- Make sure you get the form and your $40 deposit in to the Front Office by this Friday
- Spread the word: the order can’t go off until all deposits are in. No second chances this time – only those people in the initial order can get a top but it would be very nice if we all had one!!!
- Please see me privately if you need help with the finances. I’m really keen for everyone who wants one to get one and am happy to make special arrangements for those who really need them…
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Event #1: RRisk for the students of Year 12, 2012 is on Friday Nove 25th. Meet at the bus shelter by 8.45am. We will be back at 3pm. There is no cost but remember to bring money/lunch.
Event#2: Parents Info Evening. “Surviving and HSC”. A panel including the Principal and Deputy, a parent and a past student to explore supporting students through this challenging year. 7pm in the school library. Tea, coffee and biscuits.
Please spread the word for both.
2011-2012 HSC Assessment Schedules Now Updated
Posted: November 7, 2011 in UncategorizedThe new assessment schedules are now updated under the ‘Assessments’ tab at the top of the blog. All the old Year 11 ones are now gone and the year ahead is mapped out in a wonderful blaze of assessment tasks just waiting for your attention. Enjoy!
“RRisk” is an acronym which stands for Reduce Risk – Increase Student Knowledge
Here is some information they have provided me about what the seminar on the 25th of November will be about:
“The RRISK Program aims to reduce adolescent risk taking associated with alcohol and drug use,
driving and celebrating. RRISK builds resilience by providing students with knowledge, skills and
attitudes to help them make responsible decisions. The RRISK seminars are designed to enhance
curriculum based Drug and Road Safety Education, Pastoral Care and Welfare Programs.
The key messages are:
- · Plan ahead
- · Know the facts
- · Make informed decisions
- · Reduce risks
- · Look after your friends
Topics are listed below:
1. Young people and risk taking
2. Adolescent drinking behaviour
3. Parties – will you allow alcohol at your adolescent’s party?
4. Talking to young people about alcohol and drugs
5. Australian Alcohol Guidelines for Children and Young People under 18
6. Young drivers aged 17-25 years. Why are they at risk?
7. Alcohol, illegal drugs and roadside testing
8. Tips for supervising your learner driver
9. Tips for supporting provisional drivers
10. Points to consider when buying a used car
11. RRISK Seminar 2011
Students in Year 12 in 2012 at Bellingen High will find many useful things on this site and I hope that you will all subscribe so that you receive notification of new posts as they are made. For example, as soon as Assessment tasks are given out they will be posted here and you will be notified. If you missed the handout or lose your copy you will find it here!!!
Find info about when tasks are due and how much they are worth under ‘Higher School Certificate Assessment Schedules’ above. Copies of actual tasks will be posted as they are released and will be held under the Category ‘Assessment Tasks’. Events, articles of interest and useful links are also here.
Boys and the Beauty Myth
ã By Thea O’Connor.
How are young boys today negotiating a whole new era of male body-consciousness?
‘Are you sabotaging your abs?’, ‘Lose Your Gut’, ‘Maximum Muscle in Minutes’, ‘15 Foods that Fight Fat – The Superhero Diet.’ Pick up a men’s health magazine and the headlines read like a bad parody of appearance-obsessed women’s mags.
Check your email and you could have spam advertising penis enlargements or pectoral implants.
Watch the AFL and you might start wondering not only who’s going to make the Brownlow medal, but who’s going to make it into the ‘Men For All Seasons’ calendar that showcases ‘Australia’s sexiest and hottest male football players’.
No wonder body discontent is on the rise in males. Between 1972 and 1997 the percentage of males who reported being somewhat or very dissatisfied with their bodies increased from 15 to 43%, according to an international survey published in Psychology Today of 550 Australian, Asian, American and British men ranging from 14 to 82 years.
While teenage boys overall have higher levels of body satisfaction and self-esteem than girls, they’re also vulnerable to an intensifying body culture that promotes physical perfection.
“The current male ideal for young boys is the guy you see on the front cover of Men’s Health magazine,” says Dr. Murray Drummond senior lecturer in men’s health promotion at the University of South Australia. “Muscular, without being hyper-muscular, devoid of fat (but not skinny), ‘cut’ or ‘ripped’ with a six pack, athletic looking and no body hair.”
What’s driving this broad-shouldered male ideal? It’s our changing notions of masculinity as much as marketing, according to Drummond.
As men’s roles change and technology increasingly replaces the need for manual labour, the male body has become ever more redundant. At the same time, men’s desire for a powerful muscular body has intensified, as if grasping for a lost masculinity when men’s physical strength was in demand and gender roles were clear.
And where there’s discontent and desire, there’s money to be made. Hence the recent and rapid growth of a beauty industry for males, which happily pedals an ideal look for men and boys. “Young men between the ages of eight and eighteen are recognised as a very important and growing sector of the health and beauty care industry,” says Basil Vlachou managing director of eMale – Men’s Grooming and Skin Care. “US research predicts that by the year 2008 they’ll make up 35-40% of the total health and beauty care market.”
How are adolescent boys negotiating this whole new world of the body beautiful?
Look at the hair cuts and streaks in any schoolyard and it seems that at least some boys are enjoying men’s new found freedom to invest in their appearance. “Metrosexual celebrities such as David Beckham have made it OK for young men to use grooming methods traditionally thought of as being ‘girly,’ says Vlachou.
But anyone one who buys into our body culture’s beauty myth has to dip into their pockets, and teenage boys are no exception.
While more adult men are fronting up for cosmetic surgery, teenage boys are saving up for hair gel, mousses and colouring products, the sales of which increased by 11% in 2002, according to Vlachou.
Low level spending for the sake of cool hair is pretty harmless. But the desire for a bulging V-shaped torso can turn lethal. Australian and US research indicates that steroid use is no longer restricted to athletes and that about six to twelve percent of high school males have used steroids. An Australian study of 96 male steroid users conducted by the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre, found that over 68% of them said they used steroids for appearance-related reasons, including not feeling big enough.
Of those males who are affected by an eating disorder, homosexuals and athletes are at the greatest risk, and body image is part of the cause. The gay culture’s strong focus on physical attractiveness, and the need for high levels of muscularity or leanness in certain sports (such as gymnastics, running, body building, rowing and wrestling), make these men especially vulnerable.
Less visible is the effect body dissatisfaction can have on boys’ self esteem.
“Boys won’t say ‘my body image affects my self esteem’ in the way a girl can articulate, but it does,” says Drummond whose research has found that body image and self-esteem issues are core reasons for some boys abstaining from physical education at school. “Late developers, and overweight boys are particularly vulnerable to poor body image,” says Drummond. These boys are more likely to stand out, be the target of teasing and feel like they don’t fit in. While early developers can feel good about their superior size, not all boys handle the extra attention well.
Despite these struggles, there is a distinct male-advantage when it comes to body image. Boys are much less likely than girls to compare their bodies to their friends (and when they do a significant number feel better about themselves as a result!), less likely to measure their self worth by appearance (performance is more important), they’re more likely to exercise than diet to change their body and they also seem less affected (but not immune) to the negative influence of the media, according to research conducted by Dr Lina Ricciardelli, school of psychology, Deakin University and Professor Susan Paxton of La Trobe University.
While girls seem hardwired to dismiss complements or pick up on the slightest suggestion of body-criticism, boys say that the majority of messages they receive about their body is positive, according to the 40 year seven and year nine boys interviewed by Ricciardelli: “You’ve got a good body”; “You’ve got pretty big muscles”; “You’re tall and got pretty good legs”.
Positive communication from friends and family can be a great body image booster for boys.
Ricciardelli’s study showed that positive messages from mothers were significantly related to the boys’ satisfaction with body shape and positive messages from female friends were significantly related to boys’ satisfaction with muscle tone. Boys received more praise from their mothers and female friends than from fathers or male friends.
Robin Crawley, Director of Men Alive encourages dads to celebrate and validate their sons changing bodies more, whether it’s the first pubic hair, a cracking voice or accelerated growth. “The first rite of passage from boyhood to manhood is the physical one,” says Crawley. “Acknowledge all the signs that show he’s becoming a man, and let him know you’re proud of him.”
Drummond encourages fathers to be there for sons so they can talk ‘men’s business’ when needed. But what if you’re a dad who’s baffled by body image and your son is in the monosyllabic stage of development?
“Remember what it was like for you at that age, and try not to moralise, philosophise or judge,” says Gary Simpson, a men’s health and wellbeing worker from northern NSW. “Men’s concern about being strong enough or big enough – it’s thousands of years old,” says Simpson. “Share your own experiences so young boys can hear that you went through what they’re going through.”
If words don’t come easily, try getting physical. It might be the best communication of all between fathers and sons.
“Boys need physical contact and physical challenges,” says Crawley. “Hug your son, wrestle him and play sport with him. This bonds him with you, the father, so he can go and test himself on other boys,” says Crawley.
For boys to feel good about their bodies and their unique style of being male they also need to be freed from narrow, superficial and media-driven images of masculinity.
Says Drummond “we need to show boys that they can build a sense of masculinity in so many other ways than bulking up, and that it’s strength of character that counts as much as muscle strength.”
Simpson agrees. “Admit that you make mistakes, and show your vulnerability and weakness, as this shows true courage and strength. Modelling diverse ways of being a man shows young guys that it’s OK to be sensitive, nurturing and flexible as well as strong and sure.”
Body Image Boosters for Boys
- Demonstrate respect for men and women who possess body types or personality traits that don’t meet narrowly defined ideals of masculinity and femininity.
- Praise qualities that are not appearance related.
- Celebrate and validate the bodily changes of adolescence.
- Talk about what you see on the media, and teach boys how to deconstruct media messages and advertisements.
- Discuss what constitutes true strength and power.
- Provide regular opportunities for boys to enjoy healthy physical contact and challenges with men.
- Help diversify the masculine image by providing examples of heroes who don’t fit the image, linking your sons up with a range of older males, and modelling diverse ways of being a man.
Thea O’Connor is a body image specialist, writer and speaker www.thea.com.au
The bitter-sweet reality of girl-girl friendships
ã Thea O’Connor
Girls in their teens form friendships that are all consuming, filled with confidences and conflict, love and betrayal.
The world of most teenage girls revolves around their friends. Talking, texting and telephoning, girls can form friendships of astonishing intensity and exquisite intimacy.
“Your girlfriends can make you feel so good – sharing with each other, talking about how you feel, understanding each other,” says 15 year old Melissa.
Great friendships not only feel good, they are good for girls. A study conducted by the Centre for Adolescent Health of 2,678 teenagers aged 13 to 15 years, found that good social relationships in girls were strongly related to wellbeing. (‘Good’ being defined as having some one to trust, someone to talk to and some one to depend upon)
So why did Susie Orbach, the well-known UK feminist psychotherapist, feel the need to run workshops for women to deal with the hurt, pain and difficulties they experienced with their girlfriends?
And why did Sue Young, when teaching at an all-girl junior school, find herself spending so much time sorting out girls relationships when she should have been teaching? “After every lunch time there was a drama to be dealt with, and the girls were so distressed we couldn’t ignore it,” says Sue. “It was usually about girls being left out and cut out from groups.”
When conflict emerges in female friendships, it can cause great anguish and havoc. And the intensity of these feelings can be unbearable. “One mother told us how her daughter couldn’t sleep at night when things went wrong with her best friend,” says Sue. Equally unbearable is the thought of talking directly to ones friend about the upset. For within female friendships we don’t have an accepted context for talking about anger and hurt, according to Orbach.
“Girls don’t talk directly about problems because they want to save the other persons feelings, rather than realise that indirect communication can lead to more hurt in the long run,” says Rhonda Briscoe, creator and facilitator of the Mpower program, designed to help girls better understand the dynamics of their friendships (www.connectingkids.org.au)
The cost of this avoidance is high.
“If you don’t know what you did wrong, it’s terrible because then you can’t say sorry, so instead you just move away and the friendship deteriorates,” says Katharine, 13.
Add to girls avoidance the tendency to misinterpret and over-interpret every micro-nuance, and to talk to everyone else except the person in question, and it can all go horribly wrong, terribly quickly, on quite a scale.
“You can end up with 20 people involved (including mothers) with an issue that started off between two people,” says Rhonda. “So instead of feeling things once, girls feel them again and again by replaying their interpretations with their friends, their best friends, and their mothers.”
Given the choice, most girls would prefer to be told something to their faces rather than talked about behind their backs.
“Even though we talk so much, we don’t really talk-talk, unless you are really close friends,” says Melissa. “There is not enough of – this is how I feel, this is the problem, let’s fix it. People are worried by assertiveness and confronting and problem solving, they get a bit antsy about that.”
Why does it seem so impossible to say what’s really going on? “A girl fears that if she says what she really feels she’ll damage or even lose the relationship’” says Rhonda. It’s not a risk you want to take when you want to feel connected all the time, as teenage girls do.
Sometimes girls don’t speak up because they simply feel they can’t. At other times the sword of silence is wielded very consciously, with sharp and painful consequences.
GGirls irls talk about being ‘cut’ by the scornful looks of ‘friends’ who are now ignoring them, avoiding eye contact, rolling their eyes, or speaking in a tone that is now unmistakably, but ever so slightly cool. Welcome to the hidden world of girls aggression.
“Our research found that the most common forms of bullying experienced by girls was deliberately being left out or having spreading rumours about them,” says Lyndal Bond, Research Director at the Centre for Adolescent Health. “We found that bullying causes depression in teenage boys and girls, but there’s a much stronger effect for girls,” says Bond. Perhaps it’s because girls invest in and rely on their connections so much, that they feel the disconnection so acutely.
Can you train girls to overcome their communication weakness and their cruelty and be more direct?
The Mpower program of Connecting Kids Company, has taken on this ambitious goal – to encourage girls to go against all of their conditioning and some of their biology to get good at having it out, face-to-face, in a girl-friendly way. “We try to show girls that it may actually improve their relationships, or at least help them let go of unhealthy ones, rather than make them worse,” says Rhonda.
Which is no easy task. Insists Katharine “all the teachers and counsellor say if you have a problem with someone, go and talk to them about it, tell them how you feel. But it just doesn’t work, it really doesn’t. It’s a given fact it makes it worse. It’s fine when the teacher is there, but when you go outside…”
That’s why Rhonda strongly believes you need to work with groups of girls, rather than with individuals. It’s unfair to send a single girl into the lioness’ den, because yes, the odds are she will be devoured. When she speaks up alone about her problem, she’s just as likely to get back a sarcastic “so”, or “what’s your problem,” as an empathetic attempt at reconciliation.
“You need to work with the group norms so everyone knows what the dynamics are and to expose the nasty behaviours, and to make sure everyone gets to see that,” says Rhonda. “You’re more likely to derail bitchy behaviour if girls speak out in public. Then others can see this behaviour modelled and offer support – ‘that was great when you stood up to her.’
For one hour a week, over a period of 11 weeks, the year 5 and 6 girls at Serpell primary school, Melbourne, have been meeting to learn some new ways of talking. They’re being encouraged to speak directly to other girls to check out their interpretations. “We warn them that it won’t be easy, that they’ll need to practice and they may need to try a few different approaches,” says Sue Young now Assistant Principal of Serpell Primary. The girls are given many opportunities to role-play being direct and thoughtful rather than accusative, while using their ‘nice skills. ‘I was wondering, when you said ___ what did you mean?’ or ‘I notice you’re talking to me differently, is there something wrong?’
“Even though it was challenging for them, the girls said they had more confidence to confront because they now had the words to use,” says Sue. The girls said they loved it, and the parents liked it too. Said one mother, “My daughter is now speaking to me about the relationships she experiences with girls at school and we can discuss ways of dealing with difficult situations.”
Just how can you help your daughter with her friendship difficulties, if at all?
Certainly not by joining in and fuelling the cat-fights, as some mothers do.
“Keep out of it,” advises Sue, ”because girls need to deal with it themselves.”
“It’s just a phase,” may be true but only dismisses a girl’s torment. And telling a girl to ignore what’s happening to her, is asking the impossible. Girls can’t ignore it. When a girl is being targeted, it is pretty much the only thing she can think about.
“Listen and notice,” suggests Rhonda. “Saying something like ‘I notice you’re not hanging around with Sally anymore’, can help open up communication.” And help them explore options. Ask, who are you friendly with at the moment? Is there someone else you could talk to? And did you check it out to see if that’s what Sally meant?
As painful and problematic as girls’ friendships might be at times, you can always work with girls’ strength, which is that they love to talk.
END 1,358 words
Tips for Parents
- Keep out of it
- Be a good listener and reflect back what you notice
- Realise it’s normal for girls to be changing and swapping friends, especially in their earlier teenage years.
- Remember you don’t need to find a solution for your daughter but you can help her explore the issues and define the problem.
- If you’re concerned about what’s happening at school, make an appointment with her teacher rather than arrive unannounced.
- Role model direct communication at home and with your girlfriends.
