Week 4 is all about freedom. The freedom of choice. So what do I do with that freedom? Write about buttons of course! Let’s not question it. So let’s get into it!
What Are Buttons?
I’m sure that you are all wondering the same question. “What are these mysterious objects that you call buttons?” Well, I’m here to clear that mystery up for you. Button are usually round object used to hold clothing together. The formal definition is that it’s a small faster that is used to hold 2 pieces of clothing together. Need a picture?
There you go! Seen them before? That’s cause they most commonly seen in fashion. Now, I’m not a fashion nerd myself, but I really like doing crafts, and buttons can be used in crafts.
History Of Buttons
So, where did this idea start? Well let’s go back to the
Do I like Buttons?
Yes, in fact I think that they are very useful although writing this post made me realize the lack of button that I actually have in my wardrobe. In terms of fashion, I’m not that great at keeping up with trends. I’m one of those people that chose comfort over appearance and usually cloths with buttons on them are fairly fashionable. Not to say that clothing without buttons aren’t.
Yes, I’m weird. So, what did you learn? Is there anything else I didn’t mention? Cool facts that you know? Comment and let me know what you think!
Hi guys! Today I will be telling you all about my Alberta trip that I went on! This was the trip that I went on where I was making my video. You can learn more about that in my earlier post.That post was very specific to the assignment, now I get to talk about the trip.
We went from Vancouver to Alberta to Calgary making a few stops on the way. My top favourite places that we went to would probably have to be Beakerhead, The Worlds Largest Dinosaur, a Buffalo Ranch, and Lake Louise. That isn’t to say that the other places weren’t great, the view was absolutely stunning!
For those of you who don’t know, I am in a program called PLP which is a project based program that uses iPads in order to do our work. This means that we are in charge if managing our time so that we don’t get distracted. This also means no gaming. Not to say we don’t have games on our iPads, as long as we can control our impulsivity we’re ok. Now, on this trip we always had something to do so I didn’t really have to worry about gaming as much except for one place. The bus. There were times when we were on the bus for hours on end so I would be lying if I said I didn’t game at least once. However, there were also pictures to take and sadly, homework to do.
Each day we were given something called the Daily note. This was where we were given a question at the start of the day that we had to think about and find a way to answer by the end of the day. This was what usually occupied my time during bus rides but sometimes I finished early or I got too carsick to continue. So in the end I would take a break and somehow end up gaming for the rest of the ride.
One more thing that I had worked on for a lot of the transport time was something called the “ Ghost Town video.” One of our first stops that we did was a ghost town. This means that I had the rest of the trip to work on the editing and most of the time that was done on the road. Shoutout to Malaika, Thomas, and Anthony who worked with me on the video.
The main focus for this trip was to manage our impulsivity and to be aware of what is going on. As I have mentioned earlier, I definitely still need to work on the impulsivity by maybe setting reminders and going other work so that I can be ahead of the game. Another thing that I could’ve done was planned ahead a little more, saw which stop we were going to and make a list of some more shots that I can get. This ties into the other focus, which was being aware. If I had been more on top of looking for learning opportunities I think that I could have done better in my video and learning overall.
I would like to stress the fact that we had a busy schedule so while we were actually at our destinations you had to be aware and attentive or we could miss important details. I took lots of photos and videos too so that I could find things that I could use for my final assignment. All in all I had a great time and I highly recommend it if anyone plans on going!
Hi guys, this post is all about Tpols (Transitionary Presentation Of Learning). If you remember my earlier post on Mpols, you’ll see that it was me reflecting on my learning during around the middle of the school year. This is the same thing except it’s a reflection of the year as a whole, and kinda seeing if I did the things that I said I would do during Mpols.
Humanities
I think that I could have done better with handing things in on time but I can see that I have improved since Mpols. I know after DI, I started to realize what I was doing that didn’t work, so I was defiantly trying to work on my communication. I think I can still work on this especially with the teachers so that we have a mutual understanding of where I am as a learner. The main thing that we did in Humanities was learning about the history of New France, colonization, and learning about Shakespeare’s, The Tempest. The final project for this ended up being a display of tableau’s that we used to represent events in history while using the characters from “The Tempest.”
I really liked this project because it had to do with acting and theatre which are things that I really like, I do Pantos and stuff in the winter. So I was really surprised with how nervous I was on the actual day of the performance. I’m usually ok with things like that so it seemed really out of the blue. Because of that I fumbled my lines and it was kind of embarrassing. I realize now, that it was probably because I was performing in front of people I know, rather than strangers, who I am ok with. However, this made me realize that I want to take more risks and put myself out there more. This will help me be more creative and better at speaking in front of people. I also want to have more confidence in what I say including, especially, when speaking in class.
Maker
This is the class that I had problems with handing things in on time. I do believe that the quality of the work didn’t go down but I didn’t hand things in on time which is a problem that I still need to work on. The main thing that we focussed on in Maker that I would like to mention is Blue sky, a project that we are working on for the winter exhibition. Blue sky is basically where student individually chose a problem they or someone else has and they make a product in order to fix that problem. It is a display or creativity, innovation, and invention. I really like doing Blue sky however I found that following the exact steps and handing everything in was not up my ally. For blue sky, I am making a app that basically makes people laugh. I started off by focussing on homework with teens, then it went to stress, and somehow ended up being a stress reliever using laughter. I’m not going to talk to much about this because the Exhibition hasn’t passed yet, and I still need to improve on my product.
Scimatics
Scimatics is like a sometimes ok, sometimes not ok class for me. This is because it is 2 classes in one. I am perfectly fine with math. I’d like to think that I am smart when it comes to math, and a fast learner in that aspect. I am not as great when it comes to science because it is mostly about memorization and knowing your facts. I think that science is very interesting and useful though so I am conflicted about whether or not I can say that I’m putting my best into learning. We are learning about light and how it works so we did a eyeball dissection. I really liked the eyeball dissection that we did a few days ago because I found it interesting and a hands on way to learn that makes it easier to remember things by. I am ok with gore so I started to consider whether or not I wanted to be a surgeon, and then I scraped the idea because of how much work and pressure that surgeons have especially since people lives can count on them. At any rate, since Mpols I have worked on my attention span in Scimatics and I dare say it has improved. Part of the reason for this is probably because we had so many substitutes. Not to say anything about not paying attention just because Mr.Thomas is teaching. He is a great teacher and makes material sound very interesting.
PGP
I will be honest when I say that I do not like PGP. The only reason for that though, is because it is a course that is outside the time table. For someone like me, who has horrible time management skills, and hands things late with classes from inside the timetable anyways, PGP is like a nightmare. I will tell you though, and genuinely, I like what is taught in PGP. I think that we are taught things that are lifelong skills, and are very useful. The 7 habits for example are a great example of this. They are skills, that once you learn them, they will be with you forever. Which is the main reason that PGP is a great class. When we first started learning about it though, I thought it was kind of funny how close the things taught and shown, were so close to my moms usual speech for improving yourself. Putting that aside, I want to talk about the time machine (link). I actually managed to hand this in on time and get it done. However, you can see that I only handed in the final product which makes me a little disappointed in myself. This is because in my Mpols I specifically said that I would work on handing in drafts. I remembered that I said this, and had actually wrote my lyrics out and could have handed it in… and then I noticed a spelling mistake. So I went back, fixed it… then I noticed something was off tempo. So I went back fixed it… then I noticed something else was wrong. So I was actually doing the drafting process, I just didn’t show that to the teachers and that’s what makes me disappointed. However, I was still happy with my final product, a song that I wrote;
Conclusion
I think I will defiantly still work on handing in drafts to show my growth and keeping contact with my teachers and parents. Honestly, I just need to extend the growth that I did since Mpols and continue to work on my skills that I mentioned above; Communication, Organization, and knowing when to stop. I can become very invested in things, and lose interest just as quickly.
For school, we did a project called colonizing in a tempest. This was where we used tableaus to show our understanding of the historical significance of colonizing to answer our driving question; How can we use Shakespeare’s “The Tempest” and the history of New France to stage dramatic tableaus that help an audience understand the lasting effects of colonization? Wow, that is really long. Ok so how did we do this?
Well, we started off by first learning what tableaus actually were. For those of you who do not know, tableau’s are a group of motionless people who are staged in poses to represent a scene from history, a story, etc. We were put into groups where we chose a random line from a poem, and showed it in a tableau that we came up with on the spot. The lines used were from some of Shakespeares works. This ended up being a really fun way for us to familiarize ourselves with Shakespearian language, what tableaus were, and the people that we would be working with for the next while.
Next we learned the history and the play. This was not my favourite part of the process, however I think that it was really helpful and important aspect of learning. For this, each day we watched on Act of the tempest, and since there are 5 Acts, it took us 5 days. While we watched we did something called active reading and pre-readings. The pre-readings are these pages that we read before we watched the act. It was kind of like a Summary of the Act before we watched it. It also had definitions of words that we might not understand. The Active readings were these small activities that we did while watching the play. It was 1, to make sure that we were actually paying attentions and doing work, but it also helped us pick out words and phrases that we could use when we were staging our tableaus. Honestly, I think that the active readings were a hassle and just extra work but I do admit that it helped me understand the language that was used and made me process what was going on in real time, rather than going back after and breaking down what I had seen so understood it.
While we were watching the play, we also learned about the history of New France, and the important aspects such as why people wanted to colonize it in the first place (God, Glory, Gold), and why they stayed. This was mainly about how the Europeans colonized New France, treated the First Nation, started the beaver trade and businesses, created conflicts, and ended up solving those conflicts with a whole bunch of treaties, such as the treaty of Paris. It was quite interesting and at times hard to keep up. One of the more interesting things that I found, was that even thought the Europeans acted culturally superior to the First Nation, they still relied heavily on them in order to survive.
Finally we got together with our group and created the tableaus by writing and mesmerizing our lines, creating backdrops, animations, costumes, music, and rehearsing a whole lot of times. We brought all the knowledge together and presented it in front of a audience. Here is our end result!
Overall this was a really fun and educational experience, and I learned a lot more then I thought I could. A main part of this was because I really like theatre, and acting and I think it’s a really good way to teach kids. As such I would like to end end with a big THANK YOU to both my teacher; Mr. Hughes, and Mrs. Willemse!
Hi guys, Today I am talking about something I made that is called a time machine. This was for a school project where I had to make a product that I would send back in time to my younger self and it would help me with things that I might have had trouble with before. We did this in a class called PGP which revolves around goal setting, improving productivity, and improving your overall self. PGP has helped me improve the things that I struggled with and I wish that I’d known about it sooner. I decided to make a song regarding what we had learned this year and what I could do with it.
The first thing that I did was make a brainstorm of all the things that I needed to include in my song and figure out how my song would over all sound like. So I started with finding out what rhythms sounded good and which one would best fit for if I wanted to give information. As such I chose to do a pop sounding song.
Why don’t I tell you about what I included in the song. The main things that I am talking about have to do with goal setting and productivity. To do this I also mentioned the 7 habits that were from a book my class read earlier this year. This was about how to become productive by practicing the following habits. 1. Be proactive 2. begin with the end in mind 3. Put first things first 4. Think win-win 5. Think first to understand then to be understood 6. Synergise and finally, 7. Sharpen the saw.
The next thing that I did was actually write the song. This was the hardest part because I had to make sure things actually sounded like a song while being able to convey the things that I want the audience to know. I am really proud of the lyrics because I think that they sound good and not only include what I said they would, but I’m telling somewhat of a story and making it easier to understand. One of my more favorite lines in this song is “Next up is four with a mind for the win, just be positive and think win-win that’s all you gotta do though it’s harder then it sounds. You can do it! Do your best! I believe in you!” I like this line because it is talking about the 4th habit (from the book “7 habits if highly effective teens) which is “think win-win” and I think that how it was encouraging at the end emphasizes that aspect. I also like how I put Number 4 first and then I wrote number 3 after because its kind of like a pun. Number 3 is to put first things first but since I put 4 before 3 it contradicts what the 3rd habit is.
I think that I effectively conveyed the things that I wanted to. In the lyrics you can hear the 7 habits, how to use them and why they are helpful it also tells you how you use goal setting and I think that it is also one of the main focuses because it is mentioned in the chorus. Also, although I didn’t directly mention productivity I think that it is a general idea that I have set around the whole song using words like “ hopes and dreams”, “take the wheel drive yourself”, “more effective”. This is because in my opinion, the 7 habits are the stepping stones to being productive.
We had our provincial tournament at a different time and place as the regional tournament so we had time to try and fix the things that didn’t work out in the regionals. However, the time that we got was mostly occupied by spring break. This meant that the times when every member of our group was available was rare. However, we had at least 3 people at every meeting and we managed to get things done. We first looked at our raw scores which were given to us after the regionals. We then decided the main things that we needed to work on: the payload, the story, and the team choice elements. For our team choice elements we decided that we wanted to build a music rover that can help with transportation and giving a more dramatically portrayal. To do this we used some of the left over wood that one of our group members had, and turned it into a frame. Then, making sure to test it so it can hold our weight, we added cardboard to be the exterior because we didn’t have enough wood and it was easier that way. We then painted the cardboard and found a speaker we could use. All that was left was transportation.
Team Challenge
Our first challenge that we presented was, like the regionals, the team challenge, this was definitely not our best. There were a lot of things that didn’t turn out as we wanted and a lot of things failed to come through last minute. Our drone broke when we got to the gym to perform, and while we were performing, we forgot to use one of our team choice elements.
The Negatives
So, what happened that made our performance so bad? Well first of all, our drone broke. Now this, to me, is pretty ironic because in the regionals our drone worked, while the payload did not, however this time the drone didn’t but our payload did. This is a problem because we then had to break one of our set pieces so that we could get a score. We designated one person who was originally going to control the drone, to fan what we had and get payloads to drop in the designated area. However this meant that the prop that we used to fan our drone would touch the drone meaning that even though we got the payload to work, for each successful drop, if the fan touched the drone, that drop wouldn’t count to be successful.
We also didn’t use one of our team choice elements. This was simply do to stress and the fact that we were rushing. We had created this awesome rover that played music and could be ridden. However we forgot to play the music from the rover and we only used the rover for transportation once. What else didn’t work? Well because one of the people in group had to fan the done, we couldn’t get him to say his lines and that part that we had rehearsed meaning that there was a huge gap in our performance. Our walk-in talkie, that was used as a prop, turned on “backstage” and made a loud sound during the performance. The last things that went wrong was that we forgot one of our backdrop because everyone thought that someone else had brought it, YAAAY.
The Positives
What’s the bright side to all of this? Well, our second team choice element did in fact work and the audience seemed to be very impressed with it. The second team choice element was a backdrop that lit up and had coordinated lights to turn on and off at different times. This was something that i personally was very proud of because i was the one who made the lights stay in the backdrop and got it to work. We managed to get someone to buy us a huge sheet that was used as the second backdrop just to cover up what was happening backstage. Everyone remembered there lines! This isn’t something that went wrong last time, but it was something i was worried about because the script kept getting changed even up to the last minute. The performance was dragged on a bit by our narrator though, in order to give time for the payloads to finish. The appraisers, or the “judges” were nice enough to give us extra time when they realized that we had encountered a problem and thanks to that we managed to calm down a little more and get our heads in the game. To top it all off, we won 3rd place! I’m 99% sure this is because we won the instant challenge however this is still something that I can say I did. I’m not necessarily proud of the result, i think we could have done better but given our performance of our time management skills, and teamwork I’m just happy we got what we did.
Teamwork and Time Management
Speaking of which, our teamwork! I think that it was better than before the regionals, but still not great. The main reason for this was that not all of us was at every meeting this meant that with less people, it was easier to work together. It was also Spring break so using our free time it was a great opportunity to get things done, and those who couldn’t come because they were on vacation, couldn’t come. We still needed to work on our communication skills, or else we wouldn’t have forgot the backdrop and our performance would have been a lot better. Rather than the teamwork, the thing that really improved from regionals was probably our time management skills. We definitely realized how quickly the clock tick away and helped us prioritize our need more which helped be a lot more efficient. We created things called burn down chart to help show our progress.
The burn down chart help us show how much we have done and how much we still need to do for each project. We organized the burn down charts by what we needed to prioritize and then broke down those priorities making it a efficient way to organize, and reorganize who does what and how it gets done.
Conclusion
All in all we definitely made a lot of improvements from regionals but we also failed to shine in other areas. When doing DI again next year I will definitely ask for a different group to work with (or a mix with new people) and possibly a different challenge.
