What’s on at Middle School
Week 5
- Tues 28 Feb – Senior Girls and Intermediate Boys GISSA Cricket Championships
- Thurs 2 Mar – Year 5 Parent Cuppa and Information Session
- Thurs 2 Mar – Deakin District Summer Carnival (Yr5&6)
- Thurs 2 Mar - Year 7 Parent/Guardian Afternoon
- Fri 3 Mar – GISSA Tennis Championships
- Fri 3 Mar – Rural 1 ends
Week 6
- Mon 6 Mar – Rural 2 commences
- Mon 6 Mar – SMA2 Mataram visit
- Mon 6 Mar – Yr8 cricket v Geelong College
- Mon 6 Mar – Instrumental Music Performance Night – Voice
- Wed 8 Mar – Year 5 Highton Geelong Gaol and National Wool Museum Excursion
- Wed 8 Mar – Instrumental Music Performance Night – Woodwind
- Fri 10 Mar – Highton Campus House Swimming Carnival
- Fri 10 Mar – Golf Vic School qualifying event for State Final
- Fri 10 Mar – Schools Mountain Bike event – Mt Buller resort
Student Leaders’ Induction and Service of Dedication
This afternoon, our Campus community gathered as a whole to present, induct and dedicate our 2023 Middle School – Highton Student Leaders. It was a beautiful event, where in addition to celebrating the specific students who will hold formal positions this year, we sang, prayed and reflected on leadership together. Our guest speaker, Mr Ben Peck, member of the Christian College Board, inspired our students, staff and visiting families with his take on servant leadership, while our new staff members were also welcomed and inducted into the Christian College teaching community.
Across our year levels, we have students holding roles of Project Care Representative, Mentor, Prefect, House Leader, School Captain and Vice Captain. All of these students have made a commitment to uphold our College values, and to strive to put the needs of others above their own. Their quality of character, creativity and vision for improving our campus holds us all in good stead as we continue through the year ahead.
It is with special excitement that I announce that our 2023 School Captains are Brianna Anderson and William Wray. They will be ably supported by our Vice Captains, Emily Goudge and Jack Rivas. I look forward to working with all of our leaders, indeed, all of our students, as we collectively build our campus community together this year, with spirit.
Adam Kennedy, Head of Campus
The Journey of Lent Begins…
This week has been one of great meaning in the Middle School community as we celebrate Shrove Tuesday and Ash Wednesday – the beginning of Lent.
With pancakes at the forefront of everyone’s mind, teachers and Year 9 students took part in Shrove Tuesday feasts, with Chaplains and prefects cooking up a storm. This time of eating together honoured the tradition of Shrove Tuesday and the way people would empty their cupboards of food and eat a communal feast in preparation for 40 days of fasting prior to Easter.
The Ash Wednesday morning devotional was a sacred time for MS staff, as we reflected on our need for Jesus, and God’s desire to connect with us.
As staff came up to be marked with ashes they received a blessing.
Staff were invited to take part in Lent, not necessarily through fasting, but through intentionally making choices to allow room in their lives for God to move. It is in the practice of going without, or adding on, that we can refocus our attention on Jesus, knowing that God desires to connect with us.
We invite you to take time in the next 40 days to do the same, by adding or subtracting something in your daily life choices. Maybe you buy someone a coffee, go for a walk, stop watching reality television or intentionally take time to pray each day. Whatever you choose, we can all make choices that will help us prepare for Easter as we contemplate Jesus’ death and resurrection.
Happy Lent! Let’s continue to journey through it together.
Rachel Morris
Joel Furneaux
Real Life Animated
This week our Year 9 Media Arts students attended an animation workshop at the Geelong Tech School. Students were introduced to 3D modelling software to create their own characters. Students focused their attention on details when modelling the face and body to capture likeness of specific people. Students then donned some special mo-cap suits using infrared technology to capture their movements around the space. These motions were then added to their character models to move around a scene they created for their specific character. This experience forms part of the different media skills students are learning to build up a portfolio of work to inform their independent projects later in the term.
Checkout some of their experiences and final animations!
Felicity Van Kan
NAPLAN 2023
The National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) for Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 students is fast approaching.
The tests will be run throughout a two week window from March the 15th to March 27th.
NAPLAN tests assess student knowledge and skills in writing, reading, conventions of language (spelling, grammar and punctuation) and numeracy. The results of the tests provide information for students, parents, teachers and principals and can be used to improve student achievement.
All students are expected to participate in the NAPLAN online tests. Catch up tests will be available for individual students who are absent on test days up to and including Monday 27th of March 2023.
Support will be arranged for students with disabilities if the student regularly uses similar support for classroom assessment tasks. Exemptions may be granted to students with significant intellectual disabilities and to students who have been learning English for less than one year. Our Learning Support Coordinators liaise with families of children who may be eligible for support due to disability or an exemption. Parental consent is required before any support due to disability or exemption is granted.
Students may be withdrawn from NAPLAN by their parent or carer. This is a matter for consideration by parents and carers in consultation with the principal. If, after consultation, you decide to withdraw your child, you must sign a Student Withdrawal form. These forms are available from the school by emailing h.wilkinson@ccg.vic.edu.au
Later in the year you will receive your child’s personal NAPLAN report, and more information will be provided about this process at a later date.
If you have any concerns, please don’t hesitate to contact either of our two Learning Support Coordinators or relevant Year Level Coordinators:
Learning Support Coordinator for Years 5-6 Kathrine Bowyer k.bowyer@ccg.vic.edu.au
Learning Support Coordinator for Years 7-9 Miriam Pohlenz m.pohlenz@ccg.vic.edu.au
Year 5 Coordinator Steph Hambrook s.hambrook@ccg.vic.edu.au
Year 7 Coordinator Andrew Ellery a.ellery@ccg.vic.edu.au
Year 9 Coordinator Nicole Riddle n.riddle@ccg.vic.edu.au
Symphonic Band Blast – The Senior Wind Symphony Puts on a Show!
The Year 5 and 7 students from Bellarine, Highton and Surf Coast Campuses all attended a concert and band instrument demonstration/trials this Wednesday. The Senior Wind Symphony performed for the students and also demonstrated their individual instruments. This ensemble is the most advanced of the five concert bands across the College, it is a 50-piece band with students coming from years 10-12 at the Senior Campus.
The concert was a great avenue for our senior students to inspire the younger students with their beautiful music and generous spirit. The band performed three works which is a great effort so early in the year! As conductors, Mr Rankin and I are very proud of the enthusiasm and energy and look forward to our rehearsals and performances throughout the year!
Bravo Senior Wind Symphony!
Fiona Gardner, Director of Teaching and Learning – Music
Teachers Growing and Learning
Earlier this week, Christian College teachers, Julie Shutie from Junior School-Belmont, Emma Workman and Nicola Morrish both from Senior School, commenced a year-long learning journey with the Victorian Academy of Teaching and Leadership as Teaching Excellence Programme participants.
The opening conference was held at the Melbourne Exhibition Centre with the opening address from Victorian Education Minister, Ms Natalie Hutchins. She celebrated the role and work of the teaching profession and the work we would undertake as participants in this prestigious program. She charged us with growing ourselves as learners to ensure we are providing the best possible learning outcomes for our students across the state.
We then heard from the CEO of the Academy, Dr Marcia Devlin OAM, who celebrated the teaching profession and this innovative teacher program where 500 leading teachers from across all three sectors (Independent, Catholic and Government) are working together to explore best practice in learning. She also celebrated the Master Teachers who will lead and guide the participants through the learning, with Christian College’s own Angela Tutty working as a Master Teacher for Humanities. Dr Devlin strongly emphasised that together, teachers can change the world.
Keynote speaker for the day was Professor Eric Mazur, Academic Dean for Applied Sciences at Harvard University, who challenged us to advance the quality of teaching through focusing on the quality of learning that takes place in our classrooms. He explored the human, social, cognitive and aspirational sides of learning and emphasised how the hard work of learning must be completed by the learner, with the teacher being more of a ‘guide on the side’. He challenged us to consider intrinsic and extrinsic desires of learners, inspiring us to continue to seek the inner spark of our learners and how this joy enhances their curiosity and improves student outcomes by building meaningful connections to their learning.
We leave this first stage of the Teaching Excellence Program feeling energised to embrace the program objectives and well placed to positively contribute to the teaching profession.
Nicola Morrish, Julie Shutie & Emma Workman
Device Program and Digital Wellbeing Parent Resources
Over the past two weeks, parents of our Year 4 students across the campuses have had the opportunity to attend an information session about the College’s 1:1 Device Program and Cyber Safe Schools Program. At Surf Coast and Bellarine Campuses, where students attend beyond Year 4, this invitation was extended to other families, especially new families to the College.
It is our desire to partner with parents in supporting students at all ages to develop positive digital behaviours and online safety, and these evenings provided information, guidance and support to parents – particularly parents of Year 4 students prior to the students having the opportunity to begin bringing their laptop home.
Though there was some emphasis on supporting parents in the Year 4 context, the information shared during these evenings is relevant and useful to all College families and parents. At each evening, a parent resource was made available to parents with a range of information about the device program, policy, eSafety parent guides and more.
I encourage all parents, regardless of the stage of their child’s learning journey, to explore the video recording of one of these evenings and the parent resource pack. Both of these are available via the links below.
- Video Recording of Device Program and Digital Wellbeing Parent Information Session
- Device Program Parent Resource Pack
During these evenings, the Qustodio parent app was explored as one tool available to College families as a support in the home. Families with students new to the College can expect information about how they can make use of this tool, if they wish, in the next couple of weeks.
Brendan Vanderkley, Director of Digital Learning
Lego Club
Dear Families of Christian College Senior, Middle and Junior Schools,
At Junior School we love our Lego, and we are reaching out to families to see if they can assist us in any way to build our resource.
Lego is used at Junior School for students to come together and build skills such as turn taking, sharing, listening, teamwork and collaborative problem solving. In the early 2000s, US paediatric neuropsychologist Daniel LeGoff (2004) published research that showed many children were more interested in interacting with each other if they were playing with Lego. Therefore, as Lego promotes social interaction it is also a part of the social groups that we provide for children where they can practise communication and social skills while having fun.
Whilst we do have a small collection of Lego, our levels of student engagement are meaning that we are seeking donations from any families that may be able to part with their much-loved Lego. If you have or know of anyone who may have Lego that is no longer used, or taking up space in a cupboard or storage space, and want to know that it will go somewhere where it is loved and looked after, I would ask that you contact junior@ccg.vic.edu.au to let us know. All donations will be gratefully accepted.
Thank you.
Ann-Marree Weigl, Head of Campus, Junior School-Belmont
Visit Back Creek Café!
Christian College’s Back Creek Café in Meredith is a vital part of our Year 9 residential farm experience. Located 15 minutes south of Back Creek Farm, the café is open six days a week (not Sundays) from 8:30am to 3pm. On weekdays during term time, working at the café is part of the schedule for the Year 9s’ Farm Program work groups. Students learn a whole range of hospitality-related skills as they assist with the day-to-day café operations.
If you’re passing through Meredith this weekend, or just fancy a 35-minute drive up the Midland Hwy from Geelong, make sure you drop in and say hi. While you’re there, enjoy the best coffee in town – or choose from a range of other beverages – indulge in an all-day breakfast or one of the other scrumptious light meal/snack options on the menu. There is also a variety of sweet or savoury treats to enjoy while you’re there and delicious home-made produce to purchase and take home.
You can also check out the latest from the café via its Facebook and Instagram pages.
Back Creek Café is located at 1/27 Staughton Street Meredith. For enquiries and bookings, call 5286 1166.