Carol Calderwood
Hi! I’m Carol and I was the assistant coach for this team for Norwood Primary School. Whilst Norwood is situated in Adelaide, South Australia, I live in Newcastle, New South Wales.
The distance from where I live to where the majority of the team were situated is over 1,000km. In order for me to assist with this team we had to communicate effectively through email and phone calls. The team simply didn’t have the luxury of having me with them in the classroom.
None of the students had ever created a website before, so they thought that the topic of Australian animals would be a great way of educating others around the world about their uniqueness and some very quirky aspects of the way these animals live. They learned along the way how to edit images and also how to create a web page and each of them recognised their own personal strengths in order to complete the project.
I have been coaching ThinkQuest teams for 7 years and this is the first time I’ve ever coached a team outside the 19 and Under age category. The kids showed me just how eager they were to learn to accomplish being able to use programs which were virtually unknown to them when they began.
During the project they discovered that I have a pair of wild Kookaburras who fly in to be fed twice daily, so they insisted on incorporating Gutsache and Grub into the website because these birds are wonderful (and also very funny) to watch. Their ‘call’ is very unique as it sounds like they are laughing very loudly!
I’d like to personally thank the students for their hard work. Their parents for the support when the project required more time requiring them to be away from their normal routines. Great work!
Also, thanks to Tina for her dedication and the many hours we spent on the phone together ‘troubleshooting’. The entire team appreciates this!
It has been an absolute pleasure working with everyone and I’d also like to acknowledge the support given the team from Norwood Primary School and the Principal there.