Music is in our hearts in the Somerset Junior School and we love to perform – particularly when we are entertaining our friends and family! Showcase is a performance evening which offers our youngest musicians, dramatists and dancers the opportunity to perform and showcase polished works, offering a night of incredible talent. The event allows the students coming through the Junior School the opportunity to apply their understanding of musical concepts and skills in a meaningful and practical setting.
Monday evening in Week 8, performers took to the stage to entertain a full house! Group performances were given by the Junior School Percussion Club, Recorder Ensemble, Choirs, Orchestra’s and Concert Band. A number of selected students demonstrated confidence and risk taking as they performed individual solo items. These performances included items for voice, cello, piano, guitar, saxophone, clarinet, as well as a monologue and combined dance item.
The evening would not have been possible without the behind the scenes work and assistance of Mrs Roberts, Mr Roberts, Mrs Flynn, Mrs Rowe, Mr Mitchell, Mr Keczan, Mrs Little, Mr Pearce and the many instrumental, dance and drama tutors we have at Somerset. Thank you to Mrs Collie, Mrs Millican and Mr Zernike for supporting our performers and to the many Junior School staff members who stayed to assist on the night. Lastly, a big thank you to our parents and friends who support and encourage our youngest musicians, actors and dancers to follow their heart to perform upon the stage.
Thank you and Congratulations to the dedicated students who have worked so hard to prepare items for the show. It’s amazing to see what can be accomplished when creative minds work together!
The first day of the week students designed beautiful mosaics using coloured cardboard tiles and bright coloured pens early and on Tuesday students played Italian games in the classroom. We enjoyed some fun in the sun on Wednesday playing bocce on The Common and concluded the week by watching Boss Baby on Friday, in Italian of course!
A very big thank you to Mrs Danielle Swainson for creating an exciting week in order to immerse our students in activities unique to the Italian culture.
Congratulations, Danielle, your vision and hard work in this area is certainly appreciated!
The Trivia winners of the night were a table of rowing parents, Muensters, Hartley’s, Khafajis, Mullins, Hornsey’s and Boat Club members Bulls and Jones’s.
The Trivia Night is a major fundraiser for the College rowers with proceeds going towards purchasing boats, oars and other equipment for the rowers. Thanks to the generosity of the Somerset College business community and the rowing families, there were fantastic prizes from Wyndham Resort Holidays, stays at the Mantra on Salt, a package to obtain the perfect smile from Gold Coast Orthodontics and a treatment at The Spa At Salt. Thanks to all those who purchased the great auction items, the night raised many thousands of dollars, which will go to providing more equipment for the rowers.
I would like to extend a massive thank you to Scott Whiting our resident Physiotherapist for the job as Quiz Master and compiling the questions, which is always challenging with the diversity of the ages and interests in the room. Thanks also to Andrew Plume as the Master of Ceremonies and Auctioneer, Lisa Plume and her team for compiling all of the scores, and also to the rowing committee and parents led by Michelle Smith and Fiona Liu who assisted with the excellent organisation of the night.
Special mention must go to the Charlie and Thomas Liu for spending hours creating the Band posters of the rowers and staff, which decorated the hall, Mr Sayer aka STING was the standout… well so he says!
Thank you to all the businesses for their generous donations. We ask that, when possible, the Somerset Community support the businesses that support Somerset College, please refer to the Resources section of this article to view the businesses.
Did you know that the largest Hawksbill Turtle (Eretmochelys imbricate) colony in the world nests on the Milman Island in Queensland. This turtles’ narrow pointed beak is a specialised feeding tool, much like that of a bird of prey. Its shape and length allows the turtle to reach into small cracks in the coral reef to extract sponges and other invertebrates.
These coral reef sponges are the Hawksbill primary source of food. For most marine animals, these sponges are toxic due to the spicules (glass-like spines) they contain, however, the Hawksbill turtle is immune to this making its competition very small.
From the two kilogram invasive European rabbit to the 70 kilogram endangered Hawksbill Sea Turtle, there are hundreds of invasive and endangered species in Australia each causing their own chaos. Whether it be over populating and destructing or living life on the edge of extinction!
We were in the mist of our classification unit when we undertook this assessment piece and were ready to put all of our knowledge of the stages of classification, and so much more to the test. And boy did we! So much passion, enthusiasm and time was put in, and it paid off in the end with many incredible fact sheets.
We weren’t going to just hand them in and forget about them, why not show off our new knowledge and skills? So we headed to the opposite end of the college campus - the Pre-Prep and Year 1 classrooms. Yes, there is no way, no matter how good we were, that we could teach them what a marsupial is or what Echinodermata means in an hour, but with a fun interactive booklet, a garden and magnify glasses we were able to engage and teach them some simple ideas of not only our endangered and invasive species but living things in general. We even made some new friends.
This whole project was a learning experience for each and everyone of the Year 7s and hopefully the younger students as well!
Mrs Walker would like to thank the collaborative efforts of many people who made these sessions successful. Staff as well as the Year 7 Science students, Year 1 and Pre-Prep students who wholeheartedly engaged in the experience. It was wonderful to watch these two age groups engage with one another displaying empathy, being encouraging and supporting at all times as well as showing flexibility and a willingness to make necessary compromises.
Here's what the Pre-Preps had to say:
"I had a boy, he talked to me about Cassowaries, I did an activity, it was easy.” - Annie
“I had fun with my Year 7 buddy, we didn’t find any bugs but everyone else did.” - Ava
“I did activities and looked at a skeleton picture. I did some drawings and I learnt about kangaroos.” - Lachlan
“We read books and collected a puzzle. We learnt about creatures that might die, it’s not a very good thing. Some creatures don’t have enough to eat." - Amara
You can check out our fact sheets using the links to the eBook. Thank you to Mrs McDonald for creating these eBooks. We hope that by sharing these with you we can raise awareness in our Somerset Community.
Thank you also to Geraint, Milo, Joshua and Isabella (Year 7) for your dedication to this cause.
Each antler is made up of five separate pieces and will be locked and glued together before being painted. The finished antlers will be 60cm long, weigh 500 grams and take 24 hours to print.
Rest assured that the plastic filament used to print the antlers is made from 100 per cent biodegradable cornstarch and sugar cane starch. The last thing we want to do is contribute more plastic to the planet!
The printers are hard at work on display in the KIP, much to the delight of students and parents. Feel free to drop in a take a look. They will be here until Monday 11 June.
Here are some important questions for the leaders of the 21st century:
And these were just some of the questions considered by a group of Year 10 Economics students during their visit to the Griffith University Nathan Campus for the Business and Commerce Experience Day on Thursday 6 June.
The Business and Entrepreneurship Department hopes that this is just the start of their long and rewarding careers in business, economics and commerce.
Special thanks to Mr Evans for driving the bus to and from the university and to Mr Oman for organising the day.
Students competed across ten disciplines:
More than 1,500 students competed this year over three days of the extraordinarily challenging competition. Schools in attendance included several Gold Coast independent schools, Brisbane Girls Grammar, Churchie, Ormiston College, Iona College, Somerville House, Matthew Flinders Anglican College, St Peters Lutheran College and Brisbane Boys College, among many others.
Our Year 5 team placed first in both Cartography and Engineering whilst one of our Year 6 teams place second in both Science and General Knowledge. It is a gruelling six hours requiring concentration, persistence, ability and team work. All three teams performed well and they should be congratulated for giving up their own time to practice for this event. Many lost lunch times and before school practices ensured a great preparation for the day. Bring on da Vinci 2019.
Practices have started. Join Somerset’s biggest team at the Track. Practices are daily and optional, beginning at 7.00am sharp, concluding at 8.15am.
Mondays and Wednesday: SS Jumps and Throws, JS TrackTuesdays and Thursdays: JS Jumps and Throws, SS TrackFridays: All events for JS and SS
Daily 7.00amAthletics Practices (Somerset Track)
Friday 15 June1.50pm: Sports Assembly (Winter Sports Awards - Part 1 - The Great Hall)2.30pm: House Athletics Trials #1/2 (Somerset Track)
Week 10
Daily 7.00amAthletics Practices (Somerset Track)
Friday 22 June10.40am to 11.15am: Sports Assembly (Winter Sports Awards - Part 2 - The Great Hall)11.15am to 1.00pm: House Athletics Trials #2/21.30pm to 3.15pm: APS Summer Season Trials #1/2
All policies and procedures are outlined in the Senior School Sport page of Schoolbox, under “Sport Policy and Dates”. All students and parents are encouraged to familiarise themselves with these.
Please note, practices are compulsory for both Winter and Summer Seasons.
Hinterland Trials are for strong performers to trial for representative selection in school sport. These lead to Regional and State teams.
Students wanting to trial for these teams, must email or come to the Sports Department ASAP. All trials are listed on the Sports Page of Schoolbox (“Representative Sport” tile) and announced in Notices during the week.
APS Sport PhotosClick here to access photos of your sport or your team.
All Season details on Schoolbox Senior School Sports page. (“Winter Sports” tile for all season dates, and training schedules of the APS Season)
Don’t forget to check the Somerset Schoolbox Senior School Sport Page, as well as the noticeboard at the end of the Science Block for all Sports notes.
If you need more information, drop by the Sports Office.
The Sports page link must be added to your Schoolbox.
If you need more information, drop by the Sports Office in the Ray Building.
Student Injuries: If your son or daughter is injured at school sport, it must be recorded at the time by the school nurse/medical person present if parents wish to apply through the school insurance policy. If delayed signs or symptoms arise over the weekend, students must notify the school nurse on Monday morning.
To all those students in the Junior School who are keen on their Athletics, training for both Track and Field events have begun. The weekly training schedule is as follows:
This is only open to students in Year 4 to 6. Year 3 children will be practicing, training and learning all of these the events during their HPE lessons at school.
We would like to wish Marley and Rio Burns the best of luck as they represent the Under 11 South Coast Regional team at the State Under 12 Netball Championships next weekend (Saturday 16 and Sunday 17 June) at Carrara Indoor Stadium.
Congratulations to the following students who competed in the recent South Coast Regional Cross Country Trials @ Runaway Bay:
Darcy Halloran now qualifies to represent South Coast at the Queensland School Sport 10 to 19 years Cross Country State Championships on the 21 to 23 July 2018 at the Maroochydore Cricket Club.
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