by visiting the Hatched National Graduate show at PICA and Year 12 Pulse Perspectives at the Art Gallery of Western Australia.
An annual barometer of what our youth are thinking and feeling, it is also a rich celebration of the role the arts play in the development of individual identities, it’s an intriguing snapshot of Australia’s next generation of contemporary artists.
Year 10 History students participated in the Charleston Dance lesson earlier in the term. Yr 10 History covers Australia from the end of WW up to the Civil Rights movement. It is important that students actively engage in Australian history and enjoyed learning a dance from the 1920s. It is always impressive to see how much effort out students put into activities and the joy they receive from engaging in these activities.
Leeanne Shanks
Teacher – Humanities and Social Sciences & Assistant Dean Alethea
Year 8 students went to Elizabeth Quays to explore the concept of liveability. The Geography department is passionate about allowing students to get real life experience about the world around them. It was interesting to note that our students were so well behaved a member of the public who is involved in the construction of the new apartments at Elizabeth Quays took the time to discuss with the students how the new buildings were constructed and the issues involved with digging into the river to create the underground parking and storage areas for each apartment. We were all slightly agog when we were told the penthouse has three floors, its own elevator and costs $12.5 million. Students were able to engage with the art created in the area and the water playground along with identifying all the strengths and weaknesses regarding the liveability of this new development.
Leeanne Shanks
Teacher – Humanities and Social Sciences and Assistant Dean Alethea
Students became a SSS parliament for a lesson this week. Students were given political parties and asked to represent their views regarding un fair bills that had been enacted into law in the past. Students presented themselves very well and worked hard to create an answer based on their parties position on the bill. It seems we have many future politicians in our mist – possibly even a future PM.
Leeanne Shanks
Teacher – Humanities and Social Sciences & Assistant Dean Alethea
Members of Humanities and Social Sciences recently attended an after school HASS Think Tank Meeting to improve the profile of the HASS subjects during a time where STEM subjects are the political focus. One particular strategy involved students being exposed to intellectual ideas through the use of Lego. The intellectual discussion that arouse from the student explaining why they had chosen and created their Lego pieces in relation to the question drove the intellectual discussion past the normal responses. This strategy also encouraged listening and communicating skills as students were directed to articulate their position through their Lego creation. It could also be a strategy used within the home for parents to sit down with their children and both create a piece of work based on a question or dilemma with the home which would allow both parents and children to understand the others viewpoint or get to know each other on a deeper level. One idea posed during the think tank was ‘how do you feel’. The other idea posed was ‘how do we represent HASS’ and this was then built on ‘ how do we represent HASS and continue to compete in a STEM based world’.
This non-threatening communication form was incredibly effective and it is hoped it can be introduced within appropriate HASS lessons.
Leeanne Shanks
Teacher – Humanities and Social Sciences & Assistant Dean Alethea
Students from A5 spent a lovely lunch in February with the clients from Rocky Bay. Students engaged with the clients by playing cricket, taking a lovely walk and even chasing them around the play area at Carine.
The students from A5 spent time cooking a barbecue lunch for the residents before everyone returned to school, happy and well fed. It was a pleasure to see our students participate in such a fantastic service learning endeavour and their care and concern was a credit to them.
Leeanne Shanks
Teacher – Humanities and Social Sciences & Assistant Dean Alethea
Continuing our exciting sporting news, Tegan Forrest Year 12 has achieved amazing results in karate recently, placing first for female juniors at the Australasian Schools Championships and third for female juniors at the Australian Open Championships. Crystal Edwards Year 10has taken away five medals from the Hancock Prospecting Australian Age Swimming Championships, achieving silver in the 50m and 100m Freestyle, bronze in the 200m Individual Medley and 100m Breaststroke and gold in the Mixed Medley relay team. Lastly, Glenda Morgan Year 12 is working hard at the Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra on a national training camp!
Dear Parents and Guardians
Welcome to Term 2. We would like to thank all our staff, students and community for their engagement and hard work in achieving the successes of Term 1. We look forward to further extending this work throughout Term 2 starting with our students resuming school on Tuesday 30 April.
As many visitors to the campus have noticed, our admin support officers/receptionists across the school have changed. We have sadly fare welled several staff and have welcomed new faces in the front offices of our ELC, Primary and Secondary school. We wish our exiting staff and our new staff every success for the future.
Term 2 is filled with many events including exams and NALPAN testing. We trust that our students will apply themselves and achieve results of which they can be proud. Please refer to the online calendar for details regarding various dates and activities.
http://calendar.ststephens.wa.edu.au/term.php
The School Education Act 1999 requires non-government schools in Western Australia to be registered. The Act makes various provisions for the regulation of schools’ operations and funding. In accordance with these standards St Stephen’s School regularly qualifies for a 5-year registration period. In June of this year the school will once again be going through the process of reregistration. One of the areas of importance is that of keeping children safe. Our school has adopted and will be using the Keeping Safe Child Protection Curriculum (Government of South Australia: Department of Education and Children’s Services) which covers two main themes: We all have a right to be safe, and We can help ourselves to be safe by talking to people we trust. The two themes are explored through four focus areas:
This child protection curriculum has both a broad and a narrow focus. While its specific aim is to help children and students from pre-school to senior secondary learn to recognise abuse and develop ways of protecting themselves from abuse, its wider focus covers rights, responsibilities, relationships and ethical behaviour. The curriculum’s effectiveness depends on the engagement of the whole school and community. This emphasis on keeping children safe together with codes of conduct for teachers, students and parents make up some of the documentation available for our community to operate well together and in appreciating our individual roles and responsibilities. Please keep an eye out for these documents and details regarding our behaviour and conduct towards our children and each other.
“We can do no great things, only small things with great love.” — Mother Teresa
“Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement.” — Helen Keller
We trust that you and your family will enjoy this term and that our students will realise and accomplish all their goals and dreams.
Regards
Dr Pretorius and Leadership Team
Ladies and Gentlemen, charge your engines!
The Year 9s were busy racing empty soft drink cans using static electricity this afternoon as they learnt about induced charges.
Ben Nicholson
Science Teacher
Many students say ‘I don’t have a good memory’ but there are many barriers to developing a good memory that are able to be overcome. Here are the top 3:
Henry Ford once famously said, “whether you believe you can, or you can’t, you are right”. This refers to your mindset or mental attitude, and the concept that your mind is powerful enough to enable your thoughts to create your reality. If you have a negative attitude to your memory, it will likely reduce your chance of developing and maintaining a good memory. There are some simple steps you can take to start making changes to negative thoughts. Be aware that negative thoughts are just a habit, and habits can be changed with a little effort. Awareness is the key to changing a habit, as you need to consciously be aware of the current habit before you can change it – so start catching yourself in the act of making negative statements. Affirm your intention to improve the way you think. Then correct the negative statement you just made, and make it into a more positive one.
The first stage of the memory process is encoding the information that is to be remembered – thus the brain uses the senses and emotions to process the information and form a memory. Here are some ways in which you can be less absentminded:
– Setting an intention to become more attentive.
– Sitting up front where there are less things to distract you, especially if you have difficulty paying attention in class.
-Taking notes in class to ensure you listen.
Stress will increase the likelihood of being distracted, resulting in low concentration meaning that information may not be encoded accurately – and thus cannot be later retrieved. Stress may also result in mental blanks. For example, if you’re stressed before an exam, you may not be able to think clearly and access and retrieve the information you need. The best thing to do is to take ten deep breaths and calm down to allow your mind to focus.
Learn more at the Brain and Memory unit of www.studyskillshandbook.com.au.
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Sarah Cooke
Careers Advisor