8 September 2016

Newsletter Articles

YEAR 9 SKI TRIP

On the 13th of August around 8:30pm I arrived at Gladstone High to meet all the other Year 9 Gladstone students that were also going on ski trip. After the bus was packed and many photos were taken it was time for us to say goodbye to our parents and siblings for 6 days. On the bus everyone seemed quite excited and anxious to arrive at Falls Creek and begin skiing, but after about 2 hours I think everyone was over the bus trip. After a tedious 16 hour bus trip we finally arrived at the accommodation to unload the bus.

After everyone had lugged their suitcases and sleeping bags into the kitchen building we all hopped back onto the bus to drive to Ski Plus to hire our ski equipment for the week. After everyone had checked that their ski boots, jacket and helmet fitted we all once again piled into the bus to drive to the local shopping centre. Once there everyone formed groups and headed off to buy supplies (lollies and soft drinks) for our cabins and a light lunch. After about an hour and a half of shopping we all hopped back on the bus to go back to the accommodation which was only a 5 minute drive. Once at the accommodation we all collected our luggage and headed to our cabins to unpack the food and get our ski clothes ready for tomorrow. My cabin was the smallest of the boy’s cabin with only three Joel A P, Max Smith and myself. After about 2 hours at the accommodation we hopped on the bus and headed out to tea at a place called Flour + Water.

Day 1 of skiing (Monday)

Everyone was quite excited but also tired as we drove up the hill after a 5:30am start. The bus trip was quite boring and sickening so Mr Friedrichs and I decided to have a sing along. The first song on agenda was “All of Me” by John Legend which everyone enjoyed. Once at Falls Creek everyone had to put their ski boots on which was probably harder than skiing itself. Once everyone actually had their ski boots, helmet, and googles on and skis/poles in hand we all walked to the bottom of the main chair lift. Since none of the students had ever put skis on we had to hold the skis and ski poles in our arms on the chair lift which I found out is much more difficult than having them on your feet. When we reached the top of the mountain we split into four groups with an instructor. My instructor was a great lad called Neil; the first thing he made us do was put one ski on then slide around in a circle. Then we switched the foot that had the ski on and did the same which as you can imagine is quite thrilling. The first slope Neil took us on was the learning slope called ‘Mouse Trap’ where we learnt the basic skills like how to slow down, turn and stop. Then Neil took us down the next two easiest slopes which are Wombats Ramble and Drovers Dream. After the lesson we all met in the restaurant up the top of the mountain called Cloud Nine. Then Mr Humphries took my group down The Village Route and Drovers Dream a few times. For the rest of the day Hamish Klemm, Joel A P and I skied as a group down Wombats Ramble going through some of the many shortcuts and Drovers Dream a few times.

Day 2 of skiing (Tuesday)

The day started same as the day before until we got to our instructor Neil who said we were going to be going down a new slope called NASCAR Racetrack which was a short and slim track with multiple jumps, berms and a quite steep ending. After the meeting in Cloud Nine a group of us went with Mr Humphries to go down a few new harder slopes, Highway 83 and Main Street which are both blue slopes. After going down both of them twice with Mr Humphries we were able to go down both of them without a teacher in groups of three to six. For the rest of the day I skied with Joel A P, Cooper H, Henry W and Joel Z down Wombats, Hi Way 83, Main Street and the Village run.

Day 3 of skiing (Wednesday)

The day started with an early morning breakfast again followed by a 40 minute bus drive up the windy road. Once at the base of Mt Beauty everyone piled out the bus to gather their equipment and put on their ski boots which was much harder today because it was the coldest it had been, 1 to -3 degrees. Once up the mountain with our instructor we were deciding what slopes to go on, many slopes were closed due to the horrible weather (rain/wind/fog). We decided to go down Wombat, Hi Way 83 and Main Street. After making our groups in Cloud Nine Hamish K, Henry W, Joel Z, Joel A P, Mr Smith and myself decided to go down the Last Hoot with Hamish K leading as he was the only one who had done it with Mr Humphries. For the rest of the day Joel A P Hamish K and I went down all the slopes we had previously done.

Day 4 of skiing (Thursday)

The final day of skiing was a bit different because we had to move out of our cabin before we headed up the mountain. For our final lesson we had a different instructor because Neil had a day off. She decided to take us down a new slope which she thought we had previously completed but we hadn’t. Half way down the new slope we all stopped and she asked again if we had been down it and when we said we hadn’t she decided to take us off the cliff which at the bottom connected to a black slope called Dark Side to Lake Poma. After the lesson and the meeting in Cloud Nine Joel A P, Hamish K, Sophie C, Mr Smith and I headed to the Ruined Castle. The Ruined Castle was the steepest slope any of the students had skied down on this camp. None of us fell over the first time but on the second run Hamish K had a beautiful stack which ended up with both his skis about 20 meters away from where he stopped. That was the slope that my group stayed on for the rest of the day until the final run down Wombats which most of us skied down as a school.

Bus ride home (Thursday-Friday)

After everyone had showered and got changed at the cabins we headed off home. After only two hours of driving we had our first stop at Macca’s for some tea/breakfast. The rest of the ride was very boring as everyone but I was asleep until we had our second stop at Macca’s. When we finally arrived at Jamestown all the Jamestown children hopped off then we carried on to Gladstone. Once there all the children found the parents and went home to sleep.

By Adam Jackson

YEAR 10 ENGLISH EXCURSION

This term, the Year 10 English class have been working on creating a children's story book. The work they have done has been outstanding, so to celebrate their books, we decided to share them with some primary school children. On Wednesday 24 August we went to Laura Primary School and spent some time with Mrs Moore’s Reception/Year 1 class. The primary school students were very excited to have us visit and they made a special book to share with us. We then split off into small groups and spent some time sharing our story books and then creating some interesting and funny stories together. It was a very fun day. Thank you to Mr Martin for driving the bus and Michelle for coming with us.

Mrs Cameron English Teacher

SWAT REPORT

On Friday 26th of August, the Student Wellbeing Action Team (SWAT) coordinated a fundraiser to support the Fight Cancer Foundation through a Footy Colours Day. Students were able to wear their team’s colours whether it was football, soccer, basketball, hockey or netball. The Southern Flinders and BSR Tigers as well as the Crystal Brook colours were featured highly amongst the students. Additionally, several AFL and NBA guernsey and jerseys were also featured. A variety of cupcakes were also sold by our SWAT team members throughout recess and lunch. The school was able to raise and donate $190 to the Fight Cancer Foundation which supports young Australians with cancer and their families. Finally, a big thank you to those families that donated cupcakes or cupcake mixture.

Emma Kerr, SWAT Teacher

CANTEEN CATERING FUNDRAISER

The Gladstone High School Canteen Committee would like to thank all the wonderful people who donated food/money or helped with the Canteen Catering Fundraiser on Friday 26th August. We catered for a morning tea and lunch for 60 people at the Stadium.

Fundraising for the Canteen is important for its long term viability. We appreciate your support.

Janet Evans, Lyn Russell, Cathy Combe, Julia Wardrop, Sonya Wilsdon, Joslyn Thomas, Catherine Klingner, Katherine Hansen, Kylie Sawley, Leanne Klemm, Robyn Kelly, Karyn Durrant & Bev Hennessy

Sonya Wilsdon - Canteen Committee

YEAR 8/9 KNOCKOUT NETBALL

On the 29th August a team of Year 8/9 girls attended a Knockout Netball competition in Adelaide. We played a number of games which we won that led us to play in the Grand Final, which we unfortunately lost. Our team consisted of Hannah Watson, Maggie Gambling, Tahlia Chapman, Chelsea Chapman, Lucy Wilsdon, Emily Ashby, Chloe Jackson, Sophie Crouch and Taylor Robson. Overall the day was great and a good experience. Thank you to Mr Frederich for coaching, Miss Thamm for organizing the day, also Toni Ashby and Vanessa Watson for driving us and umpiring.

Hannah, Tahlia and Maggie

Year 8/9 Knockout Netball team

COWS CREATE CAREERS

The Year 9 Home Ec. students have been busy this term taking part in Cows Create Careers – an innovative program that has been designed to introduce secondary school students to Australia’s dairy manufacturing industry. As part of this program students have designed their own recipes to showcase dairy ingredients. These recipes were trialled, fine-tuned and prepared for assessment. Our students produced a wide range of recipes including 5 Star Cheese Pizza, Panna Cottas, Haloumi Stacks, Soufflés and many more flavoursome dishes. Both Mrs Elmer and I were excited and proud of the recipes designed.

The second part of this project involved designing a milk carton to educate the public in 1 of 5 areas related to the dairy industry – dairy nutrition, dairy processing, international dairy market, domestic dairy market and dairy technology/innovation. To assist with this process, students visited Golden North Ice-Cream manufacturers in Laura. Operations manager Rick gave our students a guided tour of the factory where we were able to observe their ice-creams being made. The tour finished with a talk about how technology has assisted with production and ice-cream flavour development. A huge thank-you to Rick and his team at Golden North for showing our students around the factory and providing them with some valuable information that they could include on their milk carton. I certainly enjoyed it!

Students have now finished all elements of the Cows Create Careers programs and have submitted their work to be assessed by Dairy Australia. They will travel to Adelaide next Wednesday (week 8) for the awards ceremony and look at what other students have created. This has been an interesting unit of work that we can hopefully expand on in the future with a plan to make our own cheese and enter it for judging in 2017.

Well done to all students involved.

Golden North visit

YEAR 8 IMMUNISATIONS

Nurses from Southern Flinders Health will be attending Gladstone High School on Thursday September 15th at 9:00am to provide the next series of school based immunisations. These include:

Gardasil (Human Papillomavirus) – Year 8 students
Catch-up immunisations for students absent at previous visits

It is important that students have breakfast on the morning of immunisations.

Since it has been some months since the previous visit, please contact Dymph Catford on 86622158 or dymphna.catford@health.sa.gov.au if there have been changes to details previously provided on the immunisation consent form.

COMMUNITY NEWS

NARUNGGA LANGUAGE COURSE

OPAL NEWS SEPTEMBER 2016

SOUTHERN FLINDERS JUNIOR FOOTBALL AND NETBALL WIND-UP

The Junior Football & Netball windup will be held on Sunday the 11th September at Gladstone (the day after the grand final) it will be starting at 11:30am.

All families of footballers & netballers are asked to bring a salad & sweet please with a gold coin donation to pay for the great BBQ lunch. All Tiger players, members and supporters are invited to attend.

GEORGETOWN PRIMARY SCHOOL FAMILY FUN DAY

Sunday 25th September, Georgetown Primary School grounds from 11:00am to 4:00pm

GLADSTONE SWIMMING POOL AGM

Tuesday 13th September
7.30pm at the Gilbert White Community Centre
(formally the RSL rooms) Fifth Street, Gladstone

SCHOOL HOLIDAY HAIR AND MAKEUP TASTER COURSES

2 Days Hair & 1 Day Makeup Introductory Courses
Limited positions available

Our amazing and dynamic team of educators are looking forward to meeting and teaching the next generation of budding hair and makeup styling superstars.

The hair and makeup workshops are a fun way to spark enthusiasm, passion and have a little holiday fun!