Introduction
At the start of term 2 our year 7 cohort got involved with a project that has been developing for many years. “Project Utopia” is a project that is used to redesigning Fremantle port to make it more sustainable and liveable. Fremantle Port will be moving to Kwinana so the port will become vacant and the redesigning will begin.
This project began in English, by reading The Giver. Throughout the book we learnt the difference between a utopian and dystopian society. Then we learnt about liveability factors. We had an excursion to Fremantle Port, where we explored all the history of landmarks of Fremantle Port. We made vision boards to pitch our ideas, we included, global goals, pictures, and headings. A lot of planning, communicating & perfecting went into designing the project. In the end, we presented our final “Project Utopia” plans to special guest and parents.
The Giver
In term 2 we read a book called “The Giver” The book was about a boy living in what he thought was a perfect world. This book gave me an understanding of how someone can perceive a world to be perfect and a utopia. “The Giver” was a very important part of the learning process to understand project utopia more. “The Giver” represented a Utopia that is controlled and portrayed as being a paradise but in actual fact it is actually a dystopia. This related to Project utopia because it showed us the difference between a utopia and dystopia.
Global Goals
Leading up to the future of Fremantle redesigning we focused on the global goals and learning about each one and the importance of the global goals. The Sustainable Development Goals are a collection of 17 interlinked global goals. My group and I focused on a few global goals in our project and sought to find the best solutions to accomplish each one.
ASC Capabilities
The ASC Capabilities wheel consists of 10 skills that are needed to make a positive difference in a collaborative environment. They come under 3 categories, which are positive relationships, spirited agency, and powerful thinking. Throughout Project Utopia, I focused on developing my effective communication skills. My self and my group members all had different perspectives on what we wanted our project to contain. We all communicated we were able to combine ideas to improve them. I feel that I communicated effectively with my group to achieve the best possible result for our project.
Excursion to the port
In term 3 the year 7 cohort went on an excursion were we learnt about all of the history of the port. We went to the maritime museum and learnt all about the history of it. We also found out some very important details like how the maritime museum is heritage listed so it can not be destroyed. We learnt about the culture of Fremantle port and enjoyed a visit to the lighthouse. A very important thing we learnt about was the size of Fremantle port since it is really big we got to understand the size more. This helped to understand and create better ideas for our project.
Vision board
The next process in “Project Utopia” is the vision board. The vision board was made to pitch our ideas to staff, students, grandparents and parents at the presentation. The presentation that occurred was our first presentation about the project. We needed to prove why our ideas for Fremantle port would be the best suitable ideas. Each member in our group focused on a part of our vision board. In the presentation we all wrote a script and talked about the idea that we worked on. We presented our vision board to the grandparents since the presentation fell on the same day as grandparents day. We got a lot of feedback from the grandparents since everyone has different perspectives and the grandparents gave us a whole new perspective. The feedback was very helpful and made us think about our project in more detail.
Project Utopia Pitch
For the our project utopia pitch we had to present our model piece , and a model that our group had either physically or digitally created. Our group decided to create a co-space with our ideas for the project. we also created a model on Minecraft that we decided not to include in our presentation. For the presentation we presented twice. The first time we presented to our class and were assessed. The second time the parents were invited to come in to the class and here our pitch. Each group spread out in the room and got a table each to display their presentation and model(s). The presentation had to be between 2-3 minutes for each speaker. The parents’ feedback and question was very constructive and helpful.
Conclusion
Throughout the year I have learnt many new and interesting things. I learnt how important it is to be sustainable when thinking of the future of a city. I also learnt a lot about Fremantle and the port. Overall this project was a lot of work, but it was very interesting. I am so grateful to be in a school that could take part in this amazing project to improve Fremantle and the port.
