Liam Bonetig – Australian Schools Soccer Representative

The College welcomes back Year 12 student Liam Bonetig who has just returned from an ultra successful tour of the United Kingdom and Ireland as a pivotal member of the Australian Schools Football (Soccer) Team. Being selected as one of the elite footballers across all Australian schools was an outstanding achievement for Liam in recognition of his footballing prowess. After playing a total of 6 games (results are below) Liam was given the added, prestigious honour of being named, ‘Player of the Tour.’ The Edmund Rice College community acknowledges and celebrates Liam’s incredible achievement.

Upcoming Assessment Tasks:

UOW Discovery Day

Next Thursday 16th February, Mr Cajar and myself will have the pleasure of accompanying a large group of Year 12 students from the College for the UOW Discovery Day. The purpose of Discovery Day is to provide students with an opportunity to experience first-hand what University life is like for a day and to start them thinking about their future.

YEAR 12 ACTIVITY – PROCRASTINATION!

Everybody procrastinates from time to time. In fact, university studies show that 95% of students procrastinate which can harm performance and cause undue stress. Procrastination is a habit that our boys can easily fall into however with a bit of hard work and the right approach to learning boys can overcome the habit. With this in mind, the first weeks extended admin activity for Year 12 focused on reflection and challenges including procrastination.

The activity commenced with a presentation and discussion focused on elements contributing to success, challenges facing Year 12 and strategies to overcome these challenges. Examples of areas identified included lack of motivation, distraction avoidance, time management, stress/anxiety and last but not least procrastination.

The discussion surrounding procrastination focused upon six different categories/types of procrastinators in which each student shared which one/s applies to them. These included:

1. The perfectionist: Afraid to start the task because they get stressed about getting every detail right.
2. Dreamer: Enjoys making the ideal plan more than taking action. Highly creative but find it hard to finish.
3. Anxious avoider: Scared to take on the task. Easier to put off.
4. Crisis maker: They find crisis exciting and/or believe they work best under pressure.
5. Busy bee: Too many tasks and trouble managing time and prioritizing.
6. Cool cat: “No worries! All good, I can do that later”

Boys developed an understanding of the link between thinking- feeling- doing and procrastination and as such alternative more productive thoughts were provided to prevent further procrastination.

Techniques to avoid procrastination were suggested and discussed. Students also had the opportunity to share what methods work best for them. Examples included:

1. Managing time more effectively through the use of the diary and/or a calendar to prioritise and organise tasks surrounding due dates. Some students also suggested creating a weekly time plan to visually identify times for school, study and relaxation or social time.
2. Commencing assignments as soon as they are received even if only a small start and breaking large assignments down into small manageable steps/goals. This way the boys are not overwhelmed by the enormity of an assignment but rather focus on small steps towards success.
3. Other suggestions included working with other students, removing distractions, regularly consulting with teachers, setting regular reminders using devices and small rewards.

The overall feedback from the boys following the activity was positive. Comments from our boys included:

“I appreciated the discussion surrounding learning challenges and strategies for success. As a result, some areas that I wish to focus upon including starting assignments as soon as they are received whilst fresh in my head. I also wish to break down large assignments like the design folio for Industrial Technology Timber into small chunks. Lastly, prioritizing assignments based on difficulty and due dates also helps.” Izac Cain

“From this activity I have felt that because I am very busy with various tasks at the same time that time management is most important. To better improve upon time management I think that setting a regular series of reminders for each task would be effective. Furthermore, working with a friend on tasks helps and having a goal to work towards. I look forward to the goal setting exercise next week.” Callum Milsom

So what are you waiting for? Go for it!

Mr Marsh & Mr Breeze
Year 12 Coordinator & Assistant Coordinator