St. Emilie's Catholic Primary School

Year 6 Science Inquiry Presentations

This week our Science Inquiry Group presented their projects to an audience of invited guests.

Throughout terms 2, 3 and 4 students have worked in partners to design, build and test an air racer vehicle. It’s been a very challenging project but well worth the effort. The learning and problem solving opportunities have been exceptional.

Each team presented a powerpoint to share their learning and the challenges that they encountered.

Then the students set up their own race track. We didn’t wish to take the parents to the basketball court in this current heat wave. So the students set up their own racetrack by putting the table together.

Mrs Cogger is very proud of the group and their achievements. Well done and keep up your enthusiasm for Science projects at high school.

Water Fun Day 2019

December 13, 2019
Kerrie Cogger
· Kindy · News · Pre-Primary · Year 1 · Year 2 · Year 3 · Year 4 · Year 5 · Year 6

Our annual end of year Water Fun Afternoon was held yesterday. We set up 12 stations of water fun play for our students and they spent about 45 minutes moving from station to station.

Here are a few photos of today’s fun!!

Super soakers

Slip and slide

Party pools

Dry, dry wet game

Wet hat relay

Octopus tag

Wet sponge relay

A big thank you to Mr Cogger for setting up all the stations for our children – it was a wonderful way to finish off what has been another great year!

Chemistry comes to St Emilie’s

This week we had a wonderful opportunity at St Emilie’s. Sandra Lavery (Jack Tarandetti’s auntie) came to St Emilie’s to present chemistry workshops to the students in Years 3, 5 and 6. Sandra is a chemistry teacher at Lynwood Senior High School and she was keen to share her passionate about chemistry with he St Emilie’s students.

The students enjoyed several experiments. Here are some photos to show the experiences offered to students on Thursday.

The students got to shake this bottle and see the colour change from blue to ‘colourless’. Mrs Cogger learned something new. In chemistry liquids are never called ‘clear’. The correct term is ‘colourless’.

Sandra brought along a transportable bunsen burner. The Year 6 students can look forward to using bunsen burners at high school next year.

Jack T was Sandra’s lab technician for the sessions. He did a great job. he especially enjoyed helping out with the investigation involving a ‘flame’.

Sandra demonstrated that by heating a particular chemical in its liquid form it could be changed to a solid.

Sandra added zinc to a conical flask and another chemical and we watched it bubble. Then she placed a balloon tightly over the opening of the conical flask and trapped that was being produced.

Sandra showed us the magic of ‘elephants toothpaste’. One of the ingredients is hydrogen peroxide.

We recorded our observations and learning throughout the workshop.

Sandra used a string to ‘slice’ through an ice cube. Then she demonstrated the three states of matter by melting the ice cube and allowing the water vapour to inflate the balloon.

One of the students favourite investigations was when the egg was ‘sucked’ into the conical flask.

Sandra set up all her chemistry equipment and show the students how to create carbon dioxide. She ‘trapped’ the gas and used it to put out burning tea light candles.

To finish off her chemistry extravaganza show Sandra seta taper candle flame to a balloon filled with hydrogen gas. And the students were delighted to see the balloon explode!

Mrs Cogger interviewed some of the students on Friday morning and prepared this short iMovie about our chemistry with Sandra. Please click the link below to view the imovie.

Chemistry extravaganza

Mrs Cogger and the students would like to thank Sandra for providing this wonderful opportunity for the students.

Vivienne and learning about recycling at the MRF

November 28, 2019
Kerrie Cogger
· Classroom News · Science · Uncategorized · Year 1 · Year 1 Blue · Year 1 Gold · Year 2 · Year 2 Blue · Year 2 Gold · Year 3 · Year 3 Blue · Year 3 Gold · Year 4 · Year 4 Blue · Year 4 Gold · Year 5 · Year 5 Blue · Year 5 Gold · Year 6 · Year 6 Blue · Year 6 Gold

Vivienne returned to St Emilie’s this week to talk to the students about what happens at the Materials Recovery Facility once all the recyclables have been collected from our homes.

The students learned about the whole process from the moment the truck is emptied onto the tipping floor until the materials are ready baled and ready for collection.

All the students played a sequencing game to demonstrate and show how the materials are recovered.

We enjoyed our visits with Vivienne and we wish her all the best as she spreads the message about recycling and the waste message.

St Emilie’s student wins Chevron Focus Environment Photography Competition

November 20, 2019
Kerrie Cogger
· Classroom News · Science · Year 4 · Year 4 Blue · Year 4 Gold

Congratulations to Maria Gourley in 4G for her winning photo entry in the Chevron Focus Environment Competition.

Maria placed 3rd in the Years 3-6 category Focus on: WA’s habitats and ecosystems.

There were more than 100 entries from schools across WA. Both Year 4 classes entered the competition this year. Mrs Cogger took the students to the school bushland in Term 3 after giving the students a presentation about photography and how to capture a ‘good’ photo.

Maria’s photo will appear in The West Australian newspaper this week. Mrs Cogger’s father gets the newspaper each day and he has been alerted to look out for it!

Maria receives a $100 gift card and a certificate and St Emilie’s school has received $250. Mrs Cogger will add this money to her Science budget.

Here is Maria’s wining photo and caption.

Title: Bark and blossoming plants. Caption: ‘Among the bark, there are plants beginning to grow and bloom. All thanks to the source of sunlight’.

Cleanaway visit with Vivienne

This week we invited Vivienne back to St Emilie’s to talk to the students about waste management. Vivienne is the Education Officer for Cleanaway and she is one of our favourite visitors. We look forward to seeing her every couple of years. Cleanaway is the company that collects all the waste throughout the City of Gosnells. It is also National Recycling Week so it is important to think about our future and make plans on how to better manage our waste.

The students learned about what we should place in our General Waste and Recycling Waste bins by playing several team games.

The students learned about Waste Free lunches and how to choose products that require less packaging.

Vivienne showed the students how you can save money by buying a large 1kg block of cheese that has only one wrapper compared to a pack of 10 cheese sticks.

The students in Year 4, 5 and 6 learned about how long it takes different materials to decompose.

The students also learned about the 3 R’s hierarchy model. We should be doing MORE Reducing and sending less to landfill.

Each student will bring home a survey. Please complete the survey with your child. This will help inform Cleanaway about their waste management services and assist them to make future changes. Each students who returns the survey will receive a pop out cardboard rubbish truck and go in a draw to win a mini wheelie bin.

I hope the students have been sharing all their new knowledge about waste management and are assisting you to make changes. A few changes have already been put into place at the Cogger household!

Science Term 4 Newsletter

October 22, 2019
Kerrie Cogger
· Classroom News · Science · Uncategorized · Year 1 · Year 1 Blue · Year 1 Gold · Year 2 · Year 2 Blue · Year 2 Gold · Year 3 · Year 3 Blue · Year 3 Gold · Year 4 · Year 4 Blue · Year 4 Gold · Year 5 · Year 5 Blue · Year 5 Gold · Year 6 · Year 6 Blue · Year 6 Gold

Download (DOCX, 994KB)

Robogals and Year 6

On the 16th of August 2019 the Year 6 girls had an incursion with UWA students David and Sestley. They introduced our girls to a fun project called Robogals!

This programme is specifically just for girls. Unfortunately only 14% of women are in engineering careers. There are different types of engineering like chemical, electrical, software, civil and mechanical engineering.

We were split into 3-4 groups and each group got a robot with a code name on it. In my group I had Maureen, Olivia, Mia S and myself. Our robots name was The Hobbot. Each group got an Ipad and went onto an app. On our app you could programme your robot to move in any direction.

Emily Warren Roebling was a developer who was known for her contribution to finish building the Brooklyn Bridge after her husband Washington Roebling died from Caisson Disease. After Emily’s husband died she found loads of books on civil engineering and taught herself from scratch. Emily’s husband was a civil engineer and the Chief Engineer during the construction of the Bridge. Sadly Emily died on the 28th of February 1903.

We learned that there are different types of engineering that can do different types of things, for example Aerospace engineering helps with space. Generation engineering helps with GMO (Genetically Modified Organisms).

Towards the end of the incursion we got to create a little dance or song and perform it to the other girls.

This was a really fun incursion for the girls because it encourages us to dream big and be whatever we want to be.

A special thanks to Mrs Cogger for letting us have this opportunity.

And thanks to David and Sestley from UWA for volunteering to do this.

You both helped us out a lot and it is much appreciated.

By Ava Thorpe

Congratulations to St Emilie’s winning Nature of Science design competition

Congratulations to the following students who won awards at the Community Science Expo run by SERCUL and the City of Canning. The students were awarded their prizes at the opening ceremony on Sunday at CREEC.

Alicia was selected as the Year 1 winner