This year through hard work l have achieved many of my goals in school, sport and my grades overall. I feel like l have taken the responsibility to imporve these areas and have been more organised with balancing my schedule through dance and study/school.

Along with improving my grades in all of my subjects, making the school swimming team and been awarded champion girl in atheletics, I have also had the pleasure in performing in two dance concerts at school which I have really enjoyed. One of my biggest achievements has been teaching little kids how to dance, it has been very challenging and very rewarding. The children I teach are between the ages of 3 – 11 at my local dance studio, I teach the style of acro every Monday for 2 hours and 30 minutes and do the same times on Thursday.

I have been dancing at Elevate my dance studio for 4 years and was asked at the beginning of this year if l would like to start teaching by my dance teacher. I was very exited with this opportunity as l love dance and have always wanted to teach little kids. I had to talk to my parents about how l would stay on top of school, write a study schedule for them to keep up my grades even with extra time required to teach at the studio, I was very happy when my parents said yes and trusted me to take on this amazing opportunity l was given.

For me to take on this experience and to be given it there were many people involved. My parents were a massive part of this as they trusted me to stay organized and be on top of my school work while handling my dance, teaching and school work as well. My dance teachers also were very helpful and have supported me and trusted me to take on this amazing opportunity. l was so thrilled when they asked me as l also want to be a teacher and be part of the staff at the studio. I am very thankful with how these people help me accomplish and achieve this goal and see how hard l can work and help with the running of the studio.

I was not expecting this experience and was extremly happy when l was offerd this by my teachers that l look up to and are my role models. l was happy and exited as they saw the potencial in me and trusted me to have a part in the studio and work with the team. One of my dance teachers Miss, Sarah was a teacher at the dance studio but sadly she left, as she went travelling before starting her studies at university. They were looking for someone to assist the younger classes and help teach acro along with helping with concerts and other duities around the studio. I was offered this amazing opotunity and was very happy that l got this chance to teach dance and insire others to love dance as much as l do.

Firstly I had to ask my parents if they thought it was a possibility. They were a little worried at the start as they were not sure how I would fit the time in for my studies and my own dance. They did however realise that it was important for me to do it and that it would be wonderful work experience for my end goal of wanting to be a teacher.

I had to prove to them that it was possible to commit to my studies and dance. We sat down and talked about how my study is very important, they did acknowledge however that a job in dance is something that was perfect for me while at high school. We worked on a study plan and drew up a timetable on when I would do my studies ( and my jobs around the house). The timetable is very strict and the hardest part is the few hours I have to do Saturday morning and Sunday afternoon, but this does give me time with friends over the weekend. Mum also found me a tutor to help with my Maths, and Zoe Dallimore helped me on Wednesday morning and then I had my English tutor, Mary Reynolds who helped me as well.

I am very proud of myself and this achivement l accomplised, I knew that if l started this job l had to work extra hard on my study and school work and thats what l did l am so proud of myself this year and how l have handled all my work on top of my dance and tecahing, and still doing meeting my expectations for my grades at school. I have been teaching for quite a while know and love it so much and am so greatful and happy l was given this amazing experiance by my role models, that l look up to every day of my life.

I am hoping that l continue working at the studio for many years to come, as l love it so much. I hope that l still continue teaching and are given further responsibilities while still keeping up my grades. I have actually imporved on many of my grades this year and I think this is because I have a structured timetable that my parents ask that I follow. I very careful not to let this slip and put alot of work into achieveing good grades as I know my parents can make me reduce my hours in the studio if I dont perform, and that would be terrible.

I also hope that l can be more independent and maybe even start to run classes by myself when both of my teachers are sick or just cant make it in. I feel like l have done very well this year in my teaching and am very happy with my studies and sporting achivements this year.

One other area I would like to be involved in 2024 is looking at opportunties that I could work in at school with helping the younger students in primary school with sports and arts. This is something that I could prehaps speak to my house teachers about at the beginning of next year.

In science class, we teamed up to make earthquake-resistant buildings. The catch? We could only use spaghetti and blue tack! Our tower needed to be at least 60cm tall and have a base no larger than 30cm x 30cm. Up top, we had to add a platform that was at least 5cm x 5cm. The real challenge? Ms. Allen shook the table, and our building had to stay standing for a whole 10 seconds. We got to try twice, fixing what went wrong in the first try for our second prototype.

For this project, we had to build a strong building that could withstand an earthquake for 10 seconds. We looked into ways to make buildings safe during earthquakes and found a method called the ‘base isolation’ system. This involves using flexible pads between the building’s base and the ground. We planned and drew our building, aiming for a stable hexagon-shaped base. However, it didn’t work well; the structure tipped, and spaghetti parts kept falling and breaking when we added more levels.

We had to create a new design because the first one was too fragile. The new prototype was much better, and we both agreed on the improvements needed. To enhance the outcome, I would suggest doing more research early on to create a better prototype sooner. This would save time for testing and other project tasks.

At the project’s start, I led as both project and equipment manager, while Monique took charge as the Speaker and reporter. We made a great team. I brought creativity, energy, and a helpful attitude. Even when things went wrong, I stayed positive and kept the team’s spirits up. Monique excelled in speaking confidently, a skill I lacked, so her strength was a big help. She was also creative, which paired well with my ideas. Together, we created a project that was better than what we could do alone. Monique’s speaking and my energy made our project stand out, even in tough times.

Sienna, Astrid, Eva, and I all contributed to creating all of our products, we all worked together in class to create the bracelets and we took some home as well to work on. Astrid and Eva did most of the scrunchies as they were the only two with sowing machines. Sienna and I worked on the Hair clips during class, we resin them as well as added glitter too. We all contributed to making the Bracelets as we thought that, we could all help, and that would be our biggest selling product.

We worked all together and shared all of our ideas so we could all be included and have a part in our 20$ boss project. We allocated positions as we had 3 different products, for example, some of us would work on the business side of the project like the posters while the others make products and helped with the physical side of the project. Everyone got a position that they were happy with and could work on so everything would run more smoothly and we could get it done on time. We changed positions each lesson so people got a chance to help with most aspects of the project, we had to work together to decide and figure out each position and how to create each of our products as well.

Prices were a massive part of our project if we don’t sell our product for the right price, we might not make a profit. During the market, we had to increase and decrease the prices throughout the market to make our profit higher, or if they are not selling we have to decrease our price so we could make a higher profit.

Our biggest competition would probably have to be Jining, Haley, Isabella, and Michelle’s group, as they were doing scrunchies and bracelets as well. This meant that we had to show our target audience – girls that our bracelets were amazing and better that our competition. This made us work harder as we knew that we had some competition.

When My group and I got to the market we had to be organized and be ready for all of the customers to come to our stall and buy our product. We laid out all of our bracelets at the front because we all thought that they would be our biggest-selling product. We were correct when everyone came up to our stall people just started trying bracelets on and seeing if it is the right color and if the bracelet fits their wrist correctly. The Hair clips did not sell as much as our group thought they would but still, quite a few sold. We all definitely thought that the scrunchies would greatly sell more but they did not seem to sell as much as our bracelets did. Closer to the end of the market we decreased our prices because everyone was starting to leave and we wanted to make more of a profit. In the end, we were all quite happy with how the market turned out and was also happy with our market price increase and decrease.

The location of your store is a very important aspect as well, as if you are not in a very good location you will not sell as much as the people in a better location. CESA was in a very good location and l was pleased with how we were placed, as we were in a crowded area so when people came in they saw our product straight away as we were at the front.

The dance routine for the Illuminate Festival was a process of completing different group and individual activities, choreographing our own parts in the freedom part of the routine, and including them in our dance. We did this one partner activity when one of us was a puppet and the other was the puppet master. We had to make up one count of eight for our partner as a puppet or a doll, and they did the same for us. Then we had to find another partner and teach them the choreography that Eva taught me. Charlotte and I were partners, and we both taught the choreography to each other and combined our dances. After we both learned it, we paired up with another group and taught the choreography to them, and they taught there’s to us as well. Then we added that to the Illuminate Festival dance. This activity helped me understand the type of choreography that we were learning and sowing at the concert. After we did this process, we did the unison triangle choreography and learn the dance as well as all the timing each of us was on. After we did this we did the tuning section and created it ourselves after this we had most of our group dance bits finished.

Our class worked together with the other year 8 dance class to create a binary structure. We both did separate pieces and we worked together and combined those pieces in one for the Illuminate concert. We both had the same style of dance which was a doll theme but we sometimes had our own class bits where we each performed in different bits. This relates to my school journey, for example, when we are at school and also on a test we kinda led back but when we get out of the test we get a sense of freedom, that we have finished and completed them finally, this relates to my school journey as test are quite a big part of high school.

This dance concert preparation helped me with my collaboration skills, as we did quite a lot of choreography in small groups. Sienna, Myself, Maya, and Eva were in a group and we created a dance piece to add to the choreography for the concert. My group worked very well together and listened to everyone’s ideas and contaminated ideas effectively as well. We started off by brainstorming some ideas and just telling each other some ideas we had about freedom and some dance moves to represent that freedom as well. We used teamwork to create our dance as we all worked together and used moves that were comfortable for everyone. Next time l think maybe we could be more time efficient as most groups had finished their dance when we were still adding on to ours. But overall l think we all worked well together and l was very happy with the way our choreography turned out in the dance Illumination concert.

In this dance, we effectively used space, time, shapes, energy, and different levels and movements as well. We used Space and movement in this choreography by moving around the common area and the grass area up the top and the gavel on the floor. Near the end of the dance we were we skipped around the common area and we used space by going into the audience and interacting with them as well. This used space as well as time for us to interact with the audience while we were still performing, so they felt like they were part of the dance. We used many different shapes in this dance like when we were in the triangle formation, and when we were doing that part of the dance where we used our arms to create shapes like straight and diagonal lines, and squares. When we were free in the dance near the end we had to have lots of energy to show that we were free, we also did this by untucking our shirts and taking off our braces we had to show that we were having fun and not being controlled by anyone anymore. We used many different levels at the start of the dance, some of us did our poses and movements on the floor while the rest of us were standing up this looked like we were efficiently using different levels. In each of the dance parts, most people were using different levels too. This dance experience helped me gain new skills as l was not use to this style of dance.

Reflection on the Illuminate Performance

_________________________________________

In this performance, I feel like my timing was very good as we had some tricky timing that we used and l feel like l was on the correct counts and time for the dance. I also feel my facial expressions and energy was great in this dance as near the start you had to have quite a serious face, and at the end, you had to have a face that represented freedom with your facial expression. In this dance energy was a key concept as in some parts of the dance, you had to have more energy than in other parts of the dance. I also felt like l was more confident than l thought l would be during the dance because l was quite nervous performing in front of the whole cohort, but when l go up there I felt like l did not show that l was nervous and when l started dancing it went away. I am proud of how l performed and feel like when l was on stage l have it everything.

I feel like my Group performed very well in the Illumination dance concert, our timing was great, and we were all on the right counts for the cannons, and the rest of the dance as well. I also feel like our group was great with spacing as we were all in the correct spaces and that made our dance look better and stand out more. We all knew the dance so we were not looking at each other to find out the next move, which was a big difference because it would not look as good if people did not know the dance so we did a good job with performing the choreography on the common. I feel like we did a good job of interacting with the audience even though no one stood up and danced we did well trying to get them involved, and making it more fun for them as well as how much fun it was for us. We worked together amazingly as a team and l feel like that improved our dance a lot.

The common was different to perform on than the stage as we were using different levels and it was more challenging as l am used to performing on a normal stage, so it was quite different for me to perform on the common. I feel like performing in the common went more with the theme l want to break free as we were outside and not on an ordinary stage performing so it gave our performance more creativity. Performing on the common also gave us more creative choices in our dances for example if we were on a stage Eden could not have claimed up that tree, which showed that we were breaking free.

I have learned quite a few things from this process and performance, I have learned dancing on different levels and relating/interacting with the audience as well. I have not interacted with an audience in dance before and it felt like the audience was having fun and enjoying it as well as we were. This will help with my future projects because we may need to make up a dance not dancing on a stage or interacting with an audience. This may help me in another way because l do dance out of school at Elevate Performace company and we may need to interact with our audience in one of our dances that we make up as well l sometimes do this as l interact with the judges at comps but usually l don’t really interact with the audience as we did in the Illuminate concert. This concert helps me with many new skills and my confidence in performing in front of people as well.

My group and I had an idea about using reused beads, making them into bracelets, and giving them to the kids at the hospital who are having a hard time. We made these bracelets with reusable beads, we made bracelets, rings, phone charms, and photo frames. We thought about people in need and everyone’s different sense of style.

Here are some images below us making the beads or phone charms.

We made many different prototypes before we came up with the best designs and colour schemes. We all worked together and contributed all our ideas. We worked well together and as there were many people in the group we had many different ideas and styles.

Here are some prototypes that made the final cut.

I think that we should have done more research into the donation of the beads. We were not as organized as we would have liked to have been and I feel if we had of researched more we could have known that hospitals will not accept recycled beads. This is because they have sick patients that the beads might affect, as they do not know where they have been. If we had of known this sooner, we would have had more time to enter and work on the 20$ boss stall.

We problem solved this issue by selling our beads and donated the money to the hospital.

Before we started our stall we gathered feedback from the teachers and other students. We needed to get this feedback from our group and teachers, so we presented in front of the class and showed them our ideas and designs. Sienna and I also presented our Logos showing everyone what our logo would look like.

This allowed us to change a few of our ideas so our product would sell better in the $20 boss market.

The day arrived for the $20 boss market and we were very organized with the set up of our stall. I think we presented the items we had to sell extremely well and the sales showed this. Our rings and bracelets were very popular as were our phone charms. We took shifts working at the markets so everyone could contribute. I did the first shift at the market and it was very busy and everyone said they loved our products.

At the end of the markets we made around $100 and I feel proud that we can donate this to the hospital.

The Population of penguins has dropped 80% in the last 15 years, most of the decrease has happened since 2017. At the moment there is an estimate of only 300 penguins on the Island.

 Rockingham is the only place in WA where you can view penguins so it is very popular with tourists as well as locals. They are a big tourist attraction in Rockingham and are a big reason why people visit Rockingham ( along with the dolphins).

 Little penguins need to eat about a quarter of their body weight each day, and low fish numbers mean that many are dying. They have to swim further to find enough food. The Penguins become so tired and exhausted trying to find food, they cannot swim any further many die from fatigue.

 Rockingham Council wants to build a 3.3 million dollar discovery center on Penguin Island.

They want to start next summer.

Scientists and Conservationists are concerned that it will interrupt the breeding season and reduce the population. This will reduce the population even more. 

All Saints College

Ewing Avenue

Bull creek

WA 6149

May 13^th, 2022

Hon. McGowan’s MLA

Shop 13/7 Railway Terrace,

Rockingham

WA 6168

Dear Mr. McGowan,

I am Chloe Maxwell, a 13-year-old resident of Rockingham, (I live just up the road from you).

I am concerned about the population of our little penguins on Penguin Island. As you may be aware, over the last 15 years the penguin population has fallen by over 80%. Did you know there are only 309 penguins left on the island? There were only two births this year, which is the lowest ever recorded birth rate on Penguin Island.

I am very concerned about the proposed new discovery center that is to be built on Penguin Island because it will bring more tourists and disturb the penguin’s habitat. This will impact the penguins during the birthing season. More people will fish which will leave less fish for the penguins. It will bring more boats which might kill the penguins.

I have some suggestions to protect our penguins.  I think we should build the discovery center on the mainland as it will give the penguins a chance to increase their population.

Another idea is to close the island during the birthing season to allow the penguins to recover. The penguins do not like to give birth near noise. So building the discovery center on the mainland, this would give the penguins more privacy and less noise as little birds are quite sensitive and don’t like being disturbed. This would increase the population as they would have fewer people bothering them during their birthing season.

We could also have a no-fishing policy within 1 Kilometre of the island. This could save some of the penguins as most penguins die from starvation. If there is more fish around the area for them to feed on, then the penguins will not die from starvation. They do need a lot of fish to live.

One final idea I have is to reduce boat speed around the island to avoid people hitting the penguins.

We need to save the island for the penguins otherwise there will not be an attraction for people to come and visit. I do believe the cute penguins are one of the top tourist attractions here in Rockingham and I would be very upset if generations to come couldn’t come and visit them as there are no penguins left.

I think we should leave the penguins in peace so they can recover and their population increase over the next couple of years.

Thank you for considering my concerns.

Kind Regards

Chloe Maxwell

Year 8 – All Saints College.

Sound Telegraph. (2022). Controversial Penguin Island information center approved. [online] Available at: https://www.soundtelegraph.com.au/news/sound-telegraph/wa-planning-commission-approves-penguin-island-discovery-centre-despite-strong-opposition-from-council-locals-c-6572685 [Accessed 17 May 2022].

The West Australian. (2021). WA’s penguins in dire straits as marine heatwave hits. [online] Available at: https://thewest.com.au/news/wa/wa-penguins-fighting-for-survival-c-4665290 [Accessed 17 May 2022].

Thompson, H. (2022). New Penguin Island tourism centre to ‘doom penguin population’. [online] WAtoday. Available at: https://www.watoday.com.au/national/western-australia/new-penguin-island-tourism-centre-to-doom-penguin-population-20220211-p59vuh.html [Accessed 19 May 2022].

Scientists in a flap about fate of Rockingham’s little penguins. (2022b). ABC News. [online] 29 Jan. Available at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-01-30/time-running-out-for-rockingham-s-little-penguins/100786312.

1. What is the project you have been working on?  What are the success criteria for the competition (i.e. how will your video be assessed)?  You may like to include a link to your video at this point (you can upload your video to Microsoft Stream).

In this project, we had to create a scientific video about change. For this project me and my group decided to do our video on volcanic change, we did quite a bit of demonstration and we added lots of interesting facts as well. We made our video easy to read and also easy to understand for younger ages as well. Overall this was an amazing process and was verry fun to film.

In this project, we got to choose who we would like in our groups. We choose each other because we all had similar ideas about what we wanted to do for this particular project. In the end, l went with Eva, Emelia, and Safeera. We choose our roles as Emelia wanted to record and Eva and I wanted to do the demonstration and Safeera wanted to edit. I think we could have planned the demonstrations a bit better but overall l think we work well together and did a really good job.

3. Did your group have any disagreements? What strategies did you use to resolve these conflicts? How would you improve your work in this aspect if you had another opportunity to repeat the project?

My group and I did not have any disagreement, as we all had an input and we all listened to each other’s ideas. I really enjoyed this project and l liked how we worked well together in groups that we got to choose. I am really happy with how our project has turned out so far and all the work that everyone has put into it.

4. How did your group manage your time? Did you finish the project on time? How would you improve your work in this aspect if you had another opportunity to repeat the project?

My group and l work really well as a team and managed our time very well as we knew what we were going to do in each lesson. I would not improve my work as l thought we did verry well.

Task 1.

Adventure: This value is of high percentage to me as it is a very important part of my life.

I have done lots of adventurous things in my life like, I have bungy swung off a high bridge in New Zealand and I ski big mountains ( I even won the New Zealand big mountain championships). I love doing lots of fun and exciting things as l like pushing myself to live my best life possible and to try everything that comes my way. I love doing these adventure activity’s as well because it makes me feel like l have accomplished something and it gives me a good feeling when l have done it.

Family and Friends: I put this as the most important item on my house because my family and friends mean a lot to me, and they are always there for me when l need them and always make me feel better when l am down. My friends are so much fun, we play together and make games up that are so funny, they make me laugh even if I don’t feel like laughing. We always try new things together and push each other when we know they need pushing. My family means a lot to me and they we always there for me and always push themselves to do fun things with me. I can talk to them when l have problems and we always do fun and exciting activities together that I haven’t tried before or l have tried before but we still go and try it again.

Teamwork: Teamwork is 10% of my house because it is very important to me. I use teamwork a lot in my day-to-day life, l use it for dance when we have to do group dances and work together and we all need to be on the same beat and communicate with each other. I use teamwork with my friends when we need to work together to finish a task or to work together to win our basketball game all of these things for me represent teamwork. Teamwork is also important in my family home. We all work hard to keep the house clean and have our own jobs and the more we work together – the more fun we can have.

Task 2.

——- Heathy ——–

Layne Beachley

——- Unhealthy  ———

Kim Kardashian

My Reference:

Kim K

Life & Style. (2021). From Closet Organizer to Billionaire! Kim Kardashian’s Transformation. [online] Available at: https://www.lifeandstylemag.com/posts/kim-kardashian-plastic-surgery-before-after-151692/.

Girlfriend. (n.d.). A Breakdown Of All The Kardashian-Jenners’ Rumoured Plastic Surgery Procedures. [online] Available at: https://www.girlfriend.com.au/kardashian-surgery.

Layne Beachley

Layne Beachley. (n.d.). ABOUT LAYNE – Layne Beachley’s Insiring Journey. [online] Available at: https://www.laynebeachley.com/about-layne/.

sahof.org.au. (n.d.). Layne Beachley | Sport Australia Hall of Fame. [online] Available at: https://sahof.org.au/hall-of-fame-member/layne-beachley/amp/.