We are lucky enough to have a vegetable garden in our school. The garden is cared for by students in the support unit.
Every week they walk around and sell the wonderful organic produce to the staff at Northlakes High School.
This week the students won second place in the Wyong Shire Garden Competition.
What an awesome job….proof that farming is indeed everyone’s business!
Great job Team Northlakes!
Well we all thought that yesterday was the last day working our Archibull Artwork…but we were wrong!
Because of unforeseen circumstances, with the knitting needles breaking….our journey wasn’t quite over…..
Today we attached the new, improved and much stronger needles….large pieces of wood, liquid nails, lots more bubble wrap for stuffing and of course more red stitching….tying all the other elements together …we had to make our unforeseen circumstances work for us!!!
Well I think we did it!
We can’t believe our journey is over….we have done and learnt much more than we ever thought we could….what a ride….we are all going to sleep well tonight….
Great job Team Northlakes….xxx
The imagination is a crazy thing…..it is the home of all our ideas and dreams. In our minds through our Archibull journey we all had some crazy ideas….some thought they were impossible….we couldn’t possibly do that!
But we are proof that in the world of imagination anything is possible!
If you can dream it, then you can do it!
Well done Team Northlakes!
We had a lot of finishing touches to do on Woolbaakee. We had a list and we all had a jobs to complete. Once again the wonderful group of year 10 students gave up their entire day so our Archibull entry was painted to her very best.
As we were working in the corridor Jimmy Barnes blared from an iPhone and we all chatted about life in general. Lots of teachers and students walked past and commented on our Archi….THEY LOVED IT! I wish there was enough room around the cow for 100 students to work…we had a lot more volunteers!
At the conclusion of the day, we were all so tired, but mustered up the energy to trek Woolbaakee down to the hall for one last photo shoot.
Disaster struck when the giant wooden knitting needles and large tapestries become unbalanced and snapped!!!!!
We couldn’t let that stop us. We needed to get photographs for our artwork analysis, so Paige ran back up to the classroom and got a ball of strong black wool. We attached the wool around both ends of the needles and Brandon (who is very tall for someone in year 8), threw the ball of wool up and caught it on a large hook that was on the brick wall behind our cow. Two students held either side of the wool, to keep the needles upright.
If you look close at the photos you will see the black wool in the background.
Once all the photos had been taken, from almost every angle possible we needed to consider how to fix this major problem.
Mrs Dowe took the knitting needles, poles and tapestries home for her husband to fix.
The new and improved version is much stronger than the original, now Mrs Dowe just has to attach it to the back of Woolbaakee tomorrow….nothing like leaving it to the last minute!!!!
We had a very full and productive last day of working all together…and what a fitting ending to have quite a major problem to solve!!
After all…..WE ARE THE PROBLEM SOLVERS….WE HUNT FOR SOLUTIONS!
We were looking through some old Archi photos from last year and came across this one. There are a few familiar faces in here……last year three of these students were in year 7 and helped moved our cow around the school any chance they got!
This year these guys have helped form the core Archibull group in 8WL. Goes to show….the more change, the more things stay the same!
We have almost come to the end of our Archibull journey for 2015. We can see the finishing line, there are still a few more issues to resolve on the artwork, however they are minor and just require a little bit of time and steady hands and of course lots of concentration!
We have achieved one of our biggest and most challenging components of our entire artwork…..attaching the giant, hand-crafted, over-sized knitting needles and tapesties, visible from both sides of Woolbaakee.
These needles almost couldn’t happen, because they kept over balancing and were not stable enough when mounted on top of the cow. But we persevered and are thrilled with the final result! The tapestries are an important piece in telling our story “From fibre to fashion”, because they depict early farming life in Australia and gives the audience a sense of the history of the Australian wool industry. And to add to our message and concept both pieces of woollen tapestry and the 100% Merino wool backing blanket were purchased and up cycled from a local Op Shop. So that was an added bonus! We changed the overall colour (to suit our artwork) by hand dying it all blue – linking into the sky section of the artwork.
We also put some finishing touches on the section of the artwork, cleaning up the line work and integrating that section into the adjacent piece of the artwork. This was an important aspect to complete because it symbolises the reciprocal relationship between all parts of Australian farming – balancing native flora and fauna with livestock to ensure premium produce.
We made a little lizard out of felt and placed it walking down the leg, off the beautifully vibrant Aboriginal artwork…we think he is a very welcomed addition…and he is rather cute.
We finally finished the detail on Woolbaakee’s beanie, adding 100% Merino woollen leaves underneath the petals.
The top layer of the petals were constructed with woollen friendship bands – made by members of 8WL. This is a symbol of the lasting friendships that have been built as a result of participating in the Archibull Prize this year.
We also added the friendship bands around the top of the udders. We thought that was a nice finishing touch for the section.
We added the “Target 100” felt logo to the side of the leg. We made the colours slightly brighter than it usually is, because it worked well with our artwork.
Using the same technique we also added a Northlakes High School logo, Gmail and Facebook logo, because without all of this we would not have been able to have as much communication with Bessie (YFC) as we have had in 2015.
So I think you will agree, we have worked very hard, faced some big challenges, have had to think creatively and outside of the box – but we are almost there!
GO TEAM NORTHLAKES!
Well, What’s in a name I hear you say…..for this Archibull there’s a lot!
Last week the call went out over the Northlakes High School Facebook page to help give our beloved Archi a name. We knew it had to be something magical, because she is very special to us…….
Lots of people commented and liked our Archi and some very interesting suggestions came in….
It seems many people took “Jenny Key” into account……
So after one very busy day where we shot our short film, added finishing touches to our artwork and reflected on our efforts in Term 3….we decided on the perfect name….
“WOOLBAAKEE”
We think her name is perfect and reflects all the different influences in our artwork and the Australian Wool Industry.
The full name of our artwork is;
“Woolbaakee, Weaving an Australian Woollen Dream”
We think it is just the perfect name for her, we are very proud!
This is very exciting and I just had to reblog it for all our students to see!
I love this time of year when the entries for The 2015 Archibull Prize start flowing in.
This year the schools are taking the program to a whole new level
Who would have thought you could teach agriculture through dance.
Never underestimate the power of the story of the journey of the food you eat, the clothes you wear and roof over your head
Well done Northlakes High – on behalf of farmers everywhere we salute your
True Colours is the animation entry from Northlakes High School for the 2015 Archibull Prize.
“True Colours – Woolbaakee Weaving an Australian Woollen Dream” explores our ideas about the Australian Wool Industry, and all that we have learnt through our 2015 Archibull journey.
This year our approach to exploring our commodity, Wool was a little different. We wanted to take an abstract and artful view. We have showcased more of the exceptional talent…
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I strongly disagree with the statement that there are not enough young people involved in Agriculture in Australia. There are a lot of young farming champions in Australia who work with an allocated school each year for the Art4Agriculture Archibull Prize. There are a lot of young people who get farms passed down to them in their families, from generation to generation. There are a large amount of young farmers in Australia, because the demand for our products overseas is growing every year.
There are a lot of young farming champions in Australia who work with an allocated school each year for the Art4Agriculture Archibull Prize. There are 15 Young Farming Champions (YFC) throughout Australia who are both young and champions in their chosen field. It is the job of the YFC to go to each school, teach and educate students about farming life in Australia. In 2015 our YFC was Bessie Thomas. Her husband, Shannon and her lived on a farm in Burragan in Central Western NSW. Their main source of income was from farming Merino sheep for wool. Bessie and Shannon are examples of young Australian people who are farmers as well. They work everyday farming the land and moving livestock all in the name of agriculture.
There are a lot of young people who get farms passed down to them in their families, from generation to generation. In Australia, when a farm is past down from one generation to the next it is called “Family Farming”. In this way, the younger generation is born into farming and it is in their blood. Bessie’s family farm at Burragan has been in the family for many generations. She told our class that the farm had been part of her family for over 100 years. Bessie also added that it would be a wonderful place to bring up a family in later years. This would mean the Burragan farm would eventually be passed down to the next generation. Family farming is one way to ensure there will always be young farmers willing and eager to work in the Australian agriculture industries.
There are a large amount of young farmers in Australia, because the demand for our products overseas is growing every year. Australia is amongst the largest exporters of products to foreign countries. Young Australian farmers are responsible for working the fields and feeding the livestock which in turn produce the materials and goods to send overseas, making money for our economy. Bessie and Shannon produce Merino wool and Angus beef which they sell to people and companies to make money to support themselves. Through the process of globalisation the world’s population is growing and the distance between continents is shrinking; meaning the demand for high quality Australian grown products is easier to get and more affordable for many. Meaning more Australian young people are able to work in agriculture and support their families while doing what they love.
I strongly believe that there are enough young people in Australia who are willing and able to work in agriculture farming the land. Firstly the Archibull Prize and the Young Farming Champions are evidence of excellent young people, who are champions in their field of expertise; secondly, family farming is a strong tradition in agricultural circles in Australia. It is very common for a farm to have been in one family for 100 plus years, like Bessie and Shannon and their farm at Burragan and finally there has been a large growth and demand for Australian grown products in the world market, which leads to more young farmers working the land producing goods to export all over the world.
The original persuasive writing piece was completed by Taleah H. On Thursday 10th September, we (8WL) reworked and edited her writing to produce this published piece.
Northlakes High School Archibull 2015 