Faith Matters

Have you ever considered walking on water?

You are probably aware of the incident in the Bible where the disciples are in a storm and Jesus comes to them walking on the water. Peter gets out of the boat and starts to walk towards Jesus. However, it isn’t long before he starts to sink.

Peter discovered: just because you sink doesn’t mean you’re sunk. Here are two reasons why. First, failing doesn’t make you a failure, quitting does. Failure is just a part of learning. Sir Edmund Hillary made several attempts to scale Mount Everest before succeeding. After one such attempt he stood in front of a photograph of the mountain and shook his fist as he told his audience: ‘Mount Everest, you will not beat me again. You have grown all you are going to, but I’m still growing!’ He learned something from every unsuccessful attempt until one day he succeeded. Winston Churchill said, ‘I’ve never failed at anything in my life. I was simply given another opportunity to get it right.’ That’s the winning spirit!

Secondly, the real failures were the ones who stayed in the boat. They failed quietly and privately; their failure went unnoticed and uncriticised. Although Peter crashed and burned publicly, he experienced the euphoria of walking on the water. He alone knew how it felt to be empowered by God to do what he could never have done by himself. Once you’ve walked on water you are never the same. Peter would take this moment to his grave! Failure doesn’t come from sinking – it comes from letting your fears stop you.

Rev Peter Morphew – Chaplain

Stage 1 – Sharing Through Culture

Over the course of six school weeks, the boys in Years 1 and 2 explored and unpacked their second unit of inquiry’s central idea, ‘People share their feelings, beliefs and values through cultural traditions.’

The unit of inquiry was a wonderful way of getting the boys to explore their own cultural backgrounds, as well as those of their friends, their family and even some of the staff.

Terms like ‘culture’ and ‘tradition’ are fairly big ideas to comprehend for younger students, but the boys did a fantastic job of making the terms more concrete and less abstract. To help them understand further, the boys were invited to bring in artefacts to discuss, had talks from parent guest speakers on certain cultural traditions, and took part in various Australian traditions, such as the Easter Hat Parade and the school’s ANZAC Service. They sampled foods from different cultures and Year 1 also presented at assembly on their interpretation of culture.

As well as investigating the various differences between cultures, the boys celebrated the similarities, which is in line with the IB’s ethos of encouraging the development of ‘internationally minded, global citizens.’ This was particularly relevant in Stage 1 where there are many cultural backgrounds within the classes including Australian, Chinese, British, Belgian, Irish, Indian, Singaporean, Taiwanese and Greek to name but a few. The boys learnt about each other’s cultures and beliefs, which I think broadened the minds of many of the boys.

The boys also looked at what it actually meant to be Australian through the concept of perspective, which was open to various interpretations. Overall, it was a thoroughly enjoyable but also deeply meaningful unit, that I think the boys took a lot from.

Sam Watson – Year 1 Teacher

Stage 2 – How Humans Impact on the Earth

The second Unit of Inquiry for Stage 2 has been a Sharing the Planet unit where the boys have been exploring our Central Idea: Earth is a dynamic environment affected by human activity. These six weeks have been filled with engaging learning experiences that have raised great awareness of how our Earth is changing and has resulted in some persuasive action from the boys on ways to reduce our human impact.

Our inquiries began by exploring the natural processes of our Earth. The boys investigated the rock cycle and how rocks change over time. This led the boys to identifying these different rock types in the environment around them and our classrooms soon became an evolving geology site, filled with various rocks, crystals and gemstones. After researching about various natural processes of the Earth such as erosion, weathering and deposition, the boys began to conduct experiments to demonstrate how these processes were changing the Earth’s surface. The boys were then able to link these processes to Australian landmarks such as Uluru, the Twelve Apostles, Wave rock etc.

Then, our Unit of Inquiry shifted to explore how human activity is affecting the Earth. After a good provocation around sharing finite resources, the boys soon became very aware of the need to reduce our impact on the Earth’s surface. As whole classes, Years 3 and 4 brainstormed all the activities humans were doing that drastically affected the Earth’s surface. These then became areas of passion for the boys and they were grouped according to the issues that they wanted to fight for. These included deforestation, pollution, housing, farming and mining. The boys conducted guided inquiries to define what their issue was, how it was affecting the Earth’s surface and areas of action we can take to reduce this impact and create more of a balance. It was so rewarding to see the boys explore a concept they felt so strongly about. As a way to spread their messages, the boys are now in the final stages of preparing a Persuasive Play that addresses their issues and informs the audience on ways to reduce our human impact on the Earth’s surface.

It has been a very engaging and purposeful Unit of Inquiry for Stage 2 and we hope to see their future actions reflect their learning this term.

Shayne Pollard – Year 4 Teacher

Anzac Day Cup

As were staring off into the distance while the last post is playing in the background, we all think of the people who fought for us. Newington College, Lindfield was participating in The Gallipoli Cup at Amity Football College at Prestons in Sydney’s west. We were up against club teams and being the only school team, it was going to be a bit of a challenge. The clubs were two Amity FC teams, one being called Gallipoli FC, Galatasaray, Bossy Liverpool and Prospect FC. We had the two captains (Dimitri Vallas and Oliver Short) and Owen Ng, Cameron Lees, Will Linke and Will Lane, Harry Stuart, Jack Middleton, Sebastian Grehan and accompanied by Mr Edwards.

Our first game was against Prospect FC. We started a bit shaky with Jack Middleton, our fearless goalkeeper keeping us in the game but we picked it up quickly with Harry, Dimitri and Will Lane all scoring goals to make the final score 3-0. Our next two games were a bit disappointing but we realised our problem in defense and changed our style and positions.

The next game was a cracker and had everyone biting his or her fingernails but a last minute penalty taken by Oliver gave us the win. It was pretty funny actually. Ollie and Dimitri decided who would take the penalty using ‘scissors/paper/rock to take. Even though Dimitri won, he gave the chance to Oliver and as previously said he didn’t disappoint.

Our last game was against our hosts but we were so tired we missed 10 goal scoring opportunities. Luckily, it ended 0-0 and we finished second out of six teams.

Overall it was a great day and I know that we all enjoyed it. We also wanted to thank Mr Edwards for giving up his Anzac Day with his family to coach us during the tournament.

Oliver Short and Dimitri Vallas – Year 6B

Stage 3 – Ceramic Willow Plates

Year 5 and 6 boys have been observing and exploring the traditional Chinese art of ceramic painting. The boys have inquired into Asia as our closest neighbour and have thought about the ways in which our proximity to Asia has influenced Australian culture. The 6 boys heard the Willow Pattern story about a princess who flees her oppressive father in order to be with the man she loves. The boys devised their own written and drawn renditions of the Willow Story, using the common themes of oppression and escape.

The boys created ceramic slab plates out of clay, which are being fired and will be ready for glazing with their own Willow Pattern story in white and blue glaze. Once these are complete, they will be fired once more to seal the glaze.

The boys are enjoying this process and I look forward to seeing their completed ceramic Willow plates.

Phoebe Burnett – Art Teacher

How To Get Boys to Read

One of the greatest challenges for many boys and parents is to develop their son’s enjoyment and proficiency in reading. Reading impacts all areas of school achievement and lays the foundations for much future success. Boys tend to trail girls in the area of reading achievement.

I came across an interesting article in The Reading Teacher by a researcher Frank Serafini (Arizona State University). In his article, he addressed some of the factors that led to boys’ chronic underachievement in reading compared to girls. Some of the reasons:

• On average, boys spend less time reading than girls.
• Boys may have few male readers in their lives to emulate.
• The things boys like to read are often not well catered in school.
• Boys are often more physically active than girls and less willing to read for extended periods of time.

“Our goal is to get boys to comprehend more difficult, complex material,” says Serafini, “but first we have to get them reading…”

Researchers have found that boys are drawn to books with these characteristics:

• Focused on plot, not drama and emotions (think Alex Rider, Percy Jackson, Rangers Apprentice, Specky MacGee, Famous Five, Secret Seven);
• Visually appealing, for example, magazines and graphic novels (think Tom Gates, Amulet series, Big Nate, TinTin, Asterix);
• Practical, with information boys can use (think about any How To Book) ;
• Main characters boys can easily relate to – (Wimpy Kid, Comic Heroes, Geronimo Stilton, Tashi );
• Funny, with elements of mischief and slapstick (think about Tree House books, Just… series).

Here at Lindfield, we have a great range of books in the library that caters to all the different interests of our boys. We also have a fantastic range of books in class libraries, donated by the P&F last year.

The article goes further to suggest ideas to try with your boys:

• Support browsing. Take your boys to the local library, going to a book talk, spending time in a bookshop. There are also a number of websites to steer boys toward just the right book, including www.guysread.com, www.readkiddoread.com, and www.gettingboystoread.com.
• Shorter texts. Reading newspaper articles, short novels, short stories and picture books are also good. Below is a list of picture books and novels for boy readers suggested by Sue Gough.
• Provide extended amounts of time to read. “You cannot get better at reading if you don’t spend time reading” says Serafini. We need to help our boys have time to read in their hectic schedules.
• View reading as a social activity. Many boys don’t enjoy reading on their own but they want to talk to their friends about what they’re reading. It is often a good idea for parents to read the same book and then they can discuss the book. Adult book clubs are an example of how reading is more enjoyable when you can discuss and enjoy a book together.
• Focus on visual and multimodal texts. Picture books, comics, graphic novels, and informational texts help boy readers make sense of complex material. This is why Tom Gates and Wimpy Kid and many other graphic novels are so popular with boys.
• Develop boys’ identities as readers. We need our boys to realise that reading is fun and exciting and a very cool thing to do. We need to work out what aspect of reading appeals to them and help them learn through their interests. When I first started teaching, I had a boy who was fascinated with trucks and not really by reading. We found magazines, books and anything we could about his interest and he became a keen reader, who thought reading was great because it helped him find out more about his passion.

Let’s take the time to help our boys really enjoy and want to read. It takes some thinking, planning and modelling as parents but the rewards will be very worthwhile.

“Supporting Boys As Readers” by Frank Serafini in The Reading Teacher, September 2013 (Vol. 67, #1, p. 40-42), extracted from Marshall Memo

Ben Barrington-Higgs – Head of Lindfield Campus