We have put together a short summary of some of the things we have learnt about through our Archibull journey in 2015. Farming in Australia is about a lot more than we first thought. There are quite a lot of factors that must work all together for the Australian agriticultural industry to thrive to the high standard it does. We have listed them below;
As a group we never really considered all it takes to be a farmer in Australia before our Archibull studies this year. After learning about the Australian wool industry, our class came to the conclusion that maybe we take farmers and farming for granted. How many of us really think about or knew how far the clothes we wear have actually travelled? And how many people were involved in the processes to get the wool from the sheep’s back and on to ours?
High on the list of things we have learnt about is Biosecurity; which is all the measures it takes to make sure Australian farms and produce are free from contamination, disease, pest and weed outbreaks. We have learnt that Biosecurity doesn’t just impact on the farmers, it affects all of us. Biosecurity is everybody’s responsibility – we should not take it for granted. We must all do the very best we can to protect our agricultural industries.
The environment is the most important because without a healthy environment their livelihood is a risk. Australian farmers are always looking for new ways for best farming practice, which lessen the negative impacts on the environment.
Our livestock and wool growers have been finding new and better ways to live in harmony with their environment. During 2015, as a class we have studied the farming practices of our Young Farming Champion from Burragan Bessie Thomas and Nan Bray from Tasmania’s White Gum Wool.
Through feeding their sheep on native vegetation farmers are able to cut costs relating to food, increase productivity and be kinder to the Australian environment. It has been discovered that sheep are able to regulate and monitor their own health and well-being by using the native plants as medicine as they need it.
Soil and Vegetation
The whole ecosystem keeps soil and grass and tree healthy and keeps weeds away. Without the ecosystem animals would not have a home, shade or food.
Who are the biggest wasters of food?
Young consumers (18-24).
Households with incomes of more than $100,000 per year.
Families with children.
The hidden impact of wasting food!
When you throw out food you also waste the water, it took to get the food from the paddock to your plate. On estimated 20-40% of fruit and vegetable are rejected even before they reach the shops, mostly because they don’t match the consumers and supermarkets need for perfection.
If you add up all the food Australia wastes each year its enough to fill 450,000 garbage trucks.
What you can do?
1) Plan a little and be mindful of what you are throwing out so you don’t repeat the same mistakes.
2) We all end up with food scrapes, so start-a compost bin to generate nutrient-rich fertiliser to grow your own food.
3) If you’re in an apartment block, chat to the body corporate about a communal organic waste collection service.
4) Remember to always keep your choices environmentally friendly where you can, because as you can see every little bit helps. Above all remember to love food and hate waste it will save you money and save the Earth. be a responsible global citizen!
One of the most awesome things we learnt in 2015 is that you don’t have to spend a lot of money to make your Archi wonderful. We recycled almost all of our bubble wrap, which came wrapped around our Archi – there was soon much bubble wrap and the great thing is, none of the waste from Northlakes High School’s Archi delivery will be going into landfill.
We learnt that plastic doesn’t breakdown over time, it just sits there taking up space and adding to the issue of global warming and climate change. So through the Archibull Prize and our mindfulness of the fragile environment, we have already made a difference!
Most importantly we learnt that learning new things is great fun, because you never know what is going to happen and what the end result will be!
Who would have thought we could learn about all these different things by simply studying the Australian wool industry in the Archibull Prize. When we were told that we were participating in the Archi again, we didn’t really know what to expect. Learning about the way Australian farmers work and grow premium products which are exported all over the world was fascinating and now we know Australia really is the lucky country!
We begin our Archi Artwork journey for 2015 with inspiration from an interesting, colourful image of an elephant. The way the lines are used in this image reminds us of woollen yarn. Wool is our fibre for 2015, so this is perfect!
Also one of the big fads or rages at the minute is mindfulness colouring in books. They also use lines in a beautiful and wonderful way, which could also translate quite nicely into our artwork and work well with our concept of “The journey from fibre to fashion”.
Below is our first initial sketch, after we were inspired by using paint like lengths of yarn, we then came up with the idea of using a basket of wool which is spilling over onto the platform. We are also considering running a few lengths of yarn up the leg, incorporating it into our artwork.
It is a rough sketch….but it is all part of where it started for 2015.
As a class we sat down and discussed the possibilities and each had a go at taking inspiration from the elephant image and designing our own onto a small Archibull template.
Some of us began transferring our ideas onto out life size Archibull. Our first group of students to work on the artwork were Josh, Reef & Brandon B.
Ethan,Nathan, Zac & Brandon Br. soon took over responsibility for this. These boys had the patience to produce some beautiful images for us to continue with later.
We have even put a surprise for Bessie in our artwork!
As I have mentioned earlier, we are recording all information and ideas in our art journal as well, so below are some more ideas including;
making a 1.5mx0.70m wooden platform with wheels;
chicken wire and paper Mache structure which will be a valley or Australian farmland covered in crocheted patches of wool;
a basket of knitting yarn; hand-made authentic raw woollen sheep and trees
And lastly our costume made and designed, 100% Australian Merino wool – sourced directly from the grower.
Our Mathematics lesson Thursday, consisted of calculating the area of the wooden platform and then computing how many 10cm x 10cm crocheted squares we would need to get Jade’s Nan to knit to cover the woven valley.
Area = 1.5 m x 0.70m
Area = 1.05 m2
That equals 105, 10cm x 10cm crocheted squares for Jade’s Nan to make! Wow that’s a lot!
The photographs above are from the actual lesson that we were taught in class.
One of our main focuses for 2015 is organisation and following procedure. So as a class (lead by Mrs Dowe) we formulated our “Plan of Attack” as follows;
I have typed up our list below…….above is the lesson we did as a class; we all contributed to the sequence of events; there was a lot of discussion and I don’t think we realised the amount of things we have to do!
Image traced on Archibull-doing
Start painting artwork carefully
Get measurements for the platform-done
Get platform made…-being done
Once the platform is at school we need to position our Archibull on it.
Place an attach the cane basket to the Archibull’s hoof
Attach the archi and the basket to the platform with bolts.
Construct and make the hills and valleys on the wooden platform using chicken wire and newspaper.
Paper Mache the hills + valleys around our Archi
Undercoat hills + valleys.
Give woollen patches over the hillside.
Place our raw woollen sheep on the landscape.
We will be ticking things off our list as we complete them and we will also be adding to it as we move along our journey in 2015 and find more things to add.
Below is a photograph of a more detailed sketch with dimensions for the platform, as well as an idea for the 100% Merino Woollen beanie. It is important we take accurate measurements for all of this, because we are getting other people to make it for us.
So at the end of our first week, working as a whole class we were able to achieve a lot. We have almost completed the designing processing, transferring all the information onto the Archibull surface.
Jade’s Nan is busily crocheting 105 squares,
Mrs Dowe’s Husband is constructing our wooden platform,
Mrs Dowe is sourcing our wool for the project.
WOW! What a busy week it was for all of us! We have reached all of the goals we set at the end of Week 2!
Week 3 – Term 3 – 2015
Again we were all working in teams to complete all blog entries as well as finalise the design on our woollen inspired Archibull, who at this stage is still nameless.
Day 1 – Ethan, Nathan and Zac working together again complete the designing process. This has been one of the most time consuming tasks so far. We are focusing on getting the lines, design and form exactly how we want it – we are making sure as we that each mark relates to the Australian Industry and is easily recognisable to an audience. We aim to make our theme “The journey from fibre to fashion” very clear and precise.
The three boys came up with an ingenious idea to place the Archibull up on the tables. This made it much easier to draw the detail onto the legs of the cow and make sure they didn’t miss a spot! What a wonderful idea boys! Wonderful teamwork!
Day 2– The arrival of our wooden platform! Luckily we got all the measurements correct. It was able to fit through our classroom door and the perfect size to showcase our Archi.
Stacie and Rebecca started adding the woollen detail on the head. Our idea is to spiral small sections of wool to mimic the sheep’s fleece; in an artistic and fun way, also using our allocated fibre. The girls made a great start…..students were very excited to see our vision for 2015 coming to life!
Zac and Macarthur worked diligently on separate areas to perfect our design. Zac focused on the “ugly” scarf around Archi’s neck; while Macarthur made sure the Aboriginal inspired designs on one of the front legs were ready for painting. Macarthur was concentrating very hard to do the very best work he could.
Other students in 8WL were busy working on their posters all about the Australian Wool Industry. Some students preferred to work individually, while others liked the idea of working in the team. Either way, all students produced beautiful information posters which are now being displayed in our classroom.
At the conclusion of Day 2, we achieved a lot. Our Archi was positioned on the newly made wooden platform, however it hasn’t been secured yet. We have more things to complete before that can happen.
Day 3 – Stacie and Rebecca were again taking the lead covering the Archi’s head in woollen spirals. They are getting much more efficient and productive at this task.
We also had the pleasure of welcoming our Korean exchange student “Su”, who is staying with Jade and her Grandparents while attending Northlakes High School. Su loves to draw and is so accurate. She can copy almost anything from an image and does it so quickly. We all think she has some sort of magical drawing powers!
Macarthur and Ash again took it in turns to complete the designs on one of the front legs of the cow. Ash focused on putting a very finely detailed Aboriginal inspired pattern within the drawn strands of woollen fibre.
We were very happy at our progress after our activities on Day 3! Great job team Northlakes!
Day 4 – Our focus was on finalising fine detail. Adding fine – lots of them; they are going to be the fine strands of woollen fibre. This is very time consuming and frustrating at times, but if we concentrate it can also be quite relaxing.
We kept working on the woollen detail on the cow’s head and came up with the idea to put more than one layer of woollen detail. This gives the artwork more detail and is very interesting to look at. We love it….everybody really enjoys touching and feeling it!
Nathan added some small sheep images on the other side of the Archibull. It is very important for us to remember to focus on our artwork as a whole. Each area has to be as good as the part next to it, and it all must link together to illustrate a cohesive story about the Australian Wool Industry. Mrs Dowe always says this, we are beginning to see her point. This is very hard work, but we love it!
Stacie and Rebecca showed Reef and Taleah how to make the woollen spirals to cover the head, so they took over that task. They are doing a wonderful job.
We also had more guest helpers come into our classroom to offer assistance; Miss Alley and the Year 11 Photography students were a great help and we really enjoyed working with them on Friday.
This is our progress at the end of Week 3, Term 3. We are getting ever closer to the part we all want to do …..the painting!
We are all eager to get our classwork finished, so we can spend time working on our Archibull.
Week 4 of Term 3 was another busy week for our Archibull artwork.
Week 4 saw us add a few more artwork team members. Amy W, Tamar, Piper and Ashlee P were all welcomed with open arms. We are very excited to see their artistic contributions they can add. Each girl has a wonderful talent in visual arts and will surely be an asset to team Northlakes!
Day 1 – Amy W (Year 8) and Tamar (Year 7) were the lucky ones who started colour blocking our artwork.
Colour blocking gives us a solid base to create our artwork. Because there is going to be a lot of fine painted detail, in form of painted woollen yarn, it’s important to use a base colour beneath, so we don’t have to paint and repaint the surface to cover pieces of white.
We used a flow medium to give the paint a wash like look. We needed to leave all of the pencil underlines visible for the other artists. This was a very relaxing and wonderful way to start the week.
The girls also had a go at covering our Archi’s head in white woollen swirls, it’s getting there but seems to be a never ending task at this point! We will get there, it takes very patient people for this task; it can be very frustrating!
Jenna (8WL) also helped with colour blocking the legs. She did a great job!
Day 2- More teamwork; we were all assigned different parts of the project to work on.
The students got very excited because today we started adding the first bit of detail in our artwork.
Tiana, Jenna, Jade and Claudia all worked together placing small woollen swirls on lamb, which will used in the woven, woollen valley platform supporting our Archi.
Ash and Jordon worked independently on their information posters that are now displayed proudly in our classroom.
Ethan, Zac, Brandon Br. and Waide started with the detail on the back end of the Archi. They needed so much concentration, lots of patience and of course a very steady hand for this task. Great job guys!
We realised that the scarf Mrs Dowe was wearing was very similar to the pattern of the “ugly” scarf around our Archi’s neck.
Jade’s Nan completed all of the coloured crotcheted patches for our knitted valley platform. She is one fast knitter; it only took her a week and a half to knit 120, 10x10cm squares. Thank you so much Nan!
So at the conclusion of Day 2, we achieved a lot. We worked as a team and individually to achieve all we did.
Day 3 – This was a special day at Northlakes High School. Year 7 & 8 celebrated bookweek, so there were a few different characters in our class today.
Ethan worked again, concentrating on the fine detail of tangled yarn. He finds it easier to concentrate if he is listening to music while painting.
Our regulars continued working on the back end detail. They are all getting very good at working with a steady hand and some very fine brushes to produce some colourful impressions of wool.
Mac tried his best to master the art of swirling the woollen spirals for the cow’s head. He did give it a good go! This was a lesson in patience! Well done Mac!
Mrs Bayly & Mrs Hanson were even roped in, or yarned into helping today….they too learnt how difficult it was to swirl the thin strands of wool.
Waide & Zac put the first coat of paint on the cow’s udders. We have some big plans for these udders, but we can’t reveal the plans just yet….stay tuned!
Day 4 – Our artwork is developing nicely; we are really enjoying work together.
It is definitely bringing us closer together as a class and a group of people. Mrs Dowe says we are becoming more tolerant of our differences as well.
Piper from Year 9 came into our classroom to work on our Archibull.
She is one of the talented students responsible for the Aboriginal artwork detail. We think it is very important to include native animals in our artwork and design because in class we are learning lots about environmentally friendly farming practices, which includes looking after all animals that inhabit the land, not just the livestock.
This is Brandon B. & Lloyd getting involved in some Archi action. Lloyd was a bit shy to start with, but I managed to get a sneaky photograph of him.
This concludes another busy week for team Northlakes….we have some huge plans for week 5! Stayed tuned……
Week 5, Term 3
Wow! What a massive week; I seems no sooner are we finished one section of our artwork we are onto another and the wonderful thing is we have no shortage of willing helpers. This week saw us expanding our operations and including even more of our school population…..but more about that later.
Day 1 – A special delivery!
The week began with a very special delivery from White Gum Wool in Tasmania. It was our much awaited balls of Merino wool!!! The colours were absolutely magnificent and the yarn was so soft!!
We cannot wait to see what our Archi’s woollen beanie looks like! It will be perfect to keep her head warm in winter and cool in summer…..lets hope that Jade’s Nan can understand the instructions, diagram and measurements! Jade told us, her Nan is eagerly starting work on the beanie this weekend; we can’t wait to see the finished product.
These are the new and improved instructions for the beanie. Hopefully all the measurements are correct, so Jade’s Nan is able to make the perfect pattern.
Our Archi, peacefully resting in the morning sun; early on Monday waiting for the classroom to come to life.
One of our focuses this week was to begin construction of the framework of the “woven woollen valley” on the platform that supports our Archi artwork. The first thing we needed to do was mark out the position of our cow. We allowed enough room around each hooves, so the Archi can be slotted back in after the chicken wire structure for the valley is complete.
We decided to work on the platform separately from the artwork, because it can get very crowded around the cow, making it difficult to work. It is much more productive for us to divide into groups and work in different areas of our classroom. As you can see we are in a regular classroom, not an art room. We have limited space and have to work and think smart with what we do. So this was the best solution.
One of the problems we have encountered is the fiddly job of making the wool swirls which cover Archi’s face and head. This job is very time consuming and you need lots of patience to do it properly. So we came up with the idea of using adhesive contact to stick the swirls on and then transfer them onto her face. This meant lots of us could work independently making the swirls and others could place them on the cow. We have it streamlined now.
The other issue we had was painting the PVA glue onto the surface to make the swirl stick….we found it very difficult to do this neatly and many times we got more glue on our fingers than anywhere else. We now have three small squeezy bottles with fine nozzles and are able to squirt the PVA directly underneath the swirl, pasting it down with less fuss.
Day 2 – Get your staple guns ready!
Today we began construction of the valley structure. We were super excited about this. The chicken wire is recycled (not new); this very important because by reusing the wire we are saving money, but furthermore we are also saving space in landfill sites (as we learned this week), because metal does not breakdown over time.
The boys started working in the classroom, but found they needed more room so they moved out to the corridor.
Give them a staple gun and they will build!
While the boys were working outside, the rest of the class were busy making countless woollen swirls….. Mrs Hanson took charge of the gluing; we had a real production line happening!
Our new system worked wonderfully and saved so much time.
On this day, we also welcomed Piper and her friend (both in Year 9) back into our classroom to continue working on the Aboriginal artwork. We feel the Aboriginal artwork is an important element in our artwork because we want to represent the link between environmentally friendly and sustainable farming that looks after all animals; native and livestock. We first learned about this when our Young Farming Champion, Bessie visited us and in class we are learning more including feeding sheep on native plants etc.
The girls are doing such a wonderful job! Great work!
Day 3 – What a load of rubbish!
Initially we were going to stuff the chicken wire structure with newspaper (which would have been fine) because we would have been recycling the paper. But newspaper is more easily recycled than other waste in our environment.
In class, we learnt about landfill and the fact that plastic and metal didn’t breakdown over time and that inturn produced a multitude of greenhouse gases – adding to climate change and global warming ( in greater detail in another post). So we thought, why not fill the chicken wire structure with rubbish from our playground. In the breaks a group of students and Mrs Dowe walked around the school ground collecting plastic food wrappers and explaining to students what we needed them for…I’m sure a few thought we were crazy!!!
Here is a lovely photograph of Zac, Ethan & Nathan…they are slowly warming to having their pictures taken!
And stuffing the mountains of rubbish into our valley.
The girls had a go at working on the artwork at the back end of the Archi. This is another job that is taking a while and needs lots of concentration to achieve the fine detail needed. It’s coming along nicely!
Day 4 – We have it covered!
Continuing on with our idea of recycling waste, we decided to take it a step further and use the plastic bubble wrap that covered our Archi upon it’s arrival to Nortlakes High School. We go into further detail in a later post. But yet again we are solving more than one problem in doing this….
Saving money because we don’t need to buy glue for Paper Mache.
Recycling the bubble wrap and not wasting space in landfill and helping the environment.
The bubble wrap is also light weight, so it will not add unnecessary weight to our completed cow; which is important when it has to be moved up and down stairs.
Piper and her friend come back to add some more beautiful detail and colour to their portion of the artwork.
This is Reef concentrating very hard while working on the fine detail of the woollen yarn. This artwork certainly is a team effort!
Here are Rebecca and Taleah back at work on the woollen swirls.
Day 5 – All wrapped up!
As you can see, Waide has it covered….or at least himself!
The last day of a busy week saw us bringing together all the lose ends from the last week. We have certainly made a lot of progress this week and it is great to see all our hard work coming together in a cohesive way.
The boys decided to put the platform up on the tables because it was much easier to cover the chicken wire with the bubble wrap. Because we are not using any glue , they needed to make sure that the bubble wrap was anchored to the wooden platform across the valleys.
Mrs Dowe worked on the detail in Bessie’s dog….he is really coming to life!
Taleah and Rebecca worked together on colour blocking a large area of blue wash ready for lots of fine detail next week!
We have many more exciting surprises in store next week, but you’ll have to stay tuned to see………
As another action packed week comes to close, we clean up our classroom; put our books away; close the blinds and give our Archi some much needed peace and quiet.
Week 6, Term 3 – This week was a relatively quiet week for us when compared to previous weeks along our Archibull journey so far.
Day 1 – Pulling it all together!
Today we all worked on consolidating and tidying up our artwork; we still have a lot of woollen swirls to make to full cover the cow’s head and the tangled wool strands of the back end are beginning to work their way into the rest of the artwork.
Our aim is to have our entire artwork painted in fine brushstrokes to imitate the appearance of wool. We think that way our key concept and message behind Australia’s woven woollen landscape will become clear.
Day 2 – Special Delivery
Jade arrived to class with the beanie her Nan had knitted for our Archi. There was one problem; we didn’t account for the width of Archi’s horns….so it’s back to the drawing board!
After considering our options; we decided that the best way to solve issue was to use buttons and button holes down each side, under each horn and ear. Then there is no need to stretch it over the horns, it can fit around and be fastened into place.
Another sketch with the revised plan was sent home with Jade that afternoon. Sorry Nan…xx
In the meantime, Reef had some fun with the beanie posing for a photograph and after being begged by the class, Mrs Dowe did as well…..
On this day, Reef also started working on making a series of small wire cubes which will be covered in wool to represent pressed bales of wool from the farm for the valley landscape on the platform.
We have almost completely covered our platform in the recycled bubble wrap. It is coming together just how we planned it! This will be an awesome base for the woven, woollen patchwork valley to lay on!
Day 3 – Getting our wool on!
Keeping with our theme of up cycling, recycling and environmentally responsible sustainability we have decided to use some woollen items purchased from the op-shop. Our plan is to some how hang these garments from a gigantic pair of wooden knitting needles.
All the woollen garments have been stitched onto an old yellow blanket which is made from 100% Merino lambs wools. We were very lucky to find that piece!
We also purchased two woollen tapestries which lucky depict early Australian farming life.
Day 4 – Learning to hand sew!
Today was the day we started sew our crotched patches together. Not one student in the class knew how to hand stitch, so Mrs Dowe taught us. This was fun because we got to sit on the floor with our group of friends and learn how to do something new. Some of us got in a real tangle, but it was fun!
Claudia and Stacie continued working on the woollen swirls and artwork and Ash made some of the chicken wire cubes for the wool bales.
So, here we are at the end of another week; all tired and eager to see what the next week holds.
Week 7, Term 3
Day 1 – Quiet rumblings and bold decisions!
Not our usual start to the week, not a lot of activity today – but we were just getting warmed up. Macarthur did master the fine art of making a woollen swirl though, with a great deal of concentration and will power, he did it!
Day 2 – New painters and old, called to action!
Tuesday started with a small group of painters working on our cow. Macarthur, Reef, Ethan (from 8WL) and Julieanne (from Year 9) all banded together to begin the day. They were all eager to get started and add more splashes of colour to our already colourful Archi.
Julieanne wanted to focus on gluing down our never ending supply woollen swirls on our Archi’s face. We have been working on this section for so long and it was great that Julieanne wanted to help us, because 8WL are so tired of making a gluing swirls!
Ethan put a light magenta wash over sections of the unpainted surface. This makes the task of painting less daunting, because there is already a light wash down and makes the lines easier to see.
Mac worked on painting the light orange wash over the surface of the front leg.
Reef preferred to listen to music while making some very fine woollen swirls. He and Julieanne had quite a production line going, one making and one gluing!
Great teamwork guys!
We took the idea of using washes a step further; instead of just applying as a basecoat we thought it would be an idea to add it over the top of the painted woollen surface. I think it was a great idea! It has added another dimension to the artwork and made the colours really pop!
This was the first of our bold decisions in this week.
Later that afternoon our entire class worked in Archi groups. We really look forward to this time, because although we all have to work really hard, we get to work in groups with our friends!
Ash was tasked with fixing the staple gun, it was very badly jammed and Mrs Dowe thought she was going to have to buy a new one. Ash pulled the entire tool apart – it was in about 50 pieces and took him 2 x 75 minute lessons to fix, but he did it!
Jade, Jenna, Aaron and Josh work together on joining their individual patches together to make larger sections for our woven patchwork valley. We decided to use red wool as a contrasting colour to stitch the patches together because it symbolises the Australian Wool farmers being the link that binds wool and fashion together in wool’s journey from “Fibre to Fashion”
Renee from Year 9 came to spend the afternoon with us as well. We get a lot of extra visitors in our classroom these days; maybe it’s because of our Archibull.
We also stated to over paint balls of wool into areas on the surface. Our aim is to have the entire surface appear as if it is painted from individual strands of wool; sort of like organised chaos
.
Day 3 – Go Team Northlakes – Patching and stitching it all together!
Fitting all these woollen patches together is like playing a game a tetris. Aaron has taken the lead, with Mrs Hanson (our wonderful teacher’s aide) instructing which piece fits where. Aaron only learnt how to sew last week and now he is our sewing group leader!
So this is what Rebecca and Stacie get up too when Mrs Dowe puts them in charge of taking photographs for the afternoon! Nice editing, girls!
After fixing the broken staple gun, Ash decided to have a go at painting as well!
By the end of our afternoon session, there were a few things we learnt….
Aaron was exhausted…
Zac can now sew as well….
And we didn’t allow for shrinkage when sewing the patches together…
We needed lots more patches…
Jade had better ask her Nan very nicely to knit us more patches!
Day 4 – Working on the woollen details!
We continued with layering our colours and strands of woollen detail; building up the detail and depth in our artwork. We are learning that this is not a process that we can rush and every little bit counts.
Each section of our artwork must be as good as the last. We are being encouraged to stay focused on all of the small details to make our artwork as great as it can possibly be.
Day 5 – The day for bold choices and decisions.
We began the day with Mrs Dowe showing us the Art Judge, Wendy Taylor on a YouTube clip explaining exactly what she is looking when she is judging our Archibull in 2015.
We had a very constructive whole class discussion about what we have done, what we need to do and what if anything could possibly be taken off.
We were all in agreement that the front orange leg was a problem and was taking away from the entire artwork, not adding anything to it. So we brainstormed what could go in its place and add to our work.
Reef suggested an Aboriginal artwork and specifically a reproduction of the artwork that he and other Aboriginal students in the school created and won 1st place for recently. We all agreed that was a wonderful idea, as it ties directly with our central idea as well as our theme for 2015.
Reef stated that he had to paint the entire surface for the Aboriginal artwork black, because that was the colour for the 1st place artwork. So we all gave him the green light to do it.
Here is a photograph of our 1st place getting artwork we are using for inspiration. We are lucky enough to have Reef in our class, he was one of the original artists.
Waide joins in the fun painting large amounts of black.
Mrs Hanson and the others work on the woven valley, attaching the finally squares, Lloyd decided to paint the horns black as well, so we can continue the Aboriginal design on there as well.
The girls work hard on the last lot of woollen swirls for our Archi’s face.
Reef sits down after we run out if black paint and begins to sketch a rough plan and design for our newest addition…..
So I’m sure you would agree, we have had an action packed and fun filled week. We are exhausted and need to relax over the weekend, so we are full of great ideas and energy for Week 8!
Week 8, Term 3
Day 1 – Gathering more images and completing jobs
After going through our 10 C’s as a class from the list we got from Lynne, we realised we were missing a few key points from our story. Wool’s journey from “fibre to fashion” obviously involves shearers, so we needed to find images that we could include in the artwork; below are a few of the images, now the challenge will be to integrate them into the artwork, seamlessly of course.
We got a wonderful image from Bess (YFC) showing a truck load of wool being collected from her farm, so we have also decided to include this somewhere in our artwork.
We were able to finish preparing the black undercoated surface, ready for the application of the Aboriginal artwork. We have decided to weave the Aboriginal artwork from the head right through to the tail of the artwork.
In doing this we are sticking with one of our central ideas; that being the reciprocal relationship between the farmland and the livestock (sheep) and the native Australian flora and fauna. We discussed it and thought it was necessary to include sections of traditional Aboriginal art to communicate this to the audience. And let’s be honest….it looks really cool as well, and we are lucky enough to have Reef in our class; he is a very talented Aboriginal artist.
We also worked more detail into others areas of the artwork. It seems we are always reworking sections as we go, but we are seeing the benefits.
Day 2 – The dreaded woollen swirls…..
This day was fairly quiet as far as our Archi artwork goes.
We are still working on woollen swirls to cover Archi’s face. Mrs Dowe instructed all the students in 8WL to make 3 swirls each; Mrs Hanson was tasked with gluing ….however we still are not finished. We are very close though!
We will all be so happy when this job is complete! We are all so over the woollen swirls, but we know they look awesome on our artwork. Ashlee from Year 9 also made some much needed swirls and then put another coat of paint on Archi’s udders.
Day 3 – Archi gets grounded!
Today was a special day…we had been waiting for this since the start of the term. Our woven woollen platform had the final patches attached to the recycled rubbish valley and Archi was attached (bolted down) over the top.
We asked Mr Louie (who is a timber teacher) and one of his students to come and do this for us. He was only too happy to help and got the job completed straight away. We wanted to make sure it was secured properly, because the woven patchwork valley is now our Archi’s only form of transport! Luckily for us, in keeping with one of our central ideas and concepts she uses people power to move around, environmentally friendly and sustainable.
NO GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS HERE!!!!!
GREEN ALL THE WAY!!!
Day 4 – Special guest @WEAR IT PURPLE DAY
With her newly attached set of environmentally friendly wheels, our Archi had a change of scenery for today. She was out and about in our school grounds to celebrate “Wear It Purple Day”. We are also very lucky to have the San Remo Neighbourhood Centre across the road from our school, so they came across to celebrate and educate students and teacher about purple day.
We certainly took purple day as an opportunity to promote our involvement in the Archibull Prize and we had loads of students lining up at the photo booth to get their pics taken with our star. She was an interesting talking point and we also got a lot of suggestions for her name. Just a heads up… her name will not be Betsy, Bessie (even though there is a strong link to our Young Farming Champion), Lucy or Eric!
We decorated Archi’s head with loads of purple props and let her loose in Northlakes High School. She certainly gained a lot of attention and created quite a stir as she moved past the classrooms of D Block and down into the Common Room for her first official appointment of the day; visiting the Student Representative Council (SRC). We introduced Archi to the SRC, because they are going to brainstorm ways they can help in our Archibull Prize journey for 2015. It will be wonderful to see what they can come with and also have some more help!
We also found out that Mrs Hewitt (Careers and SRC roll call teacher) was once a Wool classer!!! We can’t wait to learn more about her career in the Australian Wool Industry and plan to interview her in the coming weeks. If it wasn’t for the Archibull Prize, we would have never have had a conversation about wool or found out this very interesting piece of information.
We had to very carefully carry our cow up and down stairs from one place to the next. It is actually quite difficult to move a 45kg Archibull attached to a platform as you can see from the pictures below!
Her wheels allowed her to move effortlessly through the corridors and across the quad, though!
It was a lot of extra work for all of us (especially the ones moving Archi up and down stairs), however it was very worth it. We all had a wonderful day celebrating “Wear It Purple Day” with the whole school community and the San Remo Neighbourhood Centre from across the road joining in the festivities. We celebrated Purple Day by wearing purple mufti and different accessories that were purple. Down outside the hall there were stalls set up where students could sign their names on purple pieces of paper and form links in a chain; there was also a canvas set up where students could stamp purple paint which created an artwork; they were handing out purple jelly beans and windmills; and lastly there was a photo booth where students could have pictures taken with different purple props with their friends.
Above is a picture of 8WL with Mrs Dowe, today even the students who are usually camera shy posed for photographs!
After an exhausting and rewarding day our Archi returned to D55 to retire for the evening, but not before getting a little bit more of the painted detail added onto her surface. The fresh air gave us some great ideas!
Little did she know she had been booked for another public engagement tomorrow!
Day 5 – Introducing Archi
Another early morning start to get our Archi positioned in the Library for an 8:30am start.
Today it was a very special and important public engagement; being on display for the “Secondary Principals Network Meeting” at Northlakes High School.
By all accounts, Archi gave the Principals lots to talk about and discuss over morning tea.
This brings to an end another busy week for all involved in the Archibull Prize at Northlakes High School. Can’t wait to see what week 9 brings.
Below is a video clip of our Archibull artwork journey through week 9 of term 3.
We thought it would be a great idea to put a few movies into our blog as well. And it was fun to put together.
Hope you enjoy….and keep tuned for week 10’s efforts.
Recently in both Science and HSIE our class has been learning about global warming and the effects of climate change on our planet and environment. We thought we would share our finding with you, because climate change is one of the focuses of the Archibull Prize in 2015.
Fast Facts About Climate Change 17/06/2015
Greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, methane and water vapour, trap heat in the Earth’s atmosphere and warm the planet.
In general, the greenhouse effect is a good thing. Without greenhouse gases, the temperature on Earth would be too cold to support life. With too many, it would heat up beyond survivable levels. Earth is sometimes called the Goldilocks Planet because it is “just right.”
Since 1958, the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has been measured from an observatory on Mauna Loa, a volcano in Hawaii.
The pre-industrial concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was 280 parts per million (ppm). As of March 2009, it has reached 387 ppm.
Today, the amount of carbon dioxide is higher than at any time in the last 650,000 years. And the Earth’s average temperature is increasing faster than ever before.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change projects that temperatures will rise 3.2 – 7.2 degrees Fahrenheit in the 21st century. Dramatically reducing levels of global warming pollution may keep the rise in the lower part of this range.
Contributing to Climate Change
The United States releases more carbon dioxide than any other country, though it is home to just five percent of the world’s population. If everyone in the world lived the way people do in the U.S., it would take five Earths to provide enough resources for everyone!
The amount of carbon dioxide emitted by the average family in the United States breaks down this way:
One half from heating and cooling the house
One quarter from transportation
One quarter from using electricity
Burning one gallon of gasoline puts 19 pounds of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
Effects on People, Wildlife and the Planet
Average sea level is expected to rise 7 – 23 inches before the end of this century – and perhaps as much as 31 inches (if, as some models predict, the rate of ice melting from Greenland and Antarctica increases).
All but 100 of 1,100 glaciers researched are receding (more ice melts in summer than re-forms the next winter).
The current pace of global average temperature rise puts approximately 20 to 30 percent of plant and animal species at increased risk of extinction.
Rain forest destruction contributes to climate change. That’s because trees store carbon dioxide as they grow. Clearing and burning forests releases large amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
Coral reefs are as important to marine wildlife as rainforests are to land-based wildlife. Rising seawater temperatures threaten their survival. The world lost about 16% of all coral reefs in 1998, the second hottest year on record.
Foodbank is by far, the largest hunger relief organisation in Australia.
Last year alone, we provided enough food for 32 million meals.
Foodbank is a non-denominational, non-profit organisation which acts as a pantry to the charities and community groups who feed the hungry. It was first established in 1992 in NSW and now has a presence in every state and the Northern Territory with distribution centres in all state capitals as well as a number of regional centres. We operate with a staff of approximately 90 employees and over 3,000 volunteers.
Foodbank is a conduit between the food industry’s surplus food and the welfare sector’s need. Find out more about how we work.
Everybody Can Win!!!!
Every year many Australian food companies, with the help of Foodbank, divert thousands of tonnes of food from going to landfill and give it a new purpose – to help feed people who would otherwise go hungry.
By doing so they reduce costs, avoid further contributing to the pressure on landfill space and reduce the production of the greenhouse gas methane which results from waste decomposing.
Not only does foodbanking help to address the issue of hunger in Australia but it’s also good for the environment.
For every dollar you donate to Foodbank we are able to achieve $7 worth of food.
Questions to Consider????????
1. How does food wastage occur?
Food can go off and spoil.
Food can be prepared and then not purchased by students.
The canteen lady might not know about a cake stall or a sausage sizzle and prepare food for the day. On these days students do not purchase a lot of food from the canteen.
There is organic waste off the fruit and vegetables.
Food can be wasted through human error; for example dropping the food on the floor, or sneezing on it.
How can we help? – Sustainable Strategies to Reduce Waste in Our School
2. What are environmentally friendly solutions to reduce waste in our school canteen?
The canteen could reduce the price of the foods that are reaching their used by date.
Stock needs to be rotated to make sure the foods which are going to go off are used first.
Teachers must tell the canteen when there are students and teachers out of the school or speciality food stalls or events on certain days.
Take care when preparing food and take your time to make sure it’s not dropped on the floor.
Fruit and vegetable scraps can be feed to the animals on the school farm.
The Hidden Issue of Hunger in Australia
Hunger is one of Australia’s best kept secrets. Two million Australians access food assistance at some point every year, with half of those going without being children. Low income and single parent families have become the biggest groups turning to welfare agencies for help, as cost of living pressures mean one unexpected expense or event can tip the balance.
Ethan, Zac, Brandon Br. and Waide started with the detail on the back end of the Archi. They needed so much concentration, lots of patience and of course a very steady hand for this task. Great job guys!
symbolises the Australian Wool farmers being the link that binds wool and fashion together in wool’s journey from “Fibre to Fashion”
Northlakes High School Archibull 2015 
