WHY DOES THE PAST MATTER ANYWAYS?

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Surprisingly, we have learned a LOT from the past. You may have never thought about it, but in this project we dove into the past and how it affects us today. Keep reading to find out for yourself! 😁

Here is a medevial portrait (Yes, that is actually my face).  Read about the process down below ⬇️ 

DRIVING QUESTION

Every project we have a driving question. It is used to quite us through the project. Everything that we did connected back to the driving question. The driving question was, ’What can we learn from the past and why does it matter to us today?’’ I think that this was a good driving question, because it really gets you to think deeply into the question. I used this as my guide for the whole project.

THE BOOK OF THE LION

For this project we had to read a book called The Book Of The Lion by Michael Cadnum. The book is about a boy in medieval times who got recruited to join the crusades. His name was Edmund. The book shows how people lived, and what their worldview was back then. I learned a lot about medieval times. I learned about religion, rights, economy, the society, and so much more.  My opinion on the book: To be honest, this was not my favourite book and I found it hard to follow. But it was different for everyone. With each section, we had to do a role sheet. Here is one of my role sheets: In this one, we had to draw a picture related to the reading, so I chose to draw a horse being beaten up, because in one scene, Hubert tries to stop a man beating up his horse. I think this book was good to help us learn about medevial times, and the role sheets helped us too.

LEADERS TRIBUTE

We did lots of research about different world leaders in the past, and how their actions affected us today. Many of them made lasting impacts to our world today. We researched about Genghis khan. He was a very bloodthirsty, and innovative leader. He made lasting impacts because he created the Mongolian empire.

Then Tyler, Cece, an I created a tribute to him. We could make a bill with his face on it, a drawing, a slideshow, e.t.c. But we chose to make a musical. I’m not sure that it was very informational, but it was good for the 20 minutes that we got to make it. A017C141-7A36-491A-9E0A-BBFC4AD056E8

This assignment gave me a good idea of how one leader can turn into the leader of multiple countries by gaining followers and using their power.

 

SKETCH AND TELL

This assignment was a short activity that didn’t take long. We were assigned a partner to sit across from. We had 10 minutes to draw a quick sketch about how we think societies rise and fall. When we finished the drawing, we shared it with out partner, and then wrote a paragraph about the drawing, and how we think societies rise and fall. Here is the paragraph I wrote:

Societies rise and fall for different reasons. I find that the most common reasons are anger, religion, power and land. 

We know that leaders and their societies rise and fall. But do we know why and how? This drawing shows a leader who’s land spans across a large portion of the world. But there is another society who almost has the same amount of land. The red leader is more dominant, and wants to maintain their land, so then conflict happens. There are a few things that fuel war and crusades: Anger, Religion, Power, and land. All of those ideas fuel conflict. And that conflict leads to war. The more that they fight, the more that the societies slowly fall apart. Anger is something that is very delicate, and something that must be used wisely. In the drawing, you can see the leader is very angry with the other side, and that fuelled him to fight. Next up is religion. Religion is a very important thing for societies. These days we can pick which religions to follow, but back then Christian leaders ran crusades that killed and attacked just to make everyone Christian. Power is definitely part of society. I think it is important for there to be organization, and a good leader for societies. But it should be fair. My last idea is land. I feel like this is an obvious one because depending on how much land you had, the more powerful you were back then. 

Those are some ideas and thoughts I had about how societies rise and fall. In my drawing I represented each aspect.

ARTWORK CHOICE CHART

This assignment was for us to lay out the aspects of medevial worldview. We chose a piece of medevial art for each aspect, and we incorporated it into our final product in a creative way. For each piece of art, we had to explain why this would be the best fit, and also why we chose it. We had to include links and the image had to be Creative Commons license. The time period was 1000 to 1300. This assignment helped me to understand how I was going to lay out my artwork. It also helped me to stay organized.

 

FINAL PRODUCT

Finally, we made it to the end.

Well, not quite….. I still had to assemble my personalized medieval art! In order to creat our art, we had to learn how to use SuperimposeX. It is an editing app that, after some practice, is very easy to use. It is a very fun app to explore, and our whole class had fun with it 😂.   I learned how to mask things, layer, and edit. ✍️ This is how we put together our art. You can see in my art that I included many small things from my artwork choice chart. I tried my best to blend in my hair and face. The cross represents religion in medevial times, the paper represents knowledge, the map is geography, e.t.c.

This is a paragraph about the art that I wrote before that answers the driving question, and it is based off of society:

We have learned from the medieval times because their actions taught us ways to organize our society, and society connects to the aspects of my artwork piece. Society is a big part of a civilization, and it shapes our worldview and much of our actions. The actions of the past shape the future. Have you ever wondered about medieval times and how it has affected us today? Well before this project, I have too. After some research, reading the Book Of The Lion, and making ourselves into paintings, I have finally began to understand how their actions back then have impacted us now. I found three supporting details to incorporate into my painting. I discovered that all three of them play a part in society. The first one that I chose was Beliefs. Beliefs are something that a society relies on, because it is important for everyone to believe in what they want to. Back then, they were essentially forced to believe in Christianity. There was no freedom in beliefs back then. Today, you can choose what you want to believe in. The next Idea that I had was Economy. Back then, people would travel on boats to trade. Trading was very important, and still is because that is how you would eat and get basic needs. Today, we can just go to the grocery store and buy whatever we need. They didn’t use currency until later on because they traded with goods.Trading was a big part of the society and still is today. Back then, I would have had to trade my prized belongings even if I just got hungry. The third supporting idea that I had was Knowledge. Without knowledge, we would be nowhere. Knowledge is something that you gain from experiences, other people, and reading. You can gain knowledge in other ways too, but those are most common for me. Back then one of the big ways that they learned was from reading. That is something that stayed until today, and will forever be affected. In my worldview, I believe that reading is a skill that will be effective for me all through life. Societies need knowledge in order to keep going. Knowledge is something that stays with you and helps you with life. In my painting I will incorporate all these things creatively, and put my face into the painting. Those are some ideas that I had about how the past affects the future and what has stayed the same or changed. There are other ideas too, but those are some. Making this art piece has helped me gain knowledge about all of those things, while challenging me to create something that will be interesting.

 

REFLECTION

Ok, now its almost over for real 😅. This whole project has really got me thinking into the past, and why the actions of the past have affected us today. We need to learn from our past actions, and take what we know so we can change it for the better. It is important to make up for mistakes, and learn from them. Even if I didn’t enjoy the book as much as I would have liked to, I enjoyed the process of the whole project. The medieval times were very interesting to learn about, and I am glad that we got to learn about it. It is important to know how the world has changed, and how to accept it.  Overall, I really enjoyed this project, and I know way more about worldview and the past. This post has helped me understand the answer to the driving question. I explained how the leader’s actions reflect on us today, and it matters to us today because it is up to us to make decisions and we use knowledge of the past in our everyday life. In this project, I strived to do the best I could, and show my understanding the best I could.

 

THANK YOU FOR READING! 📖

 

How can a text help me understand myself as my worldview is changing?

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WHAT IS WORLDVIEW? WHAT IS MY WORLDVIEW?

Don’t worry! You’re not alone. Those were some of the big questions that I had before this project. But along the way, I learned what worldview actually is, and I learned how experiences, beliefs, and actions are only some things that shape a person’s worldview. It is a confusing thing, and everyone’s worldview is constantly changing. In example, my worldview has changed in so many ways since the end of grade 7. I went on a trip to Europe (check out my blog on that), which really gave me perspective on how different people live in the world. Reading the outsiders taught me how bad some people have it, and how fortunate we are here. 

THE OUTSIDERS

The Outsiders was set in The 1960s, and it is about of gang of boys. Three brothers live alone, and they face many challenges, and have to fend for themselves. Many of the gang members are thief’s. And the gang vandalizes, steals, and much more. I thought that this book was a good read, and I do recommend it. It taught me a lot about perspective, and how things were back then. Every week we had to do a role sheet about the section that we read. 

 We had to do many other small assignments that helped us think deeply into the idea of worldview in the outsiders, and in general. Here are some of the projects we did along the way: Worldview MindNode, Song lyrics, and finally, the end result. You can watch the final result here 👇

 

 

MUSIC VIDEO

 

Keep reading to learn about the other assignments, and the process of creating the song 🎶 

DRIVING QUESTION

The driving question for this project was:How can a text help me understand myself as my worldview is changing? Here is the paragraph I wrote about the driving question.

WORLDVIEW MINDNODE

This was one of the first assignments, and it was mainly to help us understand our worldviews. For each section we had to write down a statement, and a personal experience or connection that we have with the statement. The sections were: Time, Geography, Society, Beliefs, Values, Economy, and Knowledge. This task really helped me piece together the idea of worldview. I think it was very helpful. Right now I don’t think that there is anything that I would do differently in this project, and I am proud of it. (This image quality is not very good) 

ROLE SHEETS

Every week we had to do a role sheet. It was reflecting on the section of the book I read, and it helps go into depth with your thinking. This was one sheet called the coder. We had to draw two mini drawings and paste in the quote that we based it off. We then had to explain why we did it, and why we thought it was fitting. These role sheets were designed for our group discussions, and they are interesting to share with your group. Everyone always has different opinions and ideas, so it makes a good discussion. I feel like doing the role sheets every week and hearing my group member’s ideas helped me understand the book way better.

 

 

 

SONG LYRICS

As we got closer to the end, we created a draft of our song. We had to re-create ‘It’s The End Of The World As We Know It’ by REM. The lyrics had to represent our transition into high school, and our changing worldview.I created my first draft, dreading the moment when we had to make individual music videos.I did NOT want to sing it alone. The day we handed it in, we were told that we were going to be put into groups to make a music video together.

Group: Chloe, Marcus and Madeline (me)

I was very relieved 😅! But that meant that we had to create new lyrics, to be a mix of all our previous lyrics. It was pretty challenging to blend it all together, but after lots of thinking we got it all figured out. I have to say, it was way smoother all blended together.  

To hear the lyrics all put together, watch the music video up above!

 

MUSIC VIDEO

Finally, after all the work, we were on the final stretch. The most challenging part was recording on garage band. I think we re-recorded about 4 times. It was hard to all be on time, and we were having technical difficulties so that also set us back a bit. When we finished recording we inserted the song into iMovie. My group and I sent pictures of us all the way from toddlers to now. We used a shared album on the photos app, and shared that way. We added the pictures to the song, and finally, our group had successfully created a movie video!! 🎉 Check out my Youtube video above! Overall, I really enjoyed the process of this project, and I feel like I understand my worldview a lot more.

THANK YOU

 

Who Am I As A PLP Learner?

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(Click on the video above to check out my Youtube video! It is my Keynote presentation about Becoming a PLP Learner)

 

This is my very first reflection post, and I wanted to share it with you.  The project was called Becoming a PLP Learner, and I wanted to show you guys! The driving question was:  Who Am I As A PLP Learner. The project consisted of many smaller assignments. I learned to use many tools, and applications that I have never used before. I really enjoyed this project. I could definitely improve on things in the future, but for now this is what I have done. Click on the video above to check out my Youtube video. It is my Keynote presentation about Becoming a PLP Learner. Here are the assignments:

ME-EMOJI ANIMATION

We were assigned to make a Memoji that looks like us, and insert it to our keynote presentation with a laptop. On the laptop we had to make digital stickers of images, logos, or things that are important to us. After that, we had to animate the stickers so they spin, bounce, e.t.c. I had some difficulty with making the stickers animated, but after some troubleshooting, we figured it out. Here is a picture of my Memoji:  

WORDPACK

The next thing that we did was make a Wordpack in the Wordpack application. It is an app where you type in words, choose a shape, choose colour combinations, and change the font. It is useful if you want to use a creative way of displaying words. We had to pick words that describe us in ‘I Am’ statements. I thought that this app was pretty cool, and I will definitely use it again.

I AM DOODLE

This assignment also tied into the ‘I Am’ statements. We had to take a selfie of ourselves doing somethings that we love, or something that describes us. We then had to add doodles of the thing we were doing in the selfie, and write an ‘I Am’ statement. Here is mine:

 

USER MANUAL

One of the tasks that we were assigned was to create a user manual about ourselves. We had to refer to ourselves as a ‘device’ and create the ‘instructions’. It was a cool thing to write about, and I enjoyed it. Check it out here:

About Me

REFLECTION

Who am I as a PLP learner?
I think that I am curious, open minded, and determined. There is more work in PLP, but I am learning how to manage my work with my extracurricular’s. At the start of the year, I thought I would have to spend way more time on homework, but now that I’ve been in PLP I’ve come to realize that I can use my time wisely and complete tasks. I think that I bring some good skills to the PLP learning team, including my sense of humour, my creativeness, my ability to concentrate and listen, being encouraging, and more. I have had to refine and learn many skills so far. Some of them have been learning how to use all the new apps for drawing, presenting, music making, and lots more! I have had trouble it’s a few of the apps being confusing, but I troubleshooted and figured it out. My teachers have been quite helpful and patient, so that helps with my work. This will change throughout the years, but for now this is how I am reflecting on this project!

(Ps. Check out my blog!)

THANKS!

My Summer Europe Trip

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After a couple months of planning, a day of packing, a stressful trek through the airport, and a 9 hour flight, we were finally in Europe!

I have always wanted to travel to Europe, and this past summer it happened!

This is my first blog post, and I chose to share about my amazing trip to Europe. Our family tried to go to Mexico in the winter, but our flight got cancelled TWICE. That was very disappointing, but after some thought, my parents came to a conclusion: “We’re going to Europe this summer, think of things you want to do!” My whole family was so excited, and we couldn’t wait. After a few months, the day finally came. We had a night flight, and I was very tired. I could barely sleep, because I was so excited. We were going to visit London England, Denmark, Finland, Amsterdam, and Paris. How could I not be excited?

 LONDON

When we arrived, we opened the window cover, and bright sunlight streamed in. Because of the time change, it was early in the morning at home, but the afternoon in London! The jet lag wasn’t too bad, luckily. Definition of jet lag

We tried to get as much done, and see as much as we could in this trip, but that means one thing: LOTS of walking. We definitely covered a lot of ground. On the first night, we took a walk to Trafalgar Square, where we looked at the lions.

Then, we walked to the London eye. By this point it was dark, so it was lit up purple, and pink. Sadly, it was closed so we didn’t go on, but it was cool to look. We also saw the Big Ben! The next morning, we woke up bright and early to walk around the city some more. We went to Buckingham palace, the queen’s gardens, some cool shops, and landmarks. Oh, and we saw the Crown Jewels in the Tower of London! On the final night in London, we went to see Les Misérables the musical. It was really cool. Overall, I really enjoyed London.

COPENHAGEN

After London, we flew to Copenhagen, to visit friends. We only went for 2 nights and one day, but it was definitely worth it! It was a very different city from London, and this is how: The architecture is way more modern, and advanced, there are way less cars and way more bikes, and I noticed it is more eco-friendly. Those are only some of the observations I made.

Our friends took us on a walking tour of the city, and showed us the different buildings, art, landmarks, and what’s significant about them. There was even an artificial ski hill called the copenhill:

I thought that that was very interesting, but sadly we didn’t bring our ski stuff ☹️. We finished off the day with a canal tour and gelato.

Even though we only spent a short time in this city, I am very glad we went!

FINLAND

The main idea of this trip was for us to have a big family reunion in Finland. My Dad’s family is from there, and he hadn’t even met all his relatives from there, so it was important.

The first place we stayed was right in the capital city, Helsinki. We only stayed in Helsinki for one night, which was just enough time to explore a little bit. The next day we had some Finnish food down by the ocean  (It was a bit strange: Dried little fish, and reindeer sausage. I didn’t really want to eat the reindeer 😐) We then hopped onto a little ferry that took us to Suomenlinna, an old fortress. After that, we took a road trip to a little cabin in the middle of nowhere. It was really beautiful, and it was right on a lake. We swam, fished, went on the rowboat, and spent time in the sauna. We stayed for a few days, then we went to our big family home on a different lake. I had fun meeting all my cousins and relatives.

 Finland was definitely a highlight, and it was quite relaxing!

 

 

AMSTERDAM

We then flew to the Netherlands, where we stayed in a very cute little boutique hotel just outside of Amsterdam. We were right in the countryside, and there were goats outside the window. We walked around the town, which was called Abcoude.

The next day our parents surprised us with a private boat/canal tour around Amsterdam with our friends from home. The guide talked us through all the cool hidden details, and the history of the city.

We finished off the tour with some delicious pizza. When we got back to the hotel, we were told that there was a big festival celebrating the anniversary of the town, so we went to the festival, and it was PACKED! We had waffles, played games, and did bumper cars. It was a great end to our Netherlands experience!

PARIS

The final country of our trip was France. We were staying in a very traditional Parisian apartment, on the sixth floor of the building (It had no elevator, but it was a good workout!) We only had 3 days to see everything, and I mean, We did ended up seeing basically everything.

We climbed the Eiffel Tower,we walked under the  Arc de Triomphe, 

We went to the Louvre museum, which was incredible! I saw so much art, and it was very tiring, but SO worth it. We even saw the Mona Lisa! I didn’t really get a good look, because of the crowds, and it was far away, but I managed to get to the front for a bit. It is hard to remember all the things we did, because we did so much, but those were just the highlights! We finished this trip with a freshly baked baguette 🇫🇷.

 

 

THANK YOU FOR READING!

This trip was definitely one that I wont be forgetting anytime soon, and I learned so much from it! I learned about culture, art, architecture, sports, history, war, delicious food, and so much more! I hoped you liked my first blog, and make sure to stay tuned for more posts.