This morning at assembly the College observed ANZAC Day. An old boy of the College, Daniel, was the special guest at the assembly. He is a current member of the armed forces and has served in Afganistan on three occasions.  He spoke about the friends that he has lost in combat. He also spoke about what ANZAC Day means for him: attending a dawn service, paying respect to his mates who have lost their lives, and spending time with his family.

A number of Year 9 boys were involved in the ANZAC Day assembly. Callum Peacocke carried the New Zealand flag onto the stage for the laying of the wreaths. Michael Anastassiou, William Qiu, Nicholas Davies, Ben Wood, Lachlan Burgess, Matthew Smith, Alex Sestanovic, Lachlan Saar and Rhys Barrow were all involved in playing music for the assembly.

A number of Year 9 boys received Academic Application awards at assembly today. To receive one of these awards, boys must be nominated by a number of their class teachers for working hard in class and during study.

Year 9 who received awards:

Patrick Bingham, Marcus Busch, Max Cullen, Nicholas Davies, Angus Dermody, Joseph Doherty (absent), Christian Dow, Curtis Fricot, Dempsey Gascoigne, Kaylam Hogan, Samuel Kanaan, Daniel O’Brien, Joel O’Donnell-Goodman, Matthew O’Malley, Oliver Sidgreaves, Francis Stackpool, Nicholas Stapleton, Edward Sykes, Julian Visalli

Year 9 did the readings, offertory and distribution of mass booklets at our Sunday evening mass tonight. The mass was said by Father Tom who is an Old Boy of the College.

Mr Brooks’ commerce class used Quizlet live in commerce today. Competition was fierce as the boys were randomly grouped into teams onto their laptops and they competed to match words to definitions in real time.

This morning in Year 9 Henry Arthur received a pennant on behalf of his undefeated tennis team.

Joe Doherty received recognition for his bowling 6/8 off 6 overs in his cricket game against Newington.

Today at recess was the 20 minute recess challenge which was fund raising for the Lenten appeal. As posted previously, during Lent the boys have been raising money for the Marist La Valla School in Cambodia.

The boys brought in a selection of cakes after the Easter weekend that were sold in aid of this worthy cause. Luckily for the boys I think many of the cakes were actually made by their parents rather than the boys themselves. They were certainly delicious!

Year 9 raised $674.84 during recess. Across the school we raised $4,196.90. This money will be added to the total raised during Lent. The total amount raised will be announced very soon.

A big thank you to all the parents who organised the cakes to be sent in to school as well as the parents who assisted during recess. Thanks also to Ms Kelly Oastler who organised the recess challenge.

Cakes before

A few left over cakes after

This afternoon Mr Vane-Tempest’s class used Kahoot! which is an online maths competition. The boys in the class compete against each other to answer questions and get the highest score.  Today the boys were solving equations and collecting like terms of algebraic equations.  All the boys in this class did very well in their recent ATB examination.

“Oscar Schindler was a highly imperfect saviour. And as Catholics, don’t we all love stories about the Saviour?”

For our Term 1 Books & Blokes Breakfast we were thrilled to welcome Australian living treasure, Thomas Keneally, author of over fifty books, and his daughter, Meg Keneally, who co-authored his latest novel The Soldier’s Curse.
Thomas on writing: Writing is one of the few things I can really do well and I am incredibly lucky to have been able to write for a living. As a school teacher at Homebush I knew nothing and had nothing to tell, but I began to research interesting people and events in history for inspiration.

Meg on writing: I am grateful to have had the opportunity to write and I absolutely loved being a newspaper reporter which helped inspire me to have a go at writing this novel.

Thomas on writing Schindler’s Ark: I am fascinated by the human condition which allowed highly educated people to be brainwashed into following Hitler’s ideology. Hatred between races has always fascinated me. As a child, being Irish and Catholic meant you were hated by many. The idea of hating someone and wanting to exterminate them based on their race is extreme and delusional. I don’t like Parramatta supporters, but I don’t want them exterminated.
When I heard the story of Oscar Schindler I was fascinated. Schindler was a flawed character – “a highly imperfect saviour and as Catholics, don’t we all love the Saviour?”

Meg on researching Australian history for the novel The Soldier’s Curse: I have always had an interest in Australian history. I am particularly interested in the female experience in history, which is often overlooked. I discovered that many female convicts in the early 1800s were utterly powerless, yet went on to become highly successful. The Soldier’s Curse is set in Port Macquarie in the early 1800s which was established as a penal colony for second offenders. The extreme isolation of Port Macquarie and the multi-dimensional characters help to create story tension and make for a great read.

Our next Books & Blokes Breakfast will be held on Tuesday 24 May where we will welcome Holocaust survivor and Joeys grandfather, Tom Fleming (formerly Fleishman), who will speak about some of his experiences and the writing of his book Lolli’s Apple.

Friday 18 March is the National Day of action against bullying and violence. The College Resources Centre has a display and and some books which deal with the subject. In the Year 9 dorms there are a large number of posters profiling Year 12 students who are taking a stand against bullying and staff will talk to the boys about this throughout the day.

More information and resources on the day are available here:

http://www.bullyingnoway.gov.au/

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Today the boys heard from Ms Clare Martin, the College psychologist about some strategies for developing a resilient mind. Luckily from all of the brain dissections which occurred in Science earlier in the term the boys knew all about the different parts of the brain. We learnt about the effects that long term stress can have on the brain and also the body. We discussed how the way we think about things can affect the way that we feel.

Year 9 will continue to learn skills to develop resilient minds throughout the year.

Some images from the Head of the River at Penrith.