To begin Term 3, Class 7 began with the Age of Discovery main lesson.  We learnt of Viking Leif Errikson and his discovery of the Scandinavian Countries.  This led us to the discovery of Europe and all it has to offer.  Thanks to the persistence of the sea faring Spaniards and Portuguese, Africa was discovered and with it came an awareness of the world around us.  Logic and navigational skills overcame superstition and the fear that they would literally sail off the end of the earth.  The brave and illustrious Vasco de Gama discovered Asia followed by the adventurous Christopher Columbus who unknowingly discovered the Americas.  However, Amerigo Vespucci took Columbus’s claim to the rights for many years.  Finally, Ferdinand Magellan masterminded the first expedition to circumnavigate the world.  

There were many twists and turns in the historical recall of the discovery of the world in which we live.  A great match for our Class 7 students.  The main lesson was also a wonderful geographical journey as each continent was mapped, countries labelled, grid referenced, and bodies of water noted.  This has led to our Monday morning Geographical Quiz, much to the delight of myself!

Below are some examples of the beautiful bookwork, geographical presentations and individual written main lesson tasks.

In our art sessions each Monday we began the term looking at perspective drawing using different mediums.  Water colour work was also included in our main lesson bookwork tasks, and to finish we are reviewing portrait drawing as we have begun our Renaissance main lesson.

Class 7 are industrious hand workers, and it has been wonderful to watch their skills progress each year.  I have always enjoyed our handwork sessions and as we begin to sew the bodies of our Waldorf dolls their stitching is quite amazing and always under the watchful eye of Jewels, our handwork teacher.  Below are their embroidered craft bags made earlier in the year.  Just beautiful!

As part of our digital technologies learning area, in Semester 1 Class 7 students, under the instruction of Matt Sivyer from Denmark FM, learnt many aspects of presenting on radio.  If you tune in to 99.7 you will hear our students.  One of the main tasks was writing and presenting their own podcasts.  Each week on Denmark FM, from 3.30 to 4pm, you will be able to recognise some of our students in the school zone project in association with other local schools.  The experience has been most enriching, and we hope to offer an elective of sorts in radio in the future as we grow our high school.

This week we have begun stage 2 of our digital technologies curriculum and have begun using laptops in class.  To begin our IT journey, we are all learning to touch type and then will move onto word processing skills.  It has certainly been an exciting week in Class 7.

Robyn

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