On Saturday morning I got up at about 8:30 with a really bad headache, so I took some panadol and went back to sleep. Then I got up again about half an hour later and got ready to go to Ballarat (for soccer). When we got into Warrnambool we chose our seats on the bus and took off for Ballarat. Everyone was there on the day and we were really excited, can you guess why? That’s right, this was our first game of the finals, if we won it we went on to the semi-finals. We got to Ballarat, it was nice and sunny, we started our training. We ran a bit and practiced some shooting. Then it was time to play, we all got into our positions and the game began. In the 1st half we scored a goal and so did the other team. Near the end of second half we were tied, 3 goals both ways. The umpire blew the whistle, that was the end… a tie. Well that’s what you would think anyway, but no! Because this was to get into the semis’ we had to play another short game of 10 minute halves. By the end of that we still had no result, another tie. So after that we had to have 5 penalty shots. By the end of that, you wouldn’t of guessed, but yet another tie. Quite a tough but even game. So then there were more penalty kicks, even. Then we let one goal slip, if we missed the next they win. Very sadly for our team, the next goal unfortunately missed. Still being a very close game, we were out of the finals. We have one more day match against Colac and then that’s all for soccer for me until next year.

On Sunday I didn’t do much, just slept in and watched a movie. Then later that afternoon mum and I went to Shaun’s to get Zac, he stayed there for the weekend. And right now I am going to have dinner, bye!

Today during ICT we have to write a review of Tutpup, an educational games site.

There are many educational games on Tutpup, they cover the areas of Algebra, Maths and spelling. Here is a small chart I have used to rate the games:

Last week, Monday the 25th of August, a CSIRO representative came to our school to do small experiments to celebrate Science Week for 2008. We were in the science room, first the man talked about CSIRO and what they do, then he explained the things we were going to do. We were in a group of 3, we all had our own bokklets to fill in about the different activities. Here are some that I can remember:

• Taking your heart rate then exercising for a minute and taking it again.
• Cutting into the muscles of a raw chicken wing.
• Standing on a special balancing thing to see how good your balance is.
• Testing different drinks to see which one contains the most sugar.
• Throwing a ball attached to a string as hard as you can into a wall to see how fast you can throw.

It was really fun doing these activities, my group was Jess, Grace and I. My favourite was probably the balancing, I think putting your feet closer together helps more.

On Friday night I went to bed pretty early because I was really tired after camp. I slept in on Saturday morning until my soccer coach rang at about 9:30 and asked if I was playing the next day. I watched some cartoons for a while then went on the computer. The next morning I woke early to get ready for soccer. We went and picked up Jacqui and Nadine and went in being the first there. One of our coaches was there so we just did some practice goal shooting. Then when everyone else had arrived we just did some training, but it started spitting so we went into the change rooms. After a little while the other team had arrived but we could still hear the rain so we did some warm ups inside. We then walked outside to start playing and the whole field was like a mini lake! It was all covered in water! By half time we were winning on 1 goal, (against the best team in our league) and all of the rain had soaked into the field. Unfortunately in the next half the other team scored 3 goals, and we were all wet and muddy. After the game with the other team most of us went to Lake Pertobe, (a park) for a barbecue. It was cold and wet, and we were still in our shorts and soccer gear. After having a sausage some of us walked over to the shop and got a hot chocolate, they were really nice! When I got home I had a nice long shower, and that was just about most of my weekend!

Science Works- I see… lots of excited children and adults, many different and interesting experiments, and an amazing Planetarium.

I hear… chatting kids, talking tour guides, and the movie in the dark Planetarium.

I feel… excited about our camp, happy to be in a fun place, and great to be in an interesting environment.

MCG- I see… lots of different coloured seats, rollers out on the field flattening the new turf, and statues and plaques in remembrance of famous people.

I hear… the tour guide filling our heads with information, people chatting about different findings, and the hooting of the pigeons in the centre of the field.

I smell… the delicious scent of the food courts, the fresh grass people have picked from the ground, and our freshly packed lunches.

I feel… privileged to be able to walk on the ground, frightened of the steepness sitting in the highest stands, and tired of walking up so many small steps!

River Cruise- I see… the gleaming water of the Yarra river, the tall city buildings, and the amazing West gate bridge.

I hear… the motor of the boat, the silence of everyone enjoying their lunch, and the boat driver explaining different sites.

I feel… the cool breeze as we sit out on the back of the boat, terrific to be seeing all of the city, and amazed by the spectacular view.

I taste… the fresh air filling my lungs, my delicious roll, and the tasty lollies I packed for a snack.

Immigration Museum- I see… heaps of pictures of different events, 3 model ships from what they would look like up to 150 years ago, lots of tired faces from a late night the night before.

I hear… the film showing families being re-united after separation, the sounds of the crew and ship which we have to listen to in to model ships, an instructor telling us how we fill in our books.

I feel… sad for those who lived for long periods of time without their loved ones, excited to be learning about how different citizens came to Australia, and happy to know the world is now more of a fair place.

I have written about most of the things we did, it was an awesome camp and I will work on getting some photos up!

DAY 1

7.00am - It was an early start, mum drove me to the school then went home to get ready for work. The trip was fun, I sat next to Katie and we watched 2 movies.

11.00am - arrive Melbourne – Scienceworks- At Scienceworks we had some free time to look around at the things to do, there was a machine where you could sit in wheelchairs and race. I raced against George and won.

11.30am - Planetarium at Scienceworks- The Planetarium was amazing! We walked in and sat on the seats, we then laid down and you would look up onto the roof which was the screen. When it began it showed a film about the solar system and things that are on different planets and under sea. It was really good and I hope I go back again one day.

12.45 - Melbourne River Cruise into city- This was really fun, we sat in rows of seats and ate lunch then we went out onto the back and took some photos. There were some low bridges that we went under so we all had to duck, the boat was built nice and low so it could fit under.

2.00pm - Immigration Museum- At the Immigration Museum we were given booklets to fill in. We split into small groups and we had to walk around the museum finding information and then filling it in. My favourite part was when we went into 3 model ships and had to listen and spot the differences between the older and newer ones.

4.00pm - check in Melbourne Discovery- All of the grade 6 girls were in the same room on bunks, I was on a bunk above Rachael.E and next to Rachel.C. The rooms were nice and big and we all got along. The showers were on the same floor and we shared with the other schools.

5.00pm – IMAX- We unfortunately missed IMAX because we were running to late and we would have been late for dinner too.

6.30pm - Dinner - Universal Pizza on Lygon st- Katie, Jess, Rachel and I all sat on a table together at one end. The other girls were near us and then the boys a bit further. The Pizza here was great! It tasted really nice, we also got some pasta which was delicious. This is also where we met Jessica Morrison, who works at ICAN. ICAN is a campaign trying to abolish all nuclear weapons so we have a safe world. After dinner the year 5’s went back to Melbourne Discovery while us year sixes went to the ICAN headquarters. When we were there we were talking about what we can do to promote the campaign even more and we talked about the countries that still have nuclear weapons. We were all also given awesome badges, and some stickers and a pamphlet.

8.00pm - Movie at Melbourne Discovery Theaterette (we take our own DVD)- We went into the small Theaterette were we all took a seat and watched ‘Bench Warmers’. After that we all went into our rooms and had about 30mins to write in our journals and stuff. Then we had lights out at 10pm, and slept until about 6:30.

DAY 2

8.00am - Breakfast Melbourne Discovery (cereal, 1 toast, drink)- Before breakfast we all woke up and got dressed and cleaned up our rooms for a room inspection.

9.00am -Travel on - presentation by met travel- The Travel On presenters didn’t show up, so we just walked down to the train station and caught it to town square. There we met Mrs. McCartney and took of for the MCG tour. On the way we passed some great places for photos.

11.30am - MCG - general tour and national sports museum- This was lots of fun. We split in half, sixes and fives and started the tour. We were shown all around the MCG and told about different stands and seats. We saw the change rooms, special seats for family and friends, gyms, cafeterias. The museum was lots of fun, there were fun things to do, read and look at.

3.30pm - Shrine of Remembrance- It was a bit of a walk from the MGC to the Shrine but we got there. Once again the classes split and took off on the tour. We watched a movie first, about war and we were given poppies. We went and looked at the medal gallery, most of them weren’t real, they were just copies of the real ones. We also saw a special medal which a man won, it had survived a big fire from a school that burned down, and then it was given to the Shrine.

5.30pm - Dinner - Trios Southgate Food court- When everyone saw the falafels, (which the majority had ordered), people thought they would be disgusting but they turned out to be delicious!

7.00pm - Eureka Skydeck- Mostly everyone who hadn’t been up Eureka before were really scared, my friends were but I told them that they have nothing to worry about and they would be fine. The elevator went up 9 metres a second! Everyone’s ears were popping and we had butterflies in our stomachs. But when you get to the top you aren’t even scared, just amazed by the terrific view. When we were up there it was dark, and the night sky was beautiful, you could see all the lights of Melbourne. We went out onto a balcony which was covered by metal, it was cold but a great option to take pictures. After we came down we went to a small ice-cream parlor, we all got small cups of ice-cream, and they were DELICIOUS!

DAY 3

8.15am - breakfast (pack up rooms and bring bags down to the foyer) - We had about an hour after we woke to get changed, packed and ready for the last day. We packed our bags, cleaned our rooms and took all of our bags into one room. After breakfast we began our journey to the Old Melbourne Gaol.

9.00am - Old Melbourne Gaol- We sat outside in the grassy part of the Gaol which used to be the hospital, and we kicked the footy until we were ready to start the tour. Once again, the classes split going on 2 separate tours. We began ours by our guide telling us about where the men were kept and where women were kept, they were in the same jail but separated by a large wall. Then he told us about their daily routines, women made clothes, and men worked. After that we went over to the Ned Kelly part of the jail, we were told about his story, then shown the place where he was hung. It was quite sad, his mother was in the room beside where he was hung, and she knew the time too. An interesting thing was that there were over 100 men hung in jail but only 4 women, due to men committing more serious crimes then women. After that we went into a small cell and our tour guide told us 3 stories about different people. The room was small and the windows were blocked so there wasn’t much air, I started feeling sick, but when we came out I was ok. We had some free time to walk around the jail and look at the cells and stories.

11.30am - Queen Victoria Market- Everyone had been looking forward to this, saving their money. We split into four groups of our choice, so they were pretty much friendship groups. I was with Jess, Rachel, Katie, Tzigane, Bailey, George, Harvey and Josh. Our teacher with us was Ms Murnane, we would all stay in one isle and then gather at the end to go into the next. These are the things that I bought: Lollies, Hand cream (for mum), body butter (for Kylie), a big set of clickity balls (for Shaun), and for me, 3 lasers, and a big blow up chair. At the Old Gaol I bought Zac some small handcuffs.

12.30pm - depart for home- On the way home I sat next to Jessica. We stopped in Inverleigh to have lunch then kept going. We watched ‘School of Rock’ and ‘Kangaroo Jack’. We got home at about 4:30.

Highlight of camp: Eureka Tower

Downlight of camp: Missing IMAX.

These are some differences between Saiful’s school, Ummul Guro and Indonesia, and our school Hawkesdale P-12 College and Australia:

• Their school day starts at 7:00am, and ends at 1:00pm. They then have a rest and get ready for prayers at 3:00pm. We start school at 9:00am and finish at 3:00pm.
• In Indonesia from the age of 6 girls have to wear white Jilbabs, (We don’t).
• They pray 5 times a day. We pray mostly twice a day and before dinner (depending on different religions.)
• Their school is a boarding school. Our school is only a day school.
• They eat rice 3 times a day. We eat all different types of foods.
• If The kids don’t have shoes at school they have to go into the middle of a group and do push-ups. In our school… well I have never seen someone without shoes and if they didn’t have them then they would probably get into trouble.

This weekend I went to Katie’s on Friday night. We stayed in her room for a couple of hours after school then we went to her Grandparents for tea. Then we went back to Katie’s and stayed up for a while. The next morning we got up bright and early to get ready for the footy, we went with the Cameron’s. They came and picked us up at about 9.30am and we got to Woorndoo at about 10am. We watched Rachel, Jess and the other girls from our class play netball, they won! After that we got some lunch and found some cut down Gum trees. We decided to sit in them and make cubbies, it was so fun!

Then Katie walked down the fence line a bit further and found a small junk yard, Bailey and I walked down there too. We decided to play a prank on Jess, Tzigane, Rachel and Jessica’s little sister Alex. We went back up and told them that there was a crazy man down there with a Ute. So we acted really scared and the other just about fell for it! But Tzigane wanted to go back down and see this “Scary Man”, so we all walked back down, Katie, Bailey and I acting really scared. We then looked around the corner and told them that his Ute was gone. So they felt a bit better and we had a look around. A few paddocks away there was a couple of sheds, we told the others that he could be living there. Then Bailey yelled out “Run!” We all asked why and he said he saw the man over behind some trees, Katie and I went along with it and the others all ran after us. We went back to our little hiding spot and stayed there for a while. then Jess, Tzigane and Alex had to go so we said bye and they left. Then we decided to tell Rachel that it was all a hoax, she then had a laugh and we went on building cubbies. After the last footy game was over we had to go home. It was a really fun day!

The next day Katie and I walked down to Apex Park, we saw Mrs Murch and Saiful there. They took some photos and then left. At about 5 I went home, after having a very exciting weekend!

I took this photo of Prince one night when I was bored. I took him out of his cage and put him into a big pen so he could eat some nice fresh grass.

We are hosting a teacher from Indonesia at out school -Saiful Falah, he comes from MAS Ummul Quoro, Bogor.

This is 5 questions that I would like to ask him:

1. What his ordinary day is like in Indonesia
2. How spicy the food is in Indonesia
3. What sort of household items he has in his home
4. What he does for a living
5. What sort of schools they have in Indonesia

I made this in MS Paint during ICT. My favourite sport to watch in the Olympics is Swimming, but my favourtie normal sport is Soccer.

This year is the Australian Football League’s 150th birthday. At school we have had a casual day fundraiser, wearing our football colours. I go for Hawthorn, I am wearing casual clothes and a Hawthorn scarf. We had to pay $2, half going to the SRC and the other half going to the Heart Foundation.

During lunch time their was a primary kick off, to see who were the best girl and boy kickers. In our class Belinda won the girls and George won the boys. The prizes were chocolate bars.

This is a link to the AFL website.

weather-interview_-ict-mp3

Today during ICT my best friend Katie and I had to record a weather interview. I was the interviewer and Katie was being interviewed.

I made this today during ICT using Bubbl.us, it’s a great site to make mind maps, it’s good for brainstorming too!    (You may have to click on it to view bigger!)

Today Mrs Murch is away and she left us instructions on her blog. The other day the year 7’s came into our classroom and we had a video conference with a lady from America called Mrs Leo. So this is what she wrote on her blog…

Today, Mrs Leo came from Boston, north eastern USA, into our grade 6 and 7 class. She used “virtual classroom software” which has been developed by an Australian, to share some PowerPoint slides, audio, video and chat. Let’s reflect on this amazing lesson and write a post about it.

• Discuss some of the questions she asked us.She asked us about how you play cricket, and Grace from year 7 explained, recently she went to Darwin to play for a Victorian girls cricket team. She asked about how bid blue tongued lizards are, what they eat, where they are found, and if they bite and things like that, Ebonie from year 7 answered all of that because she has a pet blue tongue. She also asked about our school and what parts were some places, Tzigane from year 6 answered that.

• Which questions surprised you most? The ones about PIES! I just can’t believe they don’t have pies in America!! They are just so common in Australia that it’s strange to think that people in America don’t know what they are!

• Did you learn anything new during the session? I learnt that they don’t have pies in America!

• Do you think we accurately portrayed a glimpse of life at our school and local area? Yes Why? We showed her our school, our pool, our ovals, we could of told her a bit more about what things we learn at school though.

• What about a glimpse of Australian culture? Yes Why? Because we explained how to play cricket, which is definitely Australian, we told her about meat pies, we showed her Vegemite! We also told her about the blue tongued lizard, and they live in lots of places around Australia.

• Do you enjoy being in a virtual classroom. Justify your reasons? I did because it’s fun telling people from other countries about our country and our area, especially our school.

• What skills do you think we need to develop and improve upon to successfully participate in such a class? We could of Had a power point of our own to ask things about in America.

• Can you see this as being the classroom of the future? Why or why not? Would you like it to be? I think it could be. But I wouldn’t like it, it’s fun to learn about other countries and their life but I still like normal learning when your talking to the teacher and doing work in your books and with classmates.