YEAR 6 CANBERRA CAMP

Last Week the Year 6’s went to Canberra camp. We went to many places and had a great time. These are just some of the places we went to...

We had a LONG bus ride to Canberra. We watched movies, played games and sang songs. We were on the bus from 6:30am to 5pm but that was including stops. 

The outside of parliament was so massive!!! There were fountains and perfect trees and the flag was so high. It was swaying through the air and you could see it from the top of the mountain! As you entered there was security and we had to put all of our things we had with us in a container. The room was amazing, there were marble stairs that we went up with our tour guide named Wes. Wes took us around to a room. In the room was a fake House of representatives room. In there we did a roleplay of what it is like for the people in the real house. After that we went to the real Senate room. The Senate room is the red room. Then we headed off to the real House of Representatives. The House of Reps is the green room.

The Old Parliament was really pretty. We went inside, put on gloves (to make sure that we didn’t get dirt on any of the old things) and went to the old House of Reps. It was really amazing. We learnt about the parliaments past and then went to make reasons why we need a parliament.

We pulled up at the AIS and the first thing we saw were statues, MASSIVE statues. There was one person doing a cartwheel and one person playing wheelchair basketball. We entered and met the people who were taking us to play English handball and Ultimate Soccer. In English handball what you have to do is catch the ball, take 3 steps, bounce it and take another 3 steps. In Ultimate Soccer there were 8 soccer balls and 2 teams. Whichever team that had the most balls in their goals at the end, loses (you had to try to kick the balls in the other team’s goals). After we played the games we went to this place where we could play on all this sports equipment and do competitions there. There was a basketball section, a soccer section, a footy section, a rugby section and much more.

We had dinner and headed to bowling. I was in a group with Ruby, Harlie, Zara, Jasmyn and Allie C. We had so much fun. Jasmyn was so good at bowling. I started off ok but then went a bit downhill. Jasmyn came first, Zara came second, Harlie came third, Ruby came fourth, I came fifth and Allie came sixth but I don’t mind at least we all had lots of fun. When it was all over we headed back to camp and fell straight to sleep.

We were all so excited as we pulled up to Questacon. We took a photo on the steps and headed inside. Our shoes were squeaking on the marble floor as we met the guide. We headed into the first room. It was space themed. There were lots of space themed games and learning stations. The next stop was Fundamental. You would go into a green screen section and pose. The camera woud flash and you would see your shadow on the screen. There was also an art kaleidoscope that you could make and print. The third room was Awesome Earth. There was a lightning room that  every few minutes the lightning would go off. We were all waiting for it to get to ten and we would count down and watch it flash. There was an earthquake room that we queued up to go in and you would have to pretend to be a building and feel all the different vibrations of earthquakes. Next up was Q-Lab there were microscopes and exhibits of old skulls. Then there was the shed. In the shed there was a spinning ride that we would spin on and feel different ways to spin. There was a net and rubber balls and you had to try to throw the ball at high speeds and it would tell you your speed.

The War Memorial was a grand building and it had so many amazing things inside. There were lots of jet planes of the Japanese and Australian fighter’s. We learnt about all the planes and some soldiers and headed to the wall that had names of all the lost soldiers. Then we saw the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The Tomb of The Unknown Soldier is a tomb that contains the body of the one of the only two bodies that were found of soldiers that passed in the war. The room was amazing. There were stained glass windows and awesome patterns on the roof. It was really pretty.

At CSIRO we met our guide and did an activity. The activity was really fun. We got in groups and had to grab a question off the table. The question was asking something that you could find out in exhibitions at CSIRO. You would get your question, try to find the exhibition, find out the answer and then rush back to join the line to see if your answer was right and claim the point. The group with the most points at the end won a prize.

The Mint was so cool! We learnt all about the history of Australian coins. I learnt that before coins people used trading and we have Australian Dollar because we started finding the English currency too complicated! We then saw The coin making in action. There were so many coins and machines.

The Dinosaur Exhibition was really cool. There were lots of statues of dinosaurs and lots of bones. There were facts of course too! We learnt about all the three ages of dinosaurs, Triassic, Jurassic and the Cretaceous periods.

On Friday morning we woke up at 5am for a long day on the bus. 

On behalf of the Year 6 students we thank Mr Mac for making this all happen in COVID and all the Year 6 teachers and volunteers who came along with us to camp.

By Lucy Monaghan 6SH

ANZAC DAY - SUNDAY, 25th APRIL