On the 20th of June, Middle School participated in the Semesterly STEAM Day, designed to bring their learning of the Semester to life. Each grade group participated in a wide range of activities, workshops, dances, experiments and listening to guest speakers to celebrate the end of the academic year.
Grade 6 kickstarted the day with a visit from Becki and Karen, who taught the students about the importance of bees, and why they are important to our ecosystem. They even brought in their very own hive they finished off their session with a honey tasting. Throughout the day they continued to learn about the life of the bee and finished the day by creating a Bee Hotel for the Marymount Campus. No Bee hotel could be complete without some music, so they spent some time learning about the frequency bees are attracted to, and Ms Oh had Grade 6 compose their very own songs for the bees.
Next up we have Grade 7 who spent the day learning about “Colour and Light”, where we were joined by Dr Suzanne Williams, from the Natural History Museum. She took the Grade 7s on a journey of how colour has evolved, and how every organism sees the world differently. Mr Barroca completed an interactive lesson on light beyond the visible and wowed the students with Rainbows, Secret Messages with UV and Lasers! Mr Marshall blew their minds with some incredible optical illusions, and they even had a chance to create their own! They ended the day with Mr Robertson and Ms McMahon who taught them about colour theory, using lighting on the camera, and how we can use these photographs to make our very own art.
Grade 8’s day was all about Sustainability. Here we welcomed Peg Jorgensen, the Chief Sustainability Officer at Microsoft. She had the students think about why we need to act now, and how technology could become more sustainable. They then spent the morning designing and creating their own wind turbines, before moving on to play a sustainability simulation game, and finally combined Dance, Drama and Poetry to finish the day. They performed in front of Grade 6 and 7 their final piece – immersive theatre and getting the audience to really think about the impact of Climate Change.
Overall, every student finished the day with a smile on their face, as they applauded the Grade 8s. Some students said they couldn’t believe how much they learnt and were impressed by just how fun learning can be.
