Where does chocolate come from? What is the difference between cacao and cocoa? Where are cacao beans grown? How are they harvested and turned into chocolate? Is it ethical to use child labour in cacao plantations? What does Fairtrade mean?

These are some of the questions put to visitors viewing the Geography Week display in the Resources Centre in November. The focus on chocolate corresponded with the Year 9 Geography investigation into rainforest biomes, and specifically cocoa production and ethical farming practices. The interactive display invited students to “follow the chocolate trail” and make discoveries along the way:

• see real cacao trees from tropical north Queensland
• feel the texture and weight of cacao pods
• carry a 15kg sack to experience the weight carried each day by many children sold into slavery to harvest cacao beans
• taste cacao beans, both raw and roasted
• observe the great variety and form of chocolate products
• view infographics about cocoa and chocolate production
• read about the importance of choosing fair trade products

The Resources Centre in collaboration with the geography department conducted lessons for the Year 9 Geography students to gain in-depth knowledge of cocoa production, child exploitation in the chocolate industry and the ongoing efforts of fair trade organisations to improve farming and labour practices.

To coincide with the chocolate theme, the library has launched the Summer Chocolate Reading Challenge. All students and staff are challenged to commit to reading three, six or nine novels over the summer holidays. Readers are asked to post a book review per challenge level to earn a Fairtrade chocolate on their return to the College in 2018. For more details, click here.

No money is changing hands!

Mr Ross Tarlinton was joined by his wife, Lorna, and his children for his final assembly after 12 years as Headmaster.

The 1st Basketball team was presented to the school at the final assembly for the year. In the team from Year 9 was Quinlan van Jaarsveldt.

At last Thursday’s assembly a number of sport awards were presented including one to Josh Noye who was awarded the Grogan-Murphy Memorial Trophy for the Best Athlete Cross Country Open Team.

Also receiving awards were the points winners from the College Swimming Carnival last Wednesday. Year 9 boys won in both the u14 and u15 age groups:

14 year old boys

1. Jordan Lancaster – Red – 88
2. Jarrah Ronan (Year 8) – Red – 86 *Tied 2nd
3. Aymeric Moloney – Red – 86 *Tied 2nd

15 year old boys

1. Kane Rodwell (Year 10)– Gold – 92
2. Joe McCauley – Gold – 90
3. Lachie Sinclair – Green – 70

Also recognised for breaking a college record:

Will Gibbs – 2.20.26 200m Freestyle Juniors – previous Bronson Ronan (2013) – 2.35.03

Also recognised were Tyler Banducci, Mitchell Quick and Brendan Zenere who are representing the College in the 2nd Tennis.

Congratulations to Massimo Fiore who took out the best student cake at the Year 9 Cake Stall at the Spring fair last weekend. The winning cerise and blue cake was purchased by a parent and donated back to Year 9.  The delicious sponge was demolished by the boys on Tuesday night.

Fish and chips, cricket, touch footy and basketball by Sydney Harbour at Drummoyne Oval on Saturday evening.

During a busy week, a busy term and an even busier weekend Year 9 students, parents and friends came together to celebrate the well-loved Charles Dickens tale ‘A Christmas Carol’ adapted for the stage as ‘Scrooge’. It was a significant effort and achievement.

A full house enthusiastically received the performance and the nuanced message of the play as the Year 9 boys generously stepped into the shoes of their characters, supported each other and showed the benefits of their work in creativity, collaboration, critical reflection and communication in the classroom and for the stage.

A big thank you to Di Fazio, Judy Gillespie and Bridget Tate for their support of the boys; Alice Morgan (our production and costume person from our Musicals) for supporting the ‘look’ of the show; Year 10 Drama for the lighting, video recording and sound; Alliance Catering and the Friends of Joeys Drama for their superb contribution to the night of student theatre; Michael Blair and David Hill for their unwavering support of the boys.

‘Our job is to take the audience into the dream we have created on stage’.

Conor McPherson.

All present certainly agreed the boys created that dream on Friday night.

Mr Pat O’Shea

Head of Drama

Last Friday during Period 6 Mr Capelin’s and Miss Clark’s  Commerce classes had a guest speaker. An SJC Old Boy from the class of 1991, Mr Matthew Roberton.

Mr Roberton is a criminal lawyer and took the time to share some first hand stories which were related to the current topic of Law in Action. He shed some light on the different types of punishment, the bail application process, the life of a criminal lawyer and various other matters that boys have been learning about.

Lots of interesting stories and lots of questions from the boys.

Apologies for the delay in posting, below are details from the 2nd XI Cricket courtesy of Mr David Wiseman.

The St Joseph’s College 2^nd XI cricket team travelled to Riverview for the round 2 competition game against St Ignatius’ College.  With day 1 washed out, the game reverted to a 100 over match on day 2.

The Joeys team played strongly to defeat St Ignatius’ by 6 wickets with only 2.2 over reaming.

Match Scores:  St Ignatius’ 10/144 (52 overs) defeated by St Joseph’s 4/148 (42.4 overs)

The year 9 boys again performed well with Adrian Dawson scoring a half century and being man of the match.

Adrian Dawson

Batting:                57 runs

Bowling:              1 wicket for 18 runs (4 overs)

George Martin

Bowling:              3 wickets for 26 runs (12 overs)

Ben Jones

Wicket Keeper:                faultless display behind the stumps and took 3 great catches

Willis Gunesekera

Bowling:              0 wicket for 29 runs (8 overs)

The matched paused at 11.00am for a poignant Remembrance Day ceremony.  The boys were exemplary in their participation in this service where we remembered our fellow Australians who had served in the wars.

The Year 9 Japanese class recently went on a dinner leave to a Japanese restaurant. There they were able to practice their Japanese and enjoy some delicious food at the same time.

Mr Corcoran’s science class today examining radioactive isotopes (from a distance)

The forecast is for a sunny spring day on Sunday 12 November for the always fabulous SJC SPRING FAIR.

In an exciting new development, Year 11 have organised a Ninja Warrior Obstacle Course on College A, B and C for students aged over 11 years of age. Replacing the Fashion Parade, participants will face challenges such as obstacles, high leaps, steep climbs, slides, balancing on wipe-out balls and a final plunge onto a stunt bag. Also testing the boys’ skills is the Great Basketball Shoot Out, down at the outdoor courts. Players must register before the Fair by contacting michmcd@tpg.com.au. Let’s not forget the carnival rides either – all your tickets can be pre-purchased from the Joeys Online Shop.

Kindifarm and the Happy Days Café at Kids Corner, featuring Elsa the Fairy, will enchant the little ones.

The popular Chocolate Wheel, organized by Year 10, has some amazing prizes: iPad Pro, iPhone 7, the yet-to-be released Xbox, signed 2017 Wallabies jersey, Bose headphones, a Dubbo zoo weekend, a Paddock to Plate package and lots, lots more. The Country Stall has wonderful produce from our rural and regional families across NSW, but would love more. There are jars in SJC Development Office if you would like to try some pickling!

Everything is set for a wonderful day – your Christmas shopping is taken care of with 53 stalls, your family can eat their way around the world at the food stalls and relax over High Tea. Battle of the Bands will entertain you – we just need more volunteers to put their hand up to help man a stall. Please get involved and meet your fellow parents, with whom you are sharing your Joeys journey.

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THANK YOU TO THE AMAZING SPRING FAIR COMMITTEE, REPRESENTED BY ALL YEAR GROUPS, PAST PARENTS AND OLD BOYS.

SJC PARENTS AND FRIENDS ASSOCIATION 2017

From Non-reader to English Teacher

The power of a book to change a life was clearly demonstrated at the latest Guys Read lunch. Books were not part of the childhood world of our guest speaker, Mr. Peter Tucker. Now an enthusiastic English teacher at the College, Mr. Tucker recalled that there were no books in his home and neither his parents nor siblings read much. In Year 5, his teacher encouraged the students to take home a book and recommended he read Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH, a 1971 Newbery Medal winner by Robert C. O’Brien. So involved in the book was he that remembers actually yelling out “No!” at a point in the story that shocked him. He was taken aback by his strong reaction and realised how powerful books could be, and so became an enthusiastic reader, moving on to the Narnia series and The Hobbit. He now enjoys reading across all genres and makes time to read for about 30 minutes each night.

Mr. Tucker brought along a selection of well-loved books from his collection, as well as his current read, Stephen King’s 11.22.63. This novel revolves around an English teacher(!) who stumbles upon a time portal and travels back to three years before John F Kennedy’s assassination. Determined to stop that event, he begins to investigate Lee Harvey Oswald but realises the many implications when you try to change the course of history. Mr. Tucker also enjoyed King’s collection of short stories, Different Seasons, in particular two of these stories that have been made into popular films: The Shawshank Redemption and Stand by Me.

Another favourite is the Game of Thrones fantasy series by George RR Martin. This highly successful series is heavily influenced by English history with the creation of whole worlds, ongoing wars, dragons, complex plots and conspiracies. Mr. Tucker found he developed a deep attachment to the characters, and suggested that you could read these books again and again. In fact, he recommends coming back to books you enjoyed as you always pick up new things; for example, he has read To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee at least six times.

The boys were also intrigued to hear Mr. Tucker’s description of the novel, The Wave, by Morton Rhue which explores the concept of conformity. In this book, a teacher starts a classroom experiment with the intention of showing the students the processes behind social control in Nazi Germany. However, things get out of control and the power of group pressure becomes a frightening reality.

We thank Mr. Tucker for sharing his story of reading, his favourite novels and inspiring the boys to continue their own reading. The Guys Read reading group meet two to three times a term in the library to chat about all things ‘books and reading’ – we encourage any boy who is interested to speak to Mrs. Roden in the library about joining the group.

Today during periods 1 and 2 the boys had a PDHPE excursion to the Joeys park. AFL coaches from the Sydney Swans were there to run the boys through AFL drills.

The 2nd XI cricket have 5  Year 9 boys in the team. Below is a match summary courtesy of Mr David Wiseman.

Following a long selection process, Adrian Dawson, Willis Gunesekera, Ben Jones, Will Maffey and George Martin were selected to represent the College in the Open 2^nd XI cricket team to play in the GPS competition.  The boys were presented with their playing shirts and baggy caps by Mr Ron Moroney (Assembly Guest) and Mr Tarlinton following the College Assembly on Friday.

Round 1 of the GPS competition commenced on Saturday with 2^nd XI taking on Sydney High at McKay Oval.  In a tough encounter, St Joseph’s defeated Sydney High 6/103 to 10/101.

Performances from Year 9 boys were as follows:

Willis Gunesekera

Bowling                               3 wickets for 31 runs (10 overs)

George Martin

Bowling                               2 wickets for 10 runs (8 overs)

Batting                 1 run (not out)

Will Maffey

Bowling                               2 wickets for 11 runs (7 overs)

Fielding                               1 catch

Ben Jones

Wicket keeper  4 catches

Batting                 2 runs (not out)

Adrian Dawson

Bowling                               0 wickets for 11 runs (4 overs)

Batting                 13 runs as opening batsman

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On Monday Glen Gerreyn, a motivational speaker from The HopeFull Institute, came to speak to the boys.

The boys each received a booklet which they used during the presentation. They learnt practical skills that enable them to effectively prioritise and manage their time, reduce fears of failure, combat stress, develop a growth mindset and become mindful. There were also activities on time management, goal setting and procrastination.

Courtesy of Mr David Wiseman, below is a report on the Year 9 boys in the 2nd XI cricket.

The year 9 boys did well again in 2^nd XI today.  With 5 year 9 boys playing, they nearly make up half the team.

We played the final GPS Trial against Newington and lost a close match.  Joeys scored 5/164 off 50 overs.  Newington scored 6/165 to win with 16 balls remaining.

Summary of performances are:

Adrian Dawson

Batting                                                 32 runs

Bowling                                               3 wickets for 26 runs (10 overs)

Will Maffey

Bowling                                               1 wicket for 21 runs (8.2 overs)

George Martin

Batting                                 16 runs not out

Bowling                                               1 wicket for 32 runs (7 overs)

Willis Gunesekera

Bowling                                               0 wickets for 36 runs (8 overs)

Fielding                                               1 catch

Ben Jones also played but didn’t get the opportunity to have a bowl or bat.  Ben was wicket keeper and was very tidy behind the stumps and took 1 catch

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