An autobiographical response by Blair Mayer.

An autobiographical response by Blair Mayer.

My first two weeks at Reddam High school were amazing, this is what we did. First was a day where we met more teachers and did some tests to determine our classes, then we had the swimming carnival the next day were Bennelong won (I was sad as I am in Darling). The next day we set off for camp, but this camp was different to other camps.

                                              Cataract Scout Park

    This camp was very memorable, on the first day we were put into cabins; my cabin was me, Jordy, Bryson, Zac, Mason and Jono. We were then put into groups to go and do activities with certain group leaders. My group was number 3 and first up we had orienteering.

Orienteering was a lot of fun, we all split up into groups of 2 or 3 (I went with Lucas Brown) we had to follow maps and stamp our cards at each post. Lucas and I came back 2^nd but another team already took the winners flag. A couple of minutes later we realized we weren’t all there. So we set out in different groups to look for the missing students, of course I was in the group that found them.

Then, we went back to camp to have afternoon tea, they gave us cake and cordial, after that they told us what our next activity was, it was challenge valley. Challenge valley was extremely fun, we had to crawl through mud, swing of ropes, walk on balance beams and crawl through pipes. We got very dirty.

After that we had dinner.  It was kind of fatty and the meat was dry, but I’ve had worse. After that was the most amazing part of the camp, the waterslide, (I mean how many camps have a waterslide?) it was long and bumpy and it was so much fun.                                       

  That night was pretty fun, after the waterslide we had supper (Milo in a small plastic cup), but I’m talking about after that when it was lights out. When it was lights out my cabin was actually quite tired but that didn’t stop us we were having loads of fun until some people wanted to sleep, after a moment silence we would hear, “shut up Mason” even though he wasn’t even talking.

The next morning breakfast was at seven, we had fatty bacon and oily eggs, but everyone ate as many hash browns as they could. After we were done eating we were told our activities for the day, I had rock climbing.

Rock climbing was pretty fun, I didn’t climb but I enjoyed belaying. Dan Butler was one of the best rock climbers I’d ever seen. After that activity we went to have morning tea, (more cake and cordial), next up the giant swing.

The giant swing was 15 meters tall, you would be harnessed up then you would be tied onto several strong ropes and when you are ready the whole group pulls you to the top, and then when you pull the rip cord you freefall about 10 meters and then you start swinging. This was very painful for me as the harness was twisted and was rubbing the whole time.

After that we had caving. I couldn’t do it, I went about 10 meters inside and I couldn’t breathe everything felt so small and like it was going to cave in. Although I couldn’t do this I could do what was next, afternoon tea that was a lot easier for me to do.

We all had waterslide next so that was again lots of fun. Then we had dinner, but after dinner tonight we went and played games but after about 10 minutes we had a black out and we continued using torches.

But with no power when we got back to our cabins this meant no showers because there was no warm water and we also couldn’t see our bags so we slept in our dirty smelly clothes.

This was our last day at Cataract scout camp, so we packed our bags and went to breakfast. After breakfast we had pioneering where e built a chariot and a catapult. But next we had the 12 meter giant flying fox were we also had to be harnessed up but this time we had to jump from 12 meters.

Then it was time to leave, the bus ride home was pretty funny because when I fell asleep Philipa drew all over my arm and leg. When I got home I slept until 8 o’clock the next morning, but it was one of the best camps I had ever been on and an even better first 2 weeks of school.    

Daniel Butler's first two weeks

My first two weeks at Reddam were much better than I expected. 

On the first day I woke up very early and was really nervous because everyone had built high school up to be a really big thing.I put on my uniform and new shoes and felt much more mature than I had at primary school because I knew I was now in high school.

I met lots of new people that I liked, even on the first day. 

I missed the swimming carnival on the second day because I was sick. 

On the third day, luckily, I was better because we were going to camp for three days and I really didn’t want to miss it. 

The bus trip to Cataract Scout Park was quite long but we still had a lot of fun. It was a good opportunity to get to know the other new students. When we arrived, we unloaded our bags and went down for afternoon tea and then headed to our cabins. I shared my cabin with Darcy, Ethan and Jonas who were friends from my old school. It was very rural out where we were. Over the next few days we did many activities such as Giant swing, Flying fox, Rock climbing, Challenge Valley, Caving and Orienteering. All of these were fun but I found the giant swing scary and I got lost in orienteering which seemed funny at the time. On the last night there was a black out in the middle of the night games and everyone was tired and a bit scared. We had to get a car to shine its lights through the door so we could continue the games. Later we left with our torches and I nearly fell in a ditch which gave me a fright but made everyone laugh.Camp was a very good way of meeting new friends and having lots of fun together. 

The next Monday was the first real day of schoolwork. We were given our classes and our timetables. I was a bit disappointed that I wasn’t in the same class as my old friends but I had already made new friends and it didn’t seem to really matter. I would see them all at lunch time anyway.

It was a bit hard to get used to changing classrooms and subjects every period but I started to get used to it by the end of the week. I made a mistake reading my timetable and was a bit late for one class and was told that next time I might get a demerit so I will try not to do that again. I was very nervous about my first english test but than I was told not to worry because it was only a practice test. 

I really like most of my teachers. I think I have already improved in Maths and am really enjoying English. I am now getting used to the school, teachers and especially the students who I did not know before.

So Far So Good!        

Daniel Butler

Dario Pizzuto CAMP!!-Task 1

Ah camp, the few days which make my year. I have many fond experiences of camp, but lets face it, I will never be able to tell you the really interesting things that we got up to. Although I won’t tell you everything, I will tell you the things we did that were legal. I hope they were because in my opinion challenge valley was a form of child cruelty, and no it wasn't the terrible crawling through mud, gurgling a mix of dead insects and what ever else was hidden beneath the murky surface. It was the part were you had to go home to your parents and show them the beauty and delight of your muddy, soaking, smelly and rotten clothes. 

Anyway the first memory that really struck me of camp was definitely the giant swing! I can remember all the thoughts running through my head, wait no, the weren't running they were sprinting, I felt a ridiculously strange sensation running through my body which I had never felt before. I think I was somewhere in between soiling myself and bursting out laughing. As the final tug was made to pull me up the sensation just got ridiculous, I swear I could almost see fluffy elephants flying in circles around me. I the took hold of the rope that would release me from the safety of the other ropes holding me up, and the countdown began 3,2,1 GO! I pulled the rope a couple of times and on the third pull the ropes snapped and I started to fall. I spread my arms and resisted the urge to hold on. As the the rope tightened and prepared for the swing I was sent hurtling upwards and soared like and eagle. Then being the typical idiot I am I said “Look Mama I’m flying!!!!” where the hell that came from I have no idea. Must have been those stupid fluffy elephants. 

The next memory I have is quite daunting and scary, it was the second day of camp and Harrison was taking a shower and came out screaming ‘There’s a frog in our shower!’ in excitement (and don’t worry Harry had clothes on, i’m sorry if I planted any images in your mind). We all rushed to see the frog that lurked in our cabin bathroom (that included all the people in our cabin which was Dylan, Jared, Don, Jett, Harrison). Jett and I tried to catch he/she but the slippery sucker squirmed out of our hands every time we got a hold of it. Eventually Jett caught it and he was rewarded with a fresh batch of urine, thats right he took a leak right on Jett’s hand. So much for hygiene. Well I’m sure by now your saying ‘Whats so scary and daunting about that?’ I didn’t mention the second part did I? 

He was back!! On the last day of camp I walked into the bathroom and then the ambush began, thats right I was ambushed by a frog. He jumped on my leg, and I didn’t move, I just welcomed him as an old rival, from yesterday. I called upon my good friend Jett. We once again embarked on an epic battle. We fought for 2 minutes and our friend Mr Froggy was then cornered. Jett and I then advanced upon the frog and Jett grabbed him, and released him into the wild. He took one last look at us and then he jumped out our line of sight.

Mr Froggy will always have a place in our hearts.

Moving on, somewhere around the beginning of camp we were lead to pioneering. We were given some blocks of wood and some rope. The final goal was to create a catapult which would fire a water balloon. There were two teams and I only had one target. Yes, it was the lethal Justin Bieber of Year 7 ‘Dylan Chilchik’. My turn came last and all the other team piled up in front of our catapult eager to get wet. Then I spotted my target behind the crowd trying to hide, ‘HAHA I’m gonna ruin your hair!!’ I thought to myself, I felt like a psycho and it was awesome. I aimed the catapult towards the crowd. I pulled back. Then at the very last second I changed my angle towards Dylan and fired... A DIRECT HIT, BOOM HEADSHOT.

Those were my most favored memories of camp and I hope I didn’t bore you much. I certainly enjoyed it a lot and can’t wait until our next camp! Year 7 will be great!

The Giant Swing

THE GIANT SWING

It was the second day of camp, all of us were just starting to get used to things around here, every day getting out of our comfort zone, experiencing new things. It was fun until you really started to get scared of something, it was the giant swing.

It was the morning we just woke up. It was weird how we woke up it usually worked like this. First one person got up and either got out of his bed or made a really loud noise then someone else woke up and did the exact same thing, and after a while everyone woke up and started arguing about who woke who up in the very beginning.

After a little argument one of us would go outside and see who else was awake and if they are not already awake wake them up... just for fun. Another would go outside and look at the schedule for today and see what they have in terms of activities. After a little while around seven o'clock Mr garret would come storming in and wake everyone if they are not already awake and scream “come on everyone fifteen minutes until breakfast,” and at that point everyone in our cabin started to fuss about who goes in the shower first.

Breakfast the most important meal of the day, we all lined up outside the mess hall with our cutlery, plates and cups, Eager to get some food. So we all rush in and found a place to sit down with all our friends. After that one of the instructors stood in front of everyone and told us all who's going first to eat, they did a little trick I hate in this case cause I was so hungry they said the quietest table will go first I was so I hungry I couldn't shut up, so which meant my table didn’t go first in fact oddly enough we nearly always went last.

After a satisfying breakfast the same instructor would stand up again and tell us what each group was doing today, at this point I was fine I wasn't worried about anything until they said “group four will be doing flying fox and giant swing,” and I said to myself, “giant swing, giant swing,” I didn't know what to do.

So after breakfast me and my shivering body followed the instructor and my group to the giant swing. I was talking to my friend in the group hoping my nerves would settle a bit, but they didn't so we got they THE GIANT SWING, my legs were shivering I was so scared I thought to myself that thing must be fifteen meters high it massive.

After the instructor explained the rules and safety requirements he asked who wants to go first one of my friends screamed out ME!! as they were eager to get on that stretchy sling of death but on the other hand I wanted to get as far away from that thing as I possibly could I watched her go higher and higher as we pulled her up, alright she was there at the top now I want to see how it works and then we counted down from three 3,2,1 and then she dropped so fast if you blinked you would miss it, screaming she was screaming as loud as she could and my mind was frozen stiff with the though of me doing that how and how scared I would be.

After time I thought to myself I should go up and try it, I was always told give everything a chance and plus you only live once so I made my decision I was going up on the stretchy thing of death. One of my friends just came off it and told me it was so fun now knowing that I was eager to get on he gave me his harness and I put it on, waiting in line with the people that have been pissing their pants to get on the giant swing they couldn’t wait and finally It was my turn.

I had to admit I was still a bit scared not scared enough not to do it but still quiet a bit scared I got to the top thinking i'm already up here I should just do it get it over with and then in the end I will be proud of myself so they started counting back from three which I didn’t like because it put me under pressure to do it exactly when they hit one but I wanted to go when I felt like it but then they hit one and my hand just jerked the blue string and I went flying down with the wind on my face, whistling through my ears and breezing through my hair it felt great and it was so fun , the giant swing was actually fun I was so happy I did it I wanted to scream it out into the world but then I thought hmm that would be weird.

I finally stop swinging the instructor unhooked me and I walked down the ladder, I was proud, proud of myself for getting up there and facing my fears and getting out of my comfort zone. Frankly enough after that I wanted to go on it again we begged him and begged him but sadly he told us we have run out of time. He sat us down after every big activity he did this he gave his own little speech saying that we should be proud of ourself for going out there and trying new things getting out of our comfort zone, expanding our comfort zone and facing our fears and he also said that as well as us being proud of ourself he was also proud of us which was really nice and heart warming.

By

Emmanuel Christianos

task1 by Ben Price

On the 31^st of Monday we went to school after the holidays were over. We were welcomed by year 8, 9, Mr. Garret, Mr. Pitcairn and the teachers. The teachers and our year coordinator showed us around the school. Then we had break, after a confusing morning, we talked and played in the playground. We were told about the rules on the campus, they were very stricked rules.

On Wednesday the 2^nd we went on camp, this was very exciting, and many people were excited about camp. Most people were looking forward to an activity called the Giant Swing. We had an hour and a half bus drive from school to Cataract Scout Park, on the bus we talked and listened to music, even though we weren’t allowed to.

After along bus trip we finally arrived at Cataract Scout Park, we all couldn’t wait to get off the bus and find out who was in our cabins. We hopped off the bus and took our bags, and then headed down to the dining hall for all information and instructions. We met all the instructors in the dining hall, after we had lunch and were told who our group instructors were and who was in our cabins.

As soon as we dumped our bags in our cabins we ran outside to our groups. Our group instructor ‘Nick’ he was aged in the twenties and he wore different colored glasses everyday, they were very cool. After Nick introduced himself properly we headed to an activity called Challenge Valley.

Challenge Valley was very interesting, because it was a number of courses; my favorite course was a course where you had to climb up a ladder and then go down six or more tires into a muddy pit full of dirty water and mud. Everyone in our group had a go and had lots of fun, after we completed Challenge Valley our group headed back to our cabins for a shower. We were very muddy.

By the time we got back to our cabins had a shower and got changed it was dinnertime, we all went to the dinning hall and had dinner. As soon as dinner was over, they told us that there was a waterside, everyone was really excited. We went back to our cabins to change and then headed for the slide, all of our groups raced to see which group got to go on first. The water slide was a long blue slide ending in a pool at the bottom of the hill.

We went superman style, on our knees, in a train and many more different styles. After the waterside we went back to our cabins to change and then off to bed, not that anyone actually went to bed, people were running around and making lots of noise, not me, until Mr. Garret came in. We all got sent outside with our active and sleepy heads on the wall, we stood outside for ten minutes and then went to bed.

We had a great camp.

task 1 (Josh Broyda)

My first two weeks at school (task 1) By Josh Broyda

“Ima Slap you……..”  were the first words that my friends said to me as I stepped into school on the first day back.  I’m not new to Reddam so the whole experience wasn’t that frightening for me I knew all the same people and all the staff. Basically, I knew everything about the school and how boring it can be...I started to mingle as you would on the first day back but then i heard shouts “CLASS TIME GET TO YOUR CLASSES” and then i began to  panic. I did not know what to expect...fortunately for me nothing happened.

As I was getting ready to go to bed that evening, the phone suddenly rung. I soon found out it was Jordan who called me because he wanted me to help him DJ at the Swimming Carnival. The next day was just awesome, it was one of those fun school days because we had the Swimming Carnival. I was very excited because I had been training for this day for a long time. Overall, I was happy because I came 3rd in Freestyle and 2nd in Backstroke for my year group.

The next 3 days were one of the most funnest in my life. The reason for this was that it was the Reddam Year 7 camp. But this was no ordinary camp, it was the best 3 days of my life with many, many fun events. One such activity was the Flying Swing, which I highly recommend to anyone. Basically, i was attached to a harness and the entire group had to pull me up 15.6 m high into the air. As I reached this level, i had a decision to make. I had to either pull the rope causing me to quickly swing down towards the ground or stay at 15.6m for the rest of my life. I decided to tug on the rope and for a few seconds i was flying in the air. It was just an unreal feeling...

On Monday, it was time for school to really begin. We were given a 10 day sheet with all our classes and we had to follow it like it was our leader. One such class was English, a subject i was a little scared of and when the teacher walked into the classroom, my whole class was nervous. However after a few minutes, it became obvious that this man was in fact one of the most epic teachers that i had ever met in my life. He taught our class many cool ways to use things in context, for example “I went to Woolworths yesterday and guess what the near queue was just ridiculous so I had to go to the far queue“. When the class first heard him say this, most of us didn't understand what he was talking about. However a few minutes, after much discussion we all began to laugh.

So far, Reddam in 2011, has been very exciting and enjoyable. I hope the rest of the school year can be as good as the last two weeks have been.

Jett ferguson Pugh

Camp

Finally the day had arrived, the day I had been waiting for all week, camp. 6:30 am the alarm wakes me from my deep sleep. My bags were packed and I was ready to go, but before I could leave I had to get dressed and have breakfast and then I would be on my way.

The horn blasts, mums in the car waiting for me while I’m struggling to carry my bags into the car. I departed with hugs and kisses from my dad, my sister and my two dogs; Georgie and Henry. The car ride felt like it took forever, but then we finally arrived. I said goodbye to mum and leaped out of the car with my bags and ran straight into the school. I meet some of my friends there. We were then called to enter the bus. We were waiting in the bus for an hour to depart from the school. Until finally, we were ready to start our adventure.

The bus trip was terrible, no windows were open so there was hardly any oxygen in the bus. I felt like I was going to be sick. Then finally we arrived at our destination. I jumped off the bus with joy, trying to breath in as much oxygen as possible.

After we had settled into our cabins it was time for our first activity, caving. The walk was long and exhausting and it was boiling. When we arrived at the tunnel our instructor took us through some safety tips and showed us how to attach a helmet. When we had put our helmets on we entered a small metal door, which started the cave. Once we entered the cave everything suddenly become black. I could not see anything even when I turned on my torch it was like the sun had been blowed up. The tunnel was the size of one of the slides that you find at the Mc Donald’s playgrounds sometimes even smaller.

On our second part of the caves I noticed the cave was getting smaller, and smaller. We came across a small tunnel that we had to fit through. For some people it took a while to fit through it. It was even a struggle for me, because you had to position yourself in the right spot. This reminded me of the tunnels in Vietnam.

 The water slide was awesome; if you went down the water slide on your stomach you would get a massive amount of air. You felt like you were in a formula 1 race car.

After a full on day it was time for some rest or so that was what the teachers thought we were doing. But I must not tell you, for what happens in the cabin stays in the cabin.

 Day 2 a delicious breakfast, I was ready for the next activity the giant swing. This was the activity I had been waiting for all week. Once we had arrived at the giant swing I had butterflies in my stomach, when I saw what I was dealing with.  Our instructor showed as how to put the harness and helmet on. When it was my turn I walked over to the ladder, climbed up it and sat on it so the instructor could attach me to the bungie cords. The instructor had attached me, I jumped off the ladder, I was pulled up to the top. I could see everything up there it was one of the best experiences I’ve ever had. Then I was told to tug on the cord, which suddenly dropped me downwards swinging me up high into the air. It was amazingly fast like a rocket. 

 Day 3 my group and I headed towards the Flying Fox. Our instructor showed as how to put on the helmet and harness. I was chosen to go first. I climbed up the ladders. When I got to the top I was attached to the zip line. When I was clear to go I ran non-stop,  jumped off the building and went flying down to the other instructor.

The downside to camp was the bus ride home.