Gold Digging

Hello, and welcome to my blog post. This blog post will cover the first PLP project since the summer: Gold Digger. In this project I learned all about 1800s BC and the impact it has on us today to answer the driving question: “how did the discovery of gold shape our province and its people?”. So, without further ado, here is the post.

To start this project we did a bunch of things to help our understanding, like class discussions and brainstorming on whiteboards. But, the first big art of this project were the three activities relating to major events in Canada’s gold rush history: the Chilcotin war, the Fraser valley gold rush, and the Cariboo gold rush. We completed three individual worksheets on both, which really helped me understand how much I knew and what I should learn for my final story.

Paragraph summary of the Chilcotin War:
In 1862, the Tsilhqot’in people faced a great loss of life, as two thirds of their population had died from a smallpox epidemic spread to them by a Colonial construction crew. After the mass death, the Tsilhqot’in faced starvation. In 1864, they begged a construction crew for some food, when a road builder threatened to bring smallpox back to their community. Full of anger, A Tsilhqot’in Chief named Klatsassin lead a raid on the camp with 24 men and killed 12 of the road crew. Other attacks would bring the kill count to 21. A few months later, the Colonial officials invited the Tsilhqot’in to a peace negotiation, but when 8 Tsilhqot’in showed up, they were arrested and 6 of them were hung. In recent years, the BC government and the federal government have apologized for the hangings and exonerated the 6 men of their crimes

Cause and consequence sheet on the Chilcotin War

The next big step in this project was the first keystone. This keystone was about the effects of the migrants coming into Canada, and to show my knowledge, I made a Cause and Consequence Sheet and a written paragraph with the key idea being how the influx of migrants affected and shaped the Canada we know today.

Paragraph Summary:
The influx of people from the gold rushes is critical to the identity of Canada today. From our political standings, to the ethnicity of our people, and the countries rich history, so many elements of our home have been touched by the gold rushes. For example, according to statistics Canada, over 72% of Canadians are European Canadians, which means they are descended traceable from Europe. This is likely due in part from the gold rushes bringing many Europeans to come searching for gold. Another very important aspect of the gold rushes in BC are the indigenous people. In both of Canada’s big gold rushes, indigenous people played a large role, and also have suffered many losses because of settlers in Canada.

Cause and consequence web

As this was a shorter project than many other PLP ones, this next assignment marked the halfway point and the end of the Building Knowledge phase. For this assignment, we had to create a character card for a fictional or real character that is historically accurate to the gold rush. Here is mine:

Fictional Character Card

Now that I had established who he is and what my character does, I could start fleshing out the details of my final story. The end product of this project is a short-ish story around two pages about your character and some significant event they go through in their life. I wrote a story spine and worksheet to specify all the details of my story, then got writing.

Story Spine
Story Checklist

And now, the final story:

Thanks for reading my blog post, and see you in the next.

Time Is Money

Hello, and welcome to another post. The driving question for this project was “how can we predict our finances for the future?”. To answer this question, I created a narrated video. So, without further ado, here is the post.

The final product for this project was this narrated video:

Final video

To make this video, I combined all the milestones from this project into this video. Milestone 1 was just choosing my topic. I choose to make my business about wood puzzles.

For the second milestone, I created a spreadsheet that shows all my prices, time, and mateirials required for my business to operate.

For milestone three, I created an equation to represent my earnings.

Equation

for the final milestone (excluding the video) I created a graph that show my earnings over a span of time.

Graph

And then I combined them all together and added some spice and made the final video.

Now, for the curricular competencies.

Understanding and solving apply multiple strategies to
solve problems in both abstract and contextualized situations

All time, materials, and equipment are accounted for in the cost of making your product or performing your service.

My video includes all equipment costs and they are all factored into my math.

Communicating and representing: represent mathematical ideas in concrete, pictorial, and symbolic form

Linear equations are used to determine profit per transaction, hourly wages, and predicted NET earnings (minus deductions) over a year. Graphs are created, labeled, and explained.

I showed this competency by explaining graphs and equation throughout my video. My video contains labeled graphs, equations, and other statistics.

Connecting and reflecting: connect mathematical concepts to each other and to other areas and personal interests.

Video compares your new business to other careers and considers the value of your time, if your business can cover your costs of living/operating, and its sustainability/impact on the environment.

while my video does do this, I think it could’ve been done better by me directly comparing actual jobs rather than an average salary.

The Spring Exhibition 2022

In PLP at the end of every year, all the students create a large presentation of all our learning throughout the year. The theme for my section was about PLP and how we use tech for learning. So, without further ado, here is the post.

At the start of this project, we were put into groups. My groups had Faith, Cale, Ines, Patrick, Max L, Noah, Erik and Ben T. First, we started brainstorming ideas for what our room could look like.

Here is our first plan:

First plan

Then, we finalized our plan for the room.

Map

Then, we took some photos then annotated them to envision our stations.

Then, we got to work on the room. We started creating signs for the stations, decorations, presentations, and more. Then, on the day of the exhibition, we cleared everything out of the room, set up our decorations, and then opened the exhibition to the public.

All the presentations went well, and I actually enjoyed it more than I expected, and then the cleanup was actually pretty quick.

Anyways, that concludes this post, thanks for reading. Bye.

My First Film!

In the latest PLP 9 Project, I created a 6 minute documentary about nuclear power to answer the driving question: “How can I engage and entertain an audience using my video and storytelling skills”. This blog post will cover my journey making the final film.

The first activity in this project was recording an interview. We were put into groups and had to create a short video about a chosen topic, using interviews. In this activity, we learned how to shoot interviews, which would come in handy in the final documentary.

Interview Video

After this exercise I started thinking about what my documentary could be about. Some of my ideas included nuclear power, rubiks cubes, or parkour. In the end, I chose to make it about nuclear power because I thought I could make a clearer message about this topic. I did end up regretting this though, because it is very hard to get b-roll of nuclear reactors.

Then, the next step was to write a screenplay for my film.

As it turns out writing a screenplay for a documentary is quite difficult, but I managed to get it done. I also made a treatment and logline in my documentary planning DOCs.

Now, it was time to create a storyboard. A storyboard is a plan that consists of images for each shot, a short description of each shot, and sometimes some other details. This is what I made:

Then, it was time to start filming. The first thing I did was create the collage of news articles at the start, then I contacted an expert on nuclear power, Robert Anderson, for an interview. I also needed two interviews from people who are less than experts, so I did those aswell.

Then, I edited my film. My film turned out to be longer than it was supposed to be (3-5 minutes), but I felt this was necessary to include all the interesting parts of the interview. The final documentary is below.,

Thanks for reading this post! This project was one of my favourites of the year, and I learned so many new filmmaking skills that I can use to engage and entertain my audience.

Sex Cells!

In the latest Scimatics project, I learned all about how cells reproduce through Meiosis and Mitosis, the intricacies of both, and how to show them, in order to answer the driving question: “How is the reproduction of cells essential to the survival of organisms?”. So, without further ado, here is the post.

At the start of this project, I created this mind map of what I know and what questions I have beginning the project.

Project Start Mind Map

The second milestone of this project was just completing three Tinkercad tutorials. Tinkercad is a free modeling software that we used to create 3D models of cells. Here are the final versions of my Models:

The fourth milestone was a khan academy quiz on what we learned, then it was time to create the final product, which was a narrated video that describes the process of mitosis and meiosis as well as some similarities and differences between them. Here is my final video:

Sex Cells

And, lastly, for the curricular competencies for this project.

Questioning and Predicting: Demonstrate a sustained intellectual curiosity about a scientific topic or problem of personal interest

All class time is used efficiently for learning without distractions

I think that for this project, I could’ve used my time better, because I usually worked on humanities work instead of the important scimatics work.

Planning and conducting: Collaboratively and individually plan, select, and use appropriate investigation methods, including field work and lab experiments, to collect reliable data (qualitative and quantitative)

Microscope slides of plant tissues from clones were prepared and used for photographic evidence of mitosis.

My microscope slides include all the mitosis stages clearly.

Scientific Communication: Formulate physical or mental theoretical models to describe a phenomenon

A recorded video with voice narration explains the reasons for and processes of mitosis and meiosis with accurate 3D models and Photographs. Similarities and differences are also described.

My narrated video shows accurate 3D models and the Mitosis slides, as well as clear voiceover that describes advantages and disadvantages of both types of reproduction.

Overall, I think that my final products fro this project were good, but I didn’t use my time to the fullest and some assignments were late because of it.

My Vibrant Videos!

Hello, Im Theryn Strobl, and I am excited to write to you about a recent maker project, and in my opinion, the best PLP project I have participated in. In this project, I learned lots of filmmaking history and techniques on my journey to learn more about the movies! So, without further ado, here is the post.

We began this project with some brainstorming, a small lecture n some history of filmmaking, and then we were assigned a video about a hobby or skill we have. Being an avid snowboarder, I chose to make my video about that. The video contained some posters, a beginning, middle, end, and music. It was edited in an app called Clips, which I personally think is a very bad software, especially in comparison to its free counterpart, iMovie. But nevertheless, here is my final video:

A Story About Me!

The next day, we moved onto skill #2: a silent movie. This movie was supposed to recreate an old black and white movie, with no sound (other than a soundtrack) and not to long, making use of a certain poster (it’s the old-timey looking one). I made mine about finding the last lego peice in my contraption, and I think I conveyed the story using the limited storytelling options quite well.

The Last Piece

The next product in our moviemaking journey was a tutorial video that teaches how to do something. In the end, most of them were goofy and taught a very basic skill, but they could still do their desired job, so thats a win. In my group were Dana and Brooke. So, for the first step, we got started on our storyboard, which went through many painful revisions until we got it approved.

Then, we filmed and edited our final video.

How To Tie Your Shoe

And then, for the last and most fun skill, we were put into groups of three, and givin around two hours to make a short “special effects sequence”. The goal of this was to use special effects to help tell our story. We had some preparation beforehand to figure out a story and plot, but everything else had to be finished in the allotted time. This was also in a small group, and I was with Fraser and Nolan. So, we set to work designing a quick storyboard, and then got to filming. We filmed many takes, and got quite the blooper reel, but in the end, this was our film:

The All Great Magical iPad Heist

Then the entire class shared their videos in a mini film festival. An honourable mention of mine is this video:

Overall, this was probably one of my favourite PLP projects ever, and I actually enjoyed learning how to communicate using the medium of film, and creating truly vibrant video.

Thanks for reading my post! Make sure to stay tuned for the next one, I’ll see you later. Bye.

WW1 Can Be More Comical Than You Think!

In the latest PLP Humanities project, we learned about WW1, and what happened in it, after it, and before it. The Driving Question for this project was: “How might we use graphic novels to understand Canada’s involvement in WWI?”, and throughout this project I tried to answer it. So, without further ado, here is the post.

Five weeks ago as of writing this, we started this project by learning the causes and consequences of WW1.

Cause and Consequence Sheet

For the part of the Building Knowledge stage of this project, we read an amazing graphic novel called “World War One: The War To End All Wars”. We read this book slowly over the span of around two weeks, discussing the themes and images throughout the book.

After we finished the book, I wrote a reflection paragraph on the book, which can be seen below.

Graphic Novel Reflection

The book contained many interesting facts and information, but there is so much more to this war that one project cannot really include. So, since we cannot learn everything abut WW1, we had to pick a topic that we would like to learn about, and, eventually, make a mini comic book about.

Then we did some more learning and worksheets, then I started my final comic. I worked on it a ton, and finally finished it. Here it is:

And my answer to the driving question: we can use graphic novels to understand WW1, and many other significant events, by reading them! (Or making them).

Thanks for reading my post! This project was really fun, even though I didn’t have much time to work on it, and I hope to see more projects like this in the future. Anyways, this concludes the post, and I’ll see you in the next one.

Seven Habits of Mine

In the latest maker project, we covered the “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” by Sean Covey, which is a book about self improvement. In this post, I will explain what these habit are, how they effect me, and how they can help me be my most effective self. So, without further ado, here is the post.

We started off this project by learning what the seven habits are. If you don’t know anything about the seven habits, here are two videos that hep describe them very well: Part 1 Part 2. For every section of the seven habits (the private victory, the public victory, and renewal), we completed a choice board. A choice board is basically an activity that shows our understanding of that section, and it could be note, drawing, video, podcast, or many others. For my first choice board, I made this drawing:

The Private Victory

It represents someone in somewhere private, obviously happy about accomplishing something, but with no one around to notice.

For the public victory, I made another drawing of some one giving a public speech.

The Public Victory

A speech represents the public victory because at it’s heart, the public victory is about “the art of influencing”, and what better way to influence many people than a public speech! Many of the largest events are told by speeches around the world every day.

For the next, and final choice board, I created an animation:

Sharpen The Saw

This is an animation I made of a saw blade being sharpened. It represents learning and growing, and always striving to be better.

And with that, I started working on the final 3 products, one to represent each of these three competencies:

Communicating

Thinking

Personal & Social

For the first one, communicating, I created an Apple Music playlist of songs that show communication (or the lack of it).

The playlist is HERE

For thinking, I created a container that represents my brain, and for peace of mind, I can put a little note, or random thought inside so that I remember it or can get it out of my brain.

For the personal and social competency, I created a drawing of things that help my personal life, and my social life:

The pencil and the things logo show what I use to stay on top of things and less stressed out. The arrows are a symbol of synergy, and working with others to be my best self, and the book represents me learning and improving myself, to keep the upward spiral going.

Thanks for reading my post, and I’ll see you in the next one. Bye.

Destination Imagination: In Person

The latest project in the PLP 9 classroom was DI (Destination Imagination). As you may recall from last year, DI is a worldwide competition that students can participate in, and PLP participates every year. This year, I was put onto the scientific team, where our challenge was to create a performance where our characters get stuck in a micro world and have to use the help of a mysterious object to get out. So, without further ado, here is the post.

To start this project, you need to know some things first: my group members were Teva, Ava, Ariane, and Julian. If you want to read them, the full rule book for this challenge is here, and the general rules for DI are here. We had around three months of time from when we first started DI, and the tournament was on April 2nd. The project did go over spring break though. So now, with that out of the way, I can continue.

Stage 1: Recognize

We started off the project by deciding roles and responsibilities, and learning about each others strengths and weaknesses going into the challenge. This can help up work better as a team to conquer any challenges along the way.

Stage 2: Imagine

Then, we did a around 3.4 metric tons of brainstorming; any idea, from story, technical execution, mechanisms, the visual effect, anything.

After lots and lots of ideas, it was time for a crucial step in making the final product: planning. This involves choosing which ideas will make their way onwards, as well as deciding how and when they will get used. Then, we created a first draft of the script, which was revised many times.

Stages 3-4: Collaborate, Initiate, an Assess

Now, it was time to start creating our final props and presentation. The rest of the project was honing in and improving our presentation until it was perfect. (Although it wasn’t perfect by the time we finished). The Final Script is here.

Stage 5: Evaluate and Celebrate

And finally, it was time to present. All our work has led up to this. Our team went to St. George’s Senior for the final tournament, but our struggles didn’t end there. We forgot to bring a tablecloth, and that may not sound big, but thee tablecloth was going to help obscure a prop, and without it, our set change might not be very clear. But, 30 minutes before our presentation, we taped pieces of paper together to create one large sheet, and with everything prepared, all we could do is present.

And our presentation went great! Below is our groups reflection on what went well, and what went… not as well.

+ / – chart

Again, so much thanks to my DI team of Teva, Ava, Ariane, and Julian. Overall, I learned so much this year in DI, and am surprised that I liked it. See you in the next one, and thanks for reading.

P.S. this year DI had a special challenge where you decorate your car. Here is that:

P.P.S. We won first in the team challenge!

Rube Goldberg was a cool guy.

in the latest Scimatics project we created Rube Goldberg machines to represent the scientific method. The scientific method consists of 6 steps: observation, question, hypothesis, analysis, conclusion. So, without further ado, here is the post.

I wasn’t here for the first couple days of this project, but as always, we started off with a mind map of what we knew already and questions we had. The next step was to perform some experiments on electricity.

After this we did some workbooks and a khan academy quiz that helped me understand how electricity works in a circuit. Then, we created individual diagrams of what our Rube Goldberg machine could look like. Here is mine:

First draft blueprint

Then, my group of Colton, Cale, and Max got to work on our final blueprint, which is a scale drawing of our machine, a digital drawing, and circuit diagrams and calculations. We also built our machine. Here is the final video:

And the final circuit and machine diagrams:

Final blueprint
Circuit Diagram

And for the revised mind map containing all my new knowledge:

Now, for the curricular competencies:

Questioning and Predicting: Demonstrate a sustained intellectual curiosity about a scientific topic or problem of personal interest

All class time is used efficiently for learning without distractions

I think that I used all my class time very well this project, seeing as I was away for most of it and still learned so much and got everything done

Reasoning and Analyzing: Estimate reasonably

Final blueprint is complete and accurate. Contains grid scale. All measurements are labeled with a high degree of accuracy. All lines are easily distinguished

My team’s final blueprint does contain a grid scale, measurements, and is very accurate

Planning and conducting: Select and use appropriate equipment, including digital technologies, to systematically and accurately collect and record data

Hand built series and parallel circuits are used to good effect with efficiency in your metaphor machine. Accurate circuit diagrams are included in the final blueprint. Diagrams use proper symbols. Diagrams are neat and easy to understand. Measurements of current, voltage and resistance are included

There is one series circuit in our machine, the one that lights up the question mark, and all the circuits combine make one large parallel circuit. Their are accurate diagrams of alt eh electronics in our machine in the final blueprint, accompanied by voltage, current, and resistance measurements

Scientific Communication: Formulate physical or mental models to describe a phenomenon

A video is recorded of the complete operation of the machine and voice overs are added which explain the sequence of the scientific method as the machine progresses.

I think that our final video is emerging, because the voiceovers do not sync up, and they do not explain what is happening very well. Also, the video only utilizes one of four videos of the machine working, it much less immersive.

Thanks for reading my post! Once again, thanks to my group for helping me in this project! This project was probably my favourite Scimatics project this year, so I hope to see more like it in the future. See you in the next one.