By Debbie West-McInnes, Head of Primary
To support our Year 6 students in understanding what it means to be a supportive leader in the Primary School, we organised them to work with a team from ‘Character Builders’. The program was run over two days — one at school and one on the Kokoda track at Mt Coot-tha.
On Thursday, our students played a range of games to learn about building trust, listening to others, respecting differences, appreciating others’ strengths, encouraging others and working together.
Taking on board these learnings our Year 6 students, with their teachers and myself, headed off to Mt Coot-tha Forest to take part in a range of activities designed to encourage students to pull together and achieve success within problematic situations.
It was heartening to see the students work together on the Kokoda track where they had to navigate a steep climb using a rope linking each member of the platoon together to eventually get to the top of the slope. Moving onto another group activity, the platoon had to carry a team member on a stretcher up and down the tracks to finally get to the rest stop. Finally, each platoon had to prepare a BBQ lunch working out quantities, dietary needs and roles needed to go from start to finish. This is all great preparation for Ironbark! Throughout the day we saw students’ character strengths immerge as they worked together to achieve success in each activity.
With the knowledge from these intensive training days, we are looking forward to our Year 6 students taking on their leadership roles in the Primary School. Starting this week they will be working on a range of activities to lead, including:
- Chapel helpers
- Assembly leaders
- Choir leaders
- Club facilitators
- Prep buddies
- Junior Play helpers
- Library organisers
- Student Council executive
Over the coming weeks, our students will reflect on what it is to be a good leader as they move to receive their leadership badges in March. I am looking forward to working with these wonderful young people in our Primary community.
"Great leaders don't set out to be a leader. They set out to make the difference. It is never about the role — always about the goal." Lisa Haisha.
Be part of our supportive St Peters Springfield community and contact enrolment by email s.enolments@stpeters.qld.edu.au or call 3470 3888
