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High Notes, Vol 25 No 9, March 28 2024

From the Principal

High Talent

Swimming Carnival 5
At SOPAC last Friday night, 347 students and seven staff members supported our 31 competitors at the final GPS swimming carnival of the season. Our Juniors finished 5th, Intermediates 3rd, Seniors 6th and Opens 7th based on the seasonal tally. To win a Division requires consistent participation, as well as excellence, across the six carnival season. Jiazi Chen scored 80 points for winning four events on the night. Other event winners keeping the supporters cheering were Kester Jan, Brendan Tan, Jinu Shin, Makseem Kirev and Johnathan Zhou. Qualifiers for the combined GPS team – Will Meng, Joshua Chen, Ryan Chai, Kester Jan, Maksim Kirev, Joshua Park, Mark Yan, Jiazi Chen, Brendan Tan, Jinu Shin and David Kim. Well done, lads! Congratulations to our boys who will be competing at the Australian Age Swimming Championships in April at the Gold Coast: Ryan Chai, Jiazi Chen, Joshua Park, Brendan Tan and Oliver Yin. I would like to thank MIC of Swimming, Jake Rowlands for his organisation and inspiration of our team this season. He brought his competitive swimming experience to bear on team training and competing to influence and earn the respect of the boys. Thank you also to the Social Science staff who supported Jake this season.

Year 7 Progress Reports

Year 7 parents should ask their sons to see their Interim Report for each subject. The reports will be distributed by each Faculty from Monday, April 8. The idea of the report is to let parents know how well their boys are adjusting to school life and the workload involved for each subject. Also, having so many teachers is a fundamental change for students used to having one only for most of every day. The emphasis is on socialisation and how boys are coping with the work. Their ability to get organised and meet their commitments is being assessed also. The Interim Reports are dispositional and socio-emotional in content, rather than academic. Faculties have agreed on a standard Interim Report for 2024. They will report on 1-2 learning outcomes (e.g. well developed-developed-developing) and 3 learning behaviours with the same rubric. Talk to your son about how he is responding to the teaching in the various subjects in each of his subjects and about how he is adjusting to high school life. Is he coping with the workload? The travel? The timetable? Has he a friendship group? Is he involved in co-curricular activities? Most importantly, is he happy at High?

Spelling Tests in Years 7-9

We have too many ‘cusp kids’ – at HSC mark 88 or 89. They don’t quite get Band 6. Why didn’t they get there? Often, it is because their expression, sentence construction, spelling or handwriting or a combination thereof, produced what I call an ‘apprehension of flawed excellence’ in the mind of the examiner – conscious or subconscious – that led to a reduction in an assessed mark by the examiner on one or more questions, even if just by one mark. Teachers can’t be expected to have to move students from band 4 to 5 at the HSC in two years if expression is holding them back. Nor can they polish up Band 5 students to the band 6 standard very readily. We need to fix this problem in the Junior School. Many faculties have vocabulary lists aligning with topics taught. It is easier to learn to spell words you will be using. The Executive agreed (7.3.23) to commence 10-word spelling tests for every class in Year 7-9 once a cycle, to increase spelling accuracy in context. We are continuing on that policy in 2024.

Weights Room Memberships have closed

Memberships for the Weights Room have now closed. The free trial period ended as of March 26. Thank you to the many boys who value this facility and have joined for 2024. Quite a few Year 7 students took advantage of our great introductory offer to join the weights room for their first year for just $180. Kurt Rich can now focus on the personal preparation, training, and development of all members. From now on, training session times to suit all members can be allocated. Visits when space is available are unlimited throughout the year and extend to school holidays when the weights room is open but with reduced hours. The development and maintenance of core strength is enhanced through regular weights room programs and sprints sessions. Another opportunity to join the Weights Room will be made available in semester two.

Paragraph Conscious Pedagogy: Expositions

Expositions persuade by arguing one side of an issue. Commonly, expositions follow a structure – thesis-argument-reinforcement of thesis. Thesis – Author’s position on an issue + a preview of arguments to follow. A question or emotional statement may be used to capture the audience’s attention. Argument – a series of points and elaborations. Reinforcement of thesis – Author’s position restated + arguments summed up to reinforce the author’s point of view. Expositions feature emotive language to express the author’s attitude (modality) – alarmed, appalled, concerned, worried, outraged, frustrated, angry, shocked, dismayed, disheartened, excited, inspired, gratified etc. Will, may, must, always, rarely – emphasise frequency of occurrences. Qualifying words are also used – usually, probably, often, most of the time. Linking words are common – firstly, secondly, thirdly, in summary, on the other hand, by comparison, however, therefore.
Dr K A Jaggar
Principal