Banyule/Nillumbik 2016 Week Three

We started off the program this week back at Jets Studio for a street art workshop. It was a really fun way to start the week and was great to get outside and be creative. The students started off meeting Jess from Banyule Youth Services who runs a regular street art program, and AJ the facilitator for the day. AJ showed the students a range of his own work and journals before they got stuck into designing their own pieces to spray later. Once everyone had an idea of what they wanted to get onto their board, we headed outside with the spray cans to make some art! Everyone put in a great effort, with some focusing on practising difficult techniques (which they nailed in the end!) while others let loose and created a heap of evolving pieces.

From Jets we headed into Greensborough to go to headspace. Here we met Liz who welcomed us into the space, and the students got a feel for what headspace does and how they can help out young people. We had some great discussions about emotion and are looking forward to heading back next week! Thursday the students headed to their first Reach Grounded workshop around the corner here in Collingwood. Although Newstart staff don't attend these workshops feedback from the students was great, and they're looking forward to the next one in a few weeks.

We ended off the week down at South Melbourne Life Saving Club learning some first aid and water safety. The students all practiced CPR and it was a nice start to the day before we headed out onto the water for a practical lesson in water safety and rescues. After covering all the hand signals, we had a go at using the rescue paddle boards. Everything we learnt out on the water in this session is building up our skills for surf camp next week. If Friday was any indicator, there'll be lots of successes!