At the competition of the Semester Two Exam block the Year 7 students have engaged in an IDU 'Pitch Competition' as well as building billy carts to be able to race them at the Derby Day. The focus of both of these events is for students to use the Approaches to Learning (ATL).
The ATL’s are skills designed to enable students in the IB Middle Years Programme (MYP) to, 'learn how to learn'.
This billy cart project could not go ahead without the assistance of the many Somerset community volunteers, who assist the year 7s. I am very grateful for their time and energy.
A parent expressed to me that, “The learnings they [students] get from it are really meaningful; teamwork, collaboration, resilience to mention a few, all mixed with a healthy degree of competition."
Instead of being 'fast and furious' the day was 'wet and wild' with the inclement weather.
The Year 7s showed true Spartan Spirit!
It was an amazing achievement this year to have all three of our Junior School teams make the state finals in the 2021 Tech Girls Competition. To then have all three teams listed for awards at the National Finals in October was even more amazing!
Well done to our three teams and their mentors! The girls from Year 5 and 6 that we involved this year should all be incredibly proud of what they have achieved. In 2021, there were 153 teams that entered the Primary Schools and Secondary Schools Tech Girls competition.
There is so much more to this competition than coding. Each team is coached as if they are a start-up business, with a comprehensive list of tasks that need to be submitted, including developing a prototype of their app and marketing video. The girls demonstrated fantastic skills in creativity, critical thinking and collaboration.
Sustainable Development Goal Awards
These awards were for both primary and secondary school teams nationally.
Sustainable Development Goal 4 Award - Quality Education: Kourageous Kids (Sabine Booth, Annabelle Gibson, Emma Mollard and Abhilasha Sarmah)
Sustainable Development Goal 15 Award - Life on Land: Snake It Safe (Zoe Benson, Briana Leon, Maria Narizhnay and Mia Woodthorpe)
Special Awards
Three were awarded for both primary and secondary school teams nationally.
Detectiva Award for Awesome App: Sign-a-Song (Eliana Brienza, Tamar Chester-Haviv, Ling Rostas, Ling Rostas)
Year 2 friends had been eagerly looking forward to Friday 19 November… and the day had finally arrived – it was Activities Day! This is a day that celebrates our year together and is a wonderful way for students to learn new information and skills by making connections to many of our units of inquiries from the year.
Students spent the morning session rotating around three incursions: Indigenous Arts and Craft workshop, SEQ Water Program and Ocean Stars. Children thoroughly enjoyed listening to Indigenous stories whilst being decorated with ochre and transpiring into emus, hearing The Golden Tap story learning about how we can conserve water and touching all of the incredible sea creatures that came to visit.
After lunch, students discovered there had been a very exciting delivery on The Common; there was an amazing Inflatable Obstacle Course and a Pop-Up Playground. Students bounced, balanced, spun and flipped and displayed some remarkable talents.
Next, we were back to the classroom to cool off and calm down. When we arrived, we discovered 85 pieces of clay set up and students were encouraged to create an artefact (eg: teacup, typewriter). This activity directly related to our inquiries; 'Earth’s Resources are Used in a Variety of Ways' and 'Understanding the Past Connects to the Present'.
Our last activity went out with a bang, pardon the pun… it was a Drum Beats Workshop. Every student was given a drum and they turned into musicians learning about different drums and beats.
To end the day, 45 pizzas were delivered and hungrily devoured!
It was a fabulous day, and what a delight it was seeing our Year 2 friends relishing their time together!
I extend my heartfelt congratulations to Abhilasha Sarmah, Ishan Chauhan, Riya Nagrani and Kush Veeramachaneni on receiving Distinctions for their exam from the Trinity College of London.
Their dedication and commitment to the demands of these examinations have been rewarded with outstanding results. I am sure we will see more from these young students throughout their school life.
This semester, Year 7 IAS has moved into the ‘World of Business’ and the boardroom meetings have been oozing with an abundance of creative ideas, to solve problems that the students have identified in their school environment, at home or in the community.
Before they ventured into their ‘Think Tank’ session last week, students have been introduced to a variety of teen entrepreneurs, Will’s dad; Matt Hoult who spoke to the group about finances, Michael Spencer from Stacked Framing who introduced us to a very different way of growing food compared to traditional farming and our very own Year 7 entrepreneur Declan Newman.
Declan (7.1) presented a power point of his personal experience into the business world and explained how he started his bin cleaning enterprise along with the challenges he faced and what he intends to do in the future. Declan has proved that anyone can achieve their goals at any age and if you’re really determined to follow your passion, no matter what it is, you can do it.
An Interdisciplinary Unit, a component of the MYP, was completed by over 130 very excited Year 7 students this week.
On Monday and Tuesday, the Year 7s, in their corporate attire, were very keen to ‘pitch’ their very own ‘company’ and state why the judges, a competent group of Year 11 Business Studies’ students; Michael, Kiera and Olivia should choose their company product or service as the best for 2021.
The students only had five school days to prepare and create a solution for a problem that they had brainstormed in their ‘Think Tank' session in the previous week.
Their ‘business brief’ was to create a company name, logo, mission statement, financial background and a code of conduct outlining human rights for their workers, how to lessen the impact on the environment and what charities they were going to support with this new venture.
These were modelled and taught in different subject classes during Term Three and Four so that the students could then use these skills from IAS, Mathematics, Language and Literature lessons to produce their final presentation.
In teams of four they had to produce four to five slides outlining their company’s product and policies, and present it to the Judges. Heats were held to choose first, second and third in each Year 7 Class. The winner of each class would then progress to the Grand Final.
Our Guest Judges were Year 11 Business studies students who had the very hard task of choosing not only the Heat winners but also first, second and third place winners in the Grand Final, with our Guest Judge, Mr Mark Sowerby!
The winners of the inaugural 'Sustainable Business 101' award for 2021 went to the following;
1st- Back2life-Raye, Isabel, Denver, Phebe
2ND- EVERYDAY HIRE - Zavier, Olivia, Sabastian
3rd- CAPTURE TRASH - Abhiraj, Isabella, Harrison
Year 11 Grand Final Judges, Mr Mark Sowerby, Karma Bathols, Kiera and Olivia McIntosh
All the Year 7 teams, dressed in their corporate attire, produced an amazing array of product creations and their presentations were well articulated and very professional.
The Year 7 Teaching Team would like to take this opportunity to thank the many people who made this happen and for their immense involvement in ensuring the students had the knowledge and skills to complete this Interdisciplinary Unit of work. We would also like to thank the Year 11 Grand Final Judges, Mr Mark Sowerby, Karma Bathols, Kiera Eljed and Olivia Mackintosh, also the Tech Staff and Events and Logistics staff.
A BIG ‘thank you’ to all the Year 7’s who worked very hard together to produce imaginative and creative products and Services and were willing and eager to experience the workings of the Corporate World!
During the Celebration of Entrepreneurship in Term Three, the Year 6 students worked ferociously to create small businesses as part of the ‘Kidpreneur’ programme. We spent six weeks planning and preparing our businesses ideas and learning how to run a business with the help of guests speakers along the way.
Collectively, we made an impressive $4706 profit from two action-packed days of selling our goods and set a College record! We all voted on which charity we thought we should donate our profits to and ultimately decided on supporting children experiencing poverty in Australia, through the excellent work done by The Smith Family.
We were lucky enough to have representatives from The Smith Family visit us on Tuesday to talk to us about the great work they do and for to present them with a giant cheque! (Firstly, our teachers gave us a mini-lesson on what a cheque was as most of us had never seen one before!)
Kidpreneur was an exciting experience, and we are so proud of the profits we made as a cohort, knowing that it is going to an excellent cause.
Somerset Spartans Football and Futsal clubs were busy during 2021's final school term. Read about our trophy winners from our lunchtime activities and the Future and First XI Football.
Lunchtime Football Tennis League
Junior and Senior students played the game Futnet every Monday afternoon. In the Senior School we had six teams playing each week. Congratulations to Bongani Mhlanga and Yathish Soni for winning four of their five games!
In the Junior School the league was made out of seven teams. Oliver Ng and Danny Wang were undefeated in their group stage and qualified themselves for the grand-final. In the semi-final, both with three wins, we had Liam Seymour and Joshua Thompson playing again Edward Hassett and Benedict Thompson. Liam and Josh won and moved into the final. The final was a very even game and both teams using great teamwork.
Danny and Oliver won the game to call themselves Futnet Winner 2021!
Lunchtime Futsal League
In the Junior School Futsal League we had total of 50 Junior students participating. The students made their own team and team name. We had teams such as Vectors, Cheeseburger, Panthers, Onions, England FC, Cristiano Ronaldo, and Samurai Sushi.
All teams played each other once. The Samurai Sushi’s and Cristiano Ronaldo ended on top of the league table. These two teams played the final during the Wednesday lunchtime! C. Ronaldo won the final with 3 to 2. Congratulations to Year 4 students, Zhander, Connor, Danny, Liam, Paxton, and Oliver.
In the Senior School, the Year 8 Girls won the final against the Year 7 Girls. Congratulations to Sasha, Zoe, Abigail, Emily, Pearl, and Sophia.
Futsal Player of the Year 2021
The Futsal Award is for players who have performed well at the AFA School Futsal Titles and the Queensland Futsal Cup. The students are nominated by the Somerset Futsal Coaches and the Head of Football and Futsal.
We want to congratulate to following students for winning the Futsal Award 2021:
First XI Boys: Peter Osborne
First XI Girls: Serenity Thake
Future XI Boys: Patrick Colville
Future XI Girls: Ari Thake
Football Player of the Year 2021
The First XI Football Award is for the players that have performed well at APS Football and the Uhlsport Cup. The Future XI Award is for the player that performed well at the ISSA Cup and Bill Turner Cup/Trophy. The students are nominated by the Somerset Football Coaches and the Head of Football and Futsal.
We want to congratulate to following students for winning the Football Award 2021:
First XI Boys: Jarn Marjanovic
First XI Girls: Serenity Thake
Future XI Boys: Patrick Colville
Future XI Girls: Georgie Zerbst
Futsal Club Update
All our Spartans are halfway their Futsal Season. The boys and girls keep training and playing games during the school holidays. We hope to see you at the Carrara or Robina leagues, to cheer on our Spartans!
For any questions about Football and Futsal, please contact our Head of Football and Futsal Maarten De Kruijf.
The winner of the Sports Precinct's Fitness Member of the Month is, Jyoti Ravikumar!
Jyoti is a regular attendee at classes in the gym. She is always early and ready to go.
As a great listener and follower of instructions Jyoti is a true asset to the Somerset Gym community.
Join a supportive group of people, who understand the joys and challenges when raising amazing kids, for coffee and a chat at a casual and friendly meetings. Having other parents who care and listen and getting ideas from each other can really help.
ASD & ADHD
Gold Coast Parent Support Group
Meeting date: Monday 29 November 2021
Time: 5:30pm to 7:30pm
Location: 43 Tallebudgera Creek Road Burleigh Heads Therapy Matters, Ground Floor Conference Room, Suite 3
Cost: Free! Anyone who is interested is welcome to join us.
RSVP: To attend please email your name and phone number to: aspergersgc@outlook.com
Come and join us for coffee and a chat with a supportive group of people just like you, who understand the joys and challenges we are faced with when raising our amazing kids. Our meetings are casual and friendly. Having other parents who care and listen and getting ideas from each other can really help.
Tea, coffee, biscuits and hand sanitiser will be provided.
For more information or to RSVP contact Kelly Bradley.
Type on the line above then press the Enter/Return key to submit a new search query