Head of Middle School
Term 2 is well and truly underway. We are almost a third of the way through already – quite unbelievable how fast the year is travelling.
Activities in Middle School
Term 2 continues to provide amazing opportunities for our students to learn through a variety of experiences and lessons. From sporting opportunities such as Cross Country and USL basketball, our students have already gotten their competitive edge sharpened. In week 5, we come together for the Secondary Athletics carnival – always a tightly contested event between Samuel and Joshua houses. I look forward to seeing the contest play out.
There are many curriculum experiences coming up this term for Middle School. Living History incursions for Years 7 and 8 will occur in weeks 6 and 7. Our year 9 Design students will be on excursion in week 4, and our Pavement Art competition happens later this term. Our year 9 students continue their Rite Journey this term with their Skills Days happen in week 6. Alongside this, our extra-curricular activities such as Cubing club, Zenith Club, Living History club (to name a few) continue to function with great experiences for all our students to enjoy.
ANZAC Day Commemorations
It was wonderful to see our years 5 – 12 students come together to commemorate ANZAC day for our college on 24th April. We were blessed with the involvement this year of the Jimboomba Cadets unit who provided the catafalque party for the ceremony, and participated in our drum march with Mr Nathanael Chapman, Mrs Alison Harbottle and secondary percussion students to commence the service. Our thanks also to the college wind ensemble and choirs for contributing to the service in very meaningful ways. It is important that we remember the sacrifice that was made for the freedom of generations to follow, and that we can teach our children to honour this selfless giving in your own day-to—day lives.
Exams and Assessment
Our Middle School Exam block is occurring in week 8 of term 2: Monday 3rd to 7th June. It is important that students are present during this week to complete assessment in a timely manner. The timetable for the week is slightly altered to accommodate the subjects requiring exams to be completed.
Throughout the course of this term, some subjects will have assignments for students to complete. Due dates, draft due dates and any relevant checkpoints can all be found on PAC under ‘Learning’. I would encourage you to sit with your child/ren and talk through the work that is due this term, helping them to stay on track for successful learning outcomes.
Online Presence
More and more, our world continues to move online. Our interactions with others happen in greater frequency online than in person, and it is important to help our students navigate this shift.
Many of our students have access to social media apps and programs and engage is a lot of conversation via those platforms. Unfortunately, many of those conversations are treated as a little ‘removed from reality’ and as a result often contain subject matter and phrases which as less than ideal as peers encourage one another to stretch the boundaries of what should be socially acceptable. I would encourage parents to be aware of your child’s social media engagements. Have meaningful conversations with them around who they are engaging with, what topics are discussed, and if they are prepared to show you some of the screenshots of those conversations.
Our college encourages high moral standards and decisions where possible with our students. I also know that our parents want to be part of our college because they share those same ideals and values. Many of the research articles in our time continue to warn against the overuse of social media for our younger generation, and the negative influence that it is having. Could I encourage all of us to be active in this space with our students? The real, personal relationships that we provide to our children will far surpass in importance the digital connections that they may currently be a part of.
I pray that God continues to strengthen our college community as we continue together and continues to bless the opportunities that our students have to learn.
Mr Colin Elvery
Head of Middle School
