I WONDER WHAT IT WOULD BE LIKE IF WE WERE REFUGEES? Authors Thomas and Jeremy

I sit in the cold, musty dirt. Madmen running around, waving guns in our faces. Every thirty seconds, I hear a scream of someone being slaughtered.To escape from this hellish place, I run in one direction for the sake of my life. There's blood in my eyes and I can barely see a thing. A man suddenly appears in front of me and we collide. He's holding a large blood-stained machete. His hands are red and I can tell he's a mass murderer. He grips me by the neck and prepares for his hundredth kill. Suddenly a gunshot rings in my ears. The man falls to the ground and I see my father holding a pistol aimed towards the man. I sprint towards him and fall into his arms.

He tells me we need to leave. Now! I'm heading towards a boat trying to escape from this place of horrors. I feel a cold shroud of pain, sadness and anger as I approach the old, wooden pier. A crowd of scared, worried people are following my mother, father and my younger sister. As we board the structure of old wooden planks held together by rusty nails. Gunshots suddenly ring in our ears and half the group falls down at our feet. We finally get out of reach for them to damage us and board this so-called boat.

We sail along the deep, blue ocean. Our boat falling apart by the lapping of the water. Suddenly in the distance, I spot a small, rusty, navy ship, surprisingly it's big enough to hold us all. We're saved! I think. The men on the side on the boat are holding guns. Hopefully they're the Australian men that we've heard of. They dock right beside us and jump on our boat. Everybody screaming and running for protection. I stand there shocked. I don't know why everyone is running about screaming. Suddenly I realise who there are. They're pirates.

We're laying on our knees with our hands on the back of our heads. These pirates are the creatures from hell. They take all of the people’s money that they actually have left. They finally come to my family. They ask for what we have and my dad tells then we have nothing. They know we're lying. The main pirate hits my father in the face causing him to fall. I scream at the pirates in a way I've never before. They look down at me and boot me up the hip. Immediate pain shoots up my side. It feels like agony. I can't help but hope that Australians aren't like this.

Days, weeks, even months passed. Hunger was feeding on us down to the bone. In the previous days, people have been falling dead from the lack of food and water. I can't bear watch the people that throw the bodies off the side. Suddenly out of the blue, someone calls out, "Land whole!" I'm so excited that I practically jump from my spot and sure enough, there's Australia. This is the place where people accept who you are.



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LOVE ME OR HATE ME - Author Ashleigh

Caroline woke up to the loud sound of her alarm that sat on her bedside table. She sat up and stretched her arms when she saw the time; it was 7:00am, she didn't want to be late for her first day of being a senior, so she quickly got up and got dressed in her school uniform. It was a white button-up short sleeved shirt, a red checked skirt that hung just above her knee and black school shoes with knee high socks. She brushed her loose, blonde curls into a tight, high ponytail, put a little bit of makeup on and rushed down the stairs. Caroline came to the doorway of the kitchen when she was hit by the beautiful aroma of her favourite breakfast, pancakes smeared in honey. 

“Good morning birthday girl!” her mother said while placing a plate full of pancakes on to the wooden table. “Good morning mum!” She replied in the most cheerful tone, “I am finally seventeen!” Just as she sat down to eat there was a knock on the door, she got up with a roll of her eyes and walked over to the door, she opened it and there standing in front of her was her best friend Collette holding a big box that was perfectly wrapped and tied with a massive purple bow. Attached to the bow was a perfectly written card that said ‘Caroline’.

Caroline was completely awestruck.“Hey, happy birthday, I got you a gift!” Collette shouted. Caroline took the present, her jaw still dropped. As she opened it, she saw a makeup kit, a dress and beautiful ruby red heels.“Thank you so much!” she gave her best friend a hug and invited her in. Caroline placed the box in the living room then walked into the kitchen. Collette greeted Caroline’s mother, Jenny before she sat down and joined Caroline in eating the unbelievably large stack of pancakes. After they finished they stood up and kissed Jenny goodbye before they left in Collette’s red mini.

They drove into the Grove Hill High School’s car park and parked the car. As they got out of the red mini they made their way the schoolyard, at the front there were two huge gates that were opened.

It was a massive school containing many double story buildings. They parted ways and walked to their lockers. Caroline opened her locker and grabbed her English books and notebook. As she closed her locker Collette ran up to her squealing and holding a flyer in front of her face. It read ‘Famous actor Chris Brochu attending this school to start a new life he has always wanted!” Caroline read and practically scoffed at the sight of his picture. “Great, I can’t stand him I mean he is such a stuck up jerk. Yeah right he wants a normal life; he’s probably doing it for attention” “How do you not like him?! He is so cute and you don’t even know him!” Collette said.“I don’t care I just don’t like him” She replied “When is he coming anyway?”

“No one knows, but you know how new kids always come here in the beginning of the year? Well he is meant to be one of them.” Caroline nodded and walked off to class.

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THE MYSTERIOUS ROLLER COASTER OF MAGIC - Author Bryan

Tom was an ordinary ten year old boy who lived in Funsville. He didn’t believe in magic. While magic shows fascinated him, after every magic show he watched he tried to find out how the magicians had tricked their audience. He attempted to rationalise things that sometimes were inexplicable. Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny, were about the very least things that he would believe in without logical explanation.

During a golden afternoon, when walking home, he spotted a brochure on a street lamp pole that said, “Come and Ride Aduro’s Magic Roller Coaster.” He was very excited to see the brochure and sure wanted to ride on that roller coaster. Tom enjoyed roller coaster rides but was very skeptical about the magic stuff and he wanted to see it for himself.

Back at home, he told his mum about the poster he had seen and asked if he could go to the roller coaster ride. His mum agreed. Tom was very curious about the kind of roller coaster that he would see and he was getting very excited about it.

The following morning, Tom raced to the north of Funsville looking for the amusement site. He surveyed the landscape and spotted the magnificent giant roller coaster. He dashed towards it and found that he was the first person to arrive.

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FLAPPY BIRD LAND - Author Clarissa

97%...98%...99%....100% Ding! As soon as it came alive and opened its eyes, he saw a red and blue coloured man walking up to it and greeting him. ‘Welcome! We had decided your name is Mark. You’re a bird and you are in Flappy Bird land.’

‘What?’ mumbled Mark. ‘How did I get here?’ Mario replied ‘you are the main character of this game called Flappy Bird. This is your new home and occupation which was created by a man named Joey. All that you have to do is jump through the poles until you ‘die’ and the game ends. But the least damage that the game will do to you will just be bruise, minor brain concussions and maybe a broken leg or two. It’ll be fun even’ and Mario walked off leaving Mark in terror. ‘Just a brain concussion?’ Mark thought

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THE GOOD CHILD - Authors Luisa, Natalie, Jayden and Alicia

       

Chapter 1:The kids just aren't getting it!!!

One sunny day there was a small boy that was named George. The boy didn’t know many things. He didn’t even know how to write a sentence though he was eleven years old,  although a kindergarten kid or  if they were very smart they might be a 3 year old kid.

He was very scared of school because he always got bullied  from the people in his class. Today was Friday the last day of the week he was glad that he wouldn't get bullied too much during the day. But everyday is equal because he gets bullied so much. He can’t even keep track of how kids bully him and how many times they bully him each day. His mum said to me ” everything is going to be fine ok , “mum said“ you always say that and then it gets worse,” George added.

CHAPTER 2: THE BIG DAY ! Continue reading...

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MEANING OF WONDER - Author Richard

What is the true meaning of wonder?

Why does it make you ponder?

Is it because of unanswerable questions?

Or are we humans just always destined

To always wonder about things

Like why can birds sing?

Do you ever wonder who you are?

Or why you have that scar?

Wonder is an amazing thing

It causes people to think

Why are flamingos pink?

 It makes people very curious

About what is the universe?

Do aliens really exist?

Or are they just myths?

Will we ever know?

How deep is the sea?

That the great thing about wonder you see?

It causes old, young everyone

To really, really ponder.

That, my friend is true wonder.

  

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THE MAGIC STORY - Author Lucy

I went to a forest and it wasn't very dark. There were heaps and heaps of butterflies and the grass wasn't grass, it was emeralds, and there was a river with turquoise water. There was a flower as pretty as gold. There was a rainbow with a lovely sun. There were yummy oranges in the trees. There
were plants with flowers called lilies and there was a gingerbread house.

There were lollipop bushes. There was a fence made of coloured pencils and lollipops and near that gingerbread house there were three little bees and the three little bees names were Lily, Lilac and Lauren. There was a silly, funny lady bug and there was an emerald fairy called Emily and
there was a ballerina called Paige. Emily was the prettiest fairy and she lived in a lily flower.

Inside the gingerbread house there was a witch. The witch cast a spell on Paige and Emily and they turned into emeralds and feel onto the grass.

Lily, Lilac and Lauren, the three bumble bees, stung the witch. Lauren called her friends the pixies, and five pixies came along. The pixies turned the witch into a tree, and then into a rock. The pixies turned Emily and Paige back to normal. Next, Emily turned the witch into an emerald and she was hidden in the emerald grass forever. The ladybug was so happy the witch was gone and she played a tune on her ukulele and they all had a party!

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IF ONLY - Author Alyssa

I didn’t need to sit in the real world; I have one of my own. I could create anything, I can be anyone. The world I live in isn’t anything like the one that you do, my world is one that I can only obtain through my dreams. But that never stopped me. I could fly to the peak of a mountain, or swim to the ends of the world and all it took was a little inspiration, all it took was one dream and a little imagination.

The adventures I created, were just cover ups, my life was a complete misery, living in the orphanage for three years now , my friends started to call me a freak show and the other orphans wouldn’t go near me. It wasn’t my fault; I couldn’t hold back the tears as I rocked myself to sleep. I just wanted out of this nightmare; the only way was for me to create a world I could appreciate. Where my parents didn’t abandon me and my friends didn’t call me names.

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B an Author @ the EOC

In Term 2 we invited students to B an Author @ the EOC and submit an original story. Our aim was to collect a bank of stories written by students for students. The themes for the stories were: wonder, imagine and connect. We have had a fabulous response with stories from Kindergarten to Yr 10. A panel of judges have read the stories and cannot narrow down the selection to a few distinct winners. Students will need to read, comment and vote and hopefully together we will select some winning entries. 

Each day I will upload a story to the blog. 

A few online etiquette guidelines.

•   Feedforward - What you like about the story? 
•   Suggestions for the next chapter / character /where you think the place is /  etc 
•   Please do not comment for comment sake

There will be a link to a survey for each story where you can recommend the story by the star rating. 

Happy reading! Hope you find the stories as entertaining, though provoking and topics for discussion long after the story has been read.

Student award for best and fairest and greatest collaborator....Robert

At each holiday workshop we ask students to nominate the person who has been the most helpful in trouble shooting, building and programming. These holidays all the students unanimously voted for Robert. Robert is a quiet achiever who is very camera shy!! Robert has an unassuming manner and mentors other students in a way where students feel they have collaborated together to solve the problem. Robert is to be congratulated on his own expertise with Lego Robotics and his capacity to share this expertise with others.

Robo soccer takes off

Having started the road to Robo Soccer in the April school holidays it was great to see the boys persevere in the July school holidays to get a remote control version going with the App on the iPad. The boys were their own mentors and coaches using the Internet and trial and error to get the program working. We look forward to seeing their efforts at Robocup in August.

Student mentoring new students

A big thank you to Rachael for taking on the role of coach and mentor for Lego Robotics Dance. In one day Rachael taught the girls how to build and program! Their performance at the end of the day saw three Robots dancing and moving together with the music. A huge achievement.

Lego Robotics July Workshop

Great to have our Lego Robotic family back at the EOC for the July holidays. We continued our traditional "dance off" to 'Geronimo' by Sheppard. Teams were drawn from a ballot and the challenge was set to:

•  Work as a team with people you haven't work with before
•  Extend skills  - where programmers became builders and builders became programmers
• Creativity  - new dance moves and extra points for creativity and original moves

The challenge was on! We had two winners the Astromechs and The Steve's. Their dance programs are below:

Astromechs

The full program

The Steve's program was very clever using a random program that was calibrated to detect the edge of the dancefloor and move back into the centre.

The Steve's

The full program

Closely following in second position were the Double RR's

The full program

Also in second place were the Go Sport Team who co-ordinated both medium motors to lift the bar up while dancing.

Their program is below:

The full program

The World Cup Soccer fever came to Lewisham, Colleen was the team manager with whistle, yellow and red time out cards, Arun and Ron were goalkeepers. Lots of fun on the soccer field during breaks was had by all.

Photos and Videos can be found on our EOC Student Voice Site

Lego Robotics Day 1

Lego Robotics Slideshow

The best thing about today was learning how to program on the P.C. Some challenges for me was building the sensors so that they would fit. I learned that the U.S.B. stands for universal serial bus. I learned how to program on a P.C and I also learned how to download the programming from the P.C. to robot.

By Daniel Gross

Nice Friends

Rachel's Scratch program features an elephant and a cat. The interesting feature in Rachel's program is the inclusion of sound.

Nice Friends

Rachel's Scratch program is below. Clever way to time the different parts of the program by running each piece of code separately. 

Cinderella

Following on from our Coding Workshop students are sending in their finished Scratch programs. Alice's project is below. 

The program is about a princess needing to leave at midnight. The hardest part was getting the people to actually say the things I wanted them to and getting it to make sense.

Cinderella

Welcome!

Welcome to the EOC Student Voice Blog! This space was created to provide a space for students to describe their most challenging, rewarding and enjoyable learning experiences. Students are invited to share ideas, and encouraged to reflect on their favourite topics, appealing activities (in school and outside the school walls), and exciting tasks. Responsible 'Blog Netiquette' will be modeled so that all contributors learn to respect the feelings and privacy others, while helping to highlight positive learning experiences. Names of particular teachers and students are not required. The goal is to work together to 'pay it forward' so that others can learn from the snap shots shared by students. You are invited to help us gather ideas to promote learning experiences that are challenging, engaging and fun!