Newsletter 22nd February 2013 - Emerald Secondary College

YEAR 9 CONNECT PROGRAM: From the students.................
In the first two weeks of the Connect Program we have done many things.
In the first week we listened to a comedian named Declan Fay. He taught us
to stop trying to fit in and to be ourselves. We then did rotations of 4 different
activities, ncluding creating a Dream Board identifying our interests and
goals, we wrote a letter to ourselves outlining our feelings about Year 9,
being involved in the Connect Program and what we hope to get out of it
(which is to be opened at the end of the year), Theatre Sports – which involved
participating in a number of games and activities, and finally the Amazing
Race which had us following clues and taking challenges around the school.
These activities were designed to help us bond with each other and have a
great start to the Connect Program.
In the second week we examined the personal characteristics we would bring
to the Connect Program, then wrote them on a cut out person for display in our
HG rooms. We then explored our different learning styles by taking a test on
Multiple Intelligences and compared our own results with the rest of the class.
In the afternoon we planned our activities for our Home Group’s activity day at
Emerald Lake Park.
It has been interesting being involved in the Connect Program 2013 as well
as a challenges getting used to spending the whole day working on alternative
tasks with our Home Group members and our Home Group Teachers, but there
have been many fun moments and we hope there will be many more in the
future.
Gemma Edwards & Jacob Keily 11G
CONNECT – the Launch of Emerald New Year 9 Program:
On Wednesday 6th February all Year 9 students undertook their first day in the Connect Program. The day was kicked off in
EPAC with an official introduction by the programs coordinator, Mrs Ritu Arora, which was then followed by a guest speaker
Declan Fay. Declan is one of Australia’s leading comedy writers. He has performed at the Comedy festival, the fringe Festival
and written for some of the best (and worst) television shows. He provided many relevant points and had the students entertained
with his own personal school stories.
Later the students engaged in activities run by their home group teachers. Mr Closter had students running all over the school in
an Amazing race challenge, along with them having to rock climb on the gym wall.
A huge thank you also goes to Gemco (the local Emerald Theatre Group) who also ran a theatre sports session which students
undertook during the day. This session challenged their own personal comfort zone and by the sounds of things there were some
pretty natural actors in amongst the Year 9 cohort, so a huge thank you to David Greenaway, Evie Houseman & Ash Herring
from Gemco.
This term students will continue to look at themselves, as part of the Personal Term focus, and how they learn and adapt to
different learning environments. Parents will shortly receive some extra information about what is coming up as well as an
update on several other ‘Connect’ related matters.
Ritu Arora
Connect Program Coordinator
Our Year 9s sampling the Connect Program