The Year 4 and Year 7 students tackled real-world problems with innovative ideas, winning top awards through teamwork, perseverance, and creativity!
This semester, our Year 4 and Year 7 students have embraced the art of problem-solving as part of their Digital Technologies curriculum. Working collaboratively in teams, students identified real-world issues they were passionate about and applied a structured engineering design process to develop innovative solutions. Their hard work produced an array of impressive projects, including automated systems for wetland maintenance and care, robots designed to pick up litter in parks, smart bins that sort waste, drones capable of delivering disaster relief packages, an atmospheric water generation and filtering system and sustainable housing for the homeless.
Our student’s projects provided an incredible platform for students to develop crucial 21st-century skills such as effective communication, perseverance, teamwork, strategic planning, organisation and leadership skills. Among all these skills, the perseverance demonstrated by our students truly stood out. Many dedicated countless lunch breaks and after-school hours to perfect their prototypes and prepare for their presentations. The level of commitment and enthusiasm they showed was inspiring.
On Monday 28 October, several of our Year 4 and Year 7 teams attended the Game Changer Awards at Edith Cowan University in Joondalup. The Game Changer Awards is a STEM (Science, Technologies, Engineering and Mathematics) competition. It presents an ideal opportunity for children in Years 3 to 10 to showcase their innovative solutions to the world’s challenges (UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals), using project-based learning, STEM skills, organisation, teamwork and presentation skills. During the competition, each of our teams showcased their projects with passion, confidence, and poise, impressing an esteemed panel of industry professionals. They acted maturely, showed compassion and helpfulness, demonstrated genuine teamwork and proudly proclaimed their Christian perspectives on several aspects of their projects. One judge remarked, “All of your teams have done such a great job and presented to such a high standard. I think each team should be given a medal. You should be very proud of them.”
Nearly 400 students (146 teams) participated in this year’s record-breaking event; it was huge! Each group presented their project to two rounds of panels of judges. These judges gave the groups points in the scoring app. Rehoboth emerged victorious with three top prizes across different categories – an incredible achievement for our students.
Special congratulations to our winning teams:
- Best use of STEM (Year 3/4) – Shaun Thomas, Lucienne van der Veen, Rosie Mawby, Carissa Winarto and Zac de Boer.
- Best Entry Overall (Year 7/8) – Tessa Perrot, Keira Beaver and Chloe Agleham.
- Best Presentation (Year 7/8) – Jayden Frost, Ryan Moonean, Reuel Dossugi and Alex Webb.
We are immensely proud of the dedication and creativity shown by all our students. This experience not only highlighted their technical skills, but also showcased their ability to persevere, adapt and excel under pressure.
As teachers, we would like to take this opportunity to thank the parents that came into school as ‘experts’ in plumbing, Mr Ben van der Kooy, and in programming and I.T., Mr Simeon Bartley and Ms Sonu Kurian. We would also like to acknowledge that many other parents were supporting their children with these projects at home. Mr Yu and Mrs Witcombe have appreciated your interest, engagement and support this semester.
Also, a big thank you to Mr Ruben Mellado, Mr Caleb Spencer, Mr Geoff Bargerbos and Mrs Jasper Lomarda for accompanying us to the competition on the day to help us keep everyone safe (and help carry all our stuff!).
Philippians 2:1-8 (ESV)
So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others as more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
