Educational Opportunities

Ethics Olympiad

The Ethics Olympiad is a type of debating which is a combination of philosophy and debating. Participants are given an ethical case to discuss and present an argument on. The opposing team can then disagree or further build on the other team’s arguments. Unlike regular debating, participants are also given points for respect and manners. This year one of our teams came third in a competition for schools across Australasia.

Benjamin Cuddihy, 7C

Scenario Writing

Scenario writing is a competition in which you write a piece on a topic that you get to choose from a series of different choices. The pieces of writing are similar to creative writing and have a maximum word count of one thousand, five hundred words. The scenario writing stories need to be set fifty or more years in the future. This lets you use technology that doesn’t exist yet. My topic this year was on neurotechnology. I chose this because I was interested in writing a story around mind control. Oscar Abbott, 7B

Robocup Nationals 2022

On Saturday 10 September we travelled to Dunedin for the Robocup Nationals 2022. Medbury’s cute tour mascot, Marcus, came along with my family and I. Our team, Lego Corporation, competed in the Premier (Years 9 to 13) ‘Rescue Circuit’ and came third! Robocup is a fun and challenging activity which involves lots of creative thinking, decision-making, programming skills and helps to develop a never-give-up attitude. There is always a way to solve the problem only if you keep trying, keep failing, keep thinking and keep doing. I would highly recommend Ev3 to other boys.

Sean Ma, 7M

There is so much happening at Medbury School that it is hard to fit it into one magazine! Here are just a few of the many activities taking place...

Christchurch Technology Challenge Winners

On Wednesday 31 August our RoboProgers Year 7 Scratch Team entered the Great Christchurch Technology Challenge. In this challenge we were given the opportunity to download files and code them into a functional game, according to the video we watched and the criteria we were given. The winning team would be the one who coded all elements and functionality perfectly and were first to upload their file. The competition brief was released at 3.45pm and we were away coding! Our first attempt was quick but missed the mark in a few areas. At 4.57pm, we won the competition and received a trophy and prizes. Cohen Wildermoth, 7C; Benjamin Cuddihy, 7C; and Andy Li, 7B

Future Problem Solving

This year, selected boys in Years 5 to 7 have been participating in Future Problem Solving. In FPS, you are given a scene that is based in the future and you have to work through six steps. These include identifying challenges, choosing one to solve, creating solutions, generating criteria, evaluating solutions, and writing an action plan. Altogether FPS is a very enjoyable but challenging and intense activity which gives valuable life skills.

Flynn Moss and Ollie Gordon 7Z

EPro8

EPro8 is a nationwide inter-school science and engineering competition. At school on a Tuesday lunch time over Terms 2 and 3 we worked through EPro8 challenges to help us prepare for the 3 hour competitions. This year Medbury entered a Years 5 and 6 team who placed 6th in the first round of the competition. Our Years 7 and 8 team progressed through two rounds to qualify for the Canterbury finals, gaining third place. I would highly recommend giving EPro8 a go, it is lots of fun! Noah Madgwick, 8S

Trips and visits

Year 5 visit to Ferrymead Heritage Park

In Term 2, Year 5 went on a day trip to Ferrymead Heritage Park where we learned what it was like in the 1800s when the settlers had just arrived in New Zealand. We did chores in a V-hut and learned about the experience of ‘George’ who was one of the immigrants who came to New Zealand (he was just acting though). Also we went to ‘school’ and had some lessons on handwriting, reading and arithmetic. In our opinion, it was a very interesting and fun day! Kiran Keswani and William Valentine, 5O

Lower Middle School Gymnastics

This term, the Lower Middle School went to gymnastics lessons at the Christchurch School of Gymnastics. We used a lot of apparatus, including trampolines, beams, bars, the sprung floor, ropes and rings. My favourite part was jumping into the foam pit because it was soft and bouncy and I wasn’t afraid of hurting myself. I hope we go again next year. Harry Petrie, 3S

Year 4 Trip to the Canterbury Museum

To enrich our ‘Ancient Egypt’ topic for Term 3, we went to the Canterbury Museum. The instructor, Anthony gave us a challenge. We had to find an object that was a replica of something that was discovered in Egypt. It was the Rosetta Stone. We learnt that it was a stone with Egyptian writing on it. After this we talked about the process of being mummified, the afterlife and hieroglyphics. We wrote our names in hieroglyphics using special stamps and looked at the Museum’s Mummy, Tash Pen Konshu. The Mummy was as realistic as old bones! We really enjoyed our visit. Jason Gong, 4B

Enriching class trips add depth and value to our learning programmes. Here are just a few of our recent trips and visits...

House of Bricks

On Tuesday 2 August we had an amazing day with House of Bricks. As soon as we walked inside we saw thousands of pieces of Lego. We also noticed some rules. The main rule was to build a bridge that was two feet long. My group had four people and we started instantly. Eventually we had to put a weight on our bridge to see if it could hold the weight. The bridge did not fall, but it wobbled a lot. We made some supports on the bottom and at the end we got to look at everyone’s bridges. This was a fun learning experience. Noah Mackie, 3E

Year 6 to the Airforce Museum

This term, as part of the World Wars Inquiry, the Year 6’s went to the Air Force Museum. We were divided into two groups for activities. The first thing our group did was a scavenger hunt, which consisted of questions that we had to complete. Our favourite part was looking at the planes in the hanger, with our pick of planes being a massive cargo plane. We also enjoyed the virtual plane game. The second half of our visit involved learning about life in a German POW camp. Chris, our instructor, told us about the escapes they made and shared interesting facts. Our favourite part was when he told us about what they did with the dog tags! Eli Coles and Zavier Armstrong, 6P

Junior School Trip to Airforce Museum

On a sunny Thursday morning in Week 7, the whole Junior School went to the Air Force Museum. We were excited to be going on the long bendy bus. It was fun when the bus went around corners. At the Museum we got to work with Chris. He showed us simple machines. We were also allowed to explore the Museum. We went to the classroom and we got to go on a plane. It was an old plane and we had to look after it. We were allowed to jump out of the plane. We liked jumping out onto a big blue mat. Tommy Harvey and Finlay Douglas, 2R