In this post, I will be reflecting on my experiences in PLP so far throughout this semester. I will be talking about how I met my goals that I set for myself in the beginning of the year, how I think I grew as a learner this year and how I demonstrated it, how I think I can fix my learning plan/edit it to continue to meet my goals until the end of the school year, how I plan on overcoming problems I face in the future as a learner, along with listing some of my strengths and weaknesses.

Learning Plan

In the beginning of this year, we had to fill out a learning plan document to set up goals for ourselves that we wanted to meet by the end of this semester and year. The goal that I set for myself in Maker was an extending, because I was confident that I could reach that goal for this subject. I wanted to push myself a little more in this subject because I had many strengths in this particular subject.

And I did reach my goal this semester, I think that the project that I’m most proud of that helped me get an extending in Maker was my User Manual. I was proud of this work because it was fun to make, and I had a good time writing in third person while role playing myself as a new android that my teacher had just bought.

The goal that I set for myself for Humanities was an accomplished, because I wasn’t very confident in myself and skills as a learner and my ability to get an extending in Humanities. But now I realize that maybe I should have had more confidence in myself, because I ended up getting an extending in most of my projects in humanities. One project that I was very proud of in this subject was my Middle Ages slideshow presentation. I was proud of the information that I was able to gather and put into the slideshow, and I was also very proud of the format that my slideshow was in because it was very categorized and organized to look at.

How Have I Demonstrated Growth as a Learner so Far This Year?

Something that shows I grew the most this semester are my other blog posts. I’m very proud of my blog posts, especially since it was my first ever experience using this kind of system to record my process or reflection of a project. I really enjoyed writing drafting and editing these blog posts though, and grew in my skill to accept and use peer feedback to edit my drafts and make it better than it was before. I grew in the recording and reflecting process as a learner this year through the blog posts that I had to write. While writing the drafts, it really made me think about how I did well in a specific project, or if I was unhappy with it, it helped me think about how maybe next time I do a project similar to it, a way that I can improve or do something different to feel more satisfied with my results. One blog post that really shows my growth as a learner this semester is my ‘Winter Exhibition Reflection’ blog post. I think that this post showed how well I was able to reflect on myself.

How Can I Sharpen My Learning Plan to Ensure I Will Reach My Learning Targets by the End of This School Year?

Well, I am meeting my goal for one of the learning plan, and the other I think I am exceeding, so I think I can sharpen my learning plan and plan ahead for the subject that I haven’t learned yet. I think that I can use my experience from this semester and list some strengths that I think I have in other subjects. For example, one of my strengths that can be applied to all subjects is that I like to plan ahead, and I understand directions/instruction quickly, so I can get started faster. I can also use my project planning skills to plan projects that will come in the future to be a better time manager and be less stressed in everyday school life. I think that by practicing these skills, I will be able to reach my goals, and possibly exceed them by the end of this year.

How am I Planning to Overcome Future Problems as a Learner?

If I end up with a particular project in a subject that is not my strongest suit, I plan on going to one of my peers that I know is stronger in this skill set, and ask them what they would suggest I do to be successful in making the project. For example, one of the projects that I did which included a skill set that I wasn’t very strong in was my Outsiders project. I wasn’t understanding what the reading role cards were asking me to do, and didn’t understand how I was supposed to include my worldview along with the storyline from the book into the reading role cards. So I went to my other group mates, and went to the people who had already completed a role that I was on. I asked them how they filled in their cards and how they would suggest I would use the previous chapter to fill in my card. So if I ever struggle with something like this in the future, I will go to another peer or adult and ask them for advice.

Conclusion

So overall, throughout this semester, I grew as a learner more than I thought I could. I learned knew skills as a learner such as planning ahead, asking peers for advice, and using keynote and other apps on my iPad to help make my presentations slideshows and drafts. Even while writing this blog post I am continuing to reflect on myself and my experience so far throughout this semester, and I can still continue to see more ways that I can improve for the next semester. I look forward to doing well and having fun in PLP as well as continuing to grow as a learner with the help of my teachers and peers. See you in my next blog post!!

Hello everyone, and welcome back to my blog post! Over the last few weeks in Maker PLP, we have been working on making digital art on our iPads using sketches pro. And to show off our work, instead of writing a blog post about it, we made it into a book to publish using book creator. If you enjoy my blog posts, or you enjoy drawing digitally, or even want to learn how to draw digitally, than you should check out my new book! Link is down below!! That’s all for now, Bye!!

Winter Exhibition Reflection

‘What did James Cameron’s fantasy world of Avatar teach us about the real world?’ Well, that question wasn’t one that could be answered in a simple way. Everyone thought that there were way more than one answer to the driving question, but they chose one them that they thought Avatar taught us the most. We were supposed to make a model that includes a box somewhere in it that helps us answer the driving question, and record our process and progress in a launch journal. The theme that I chose was ‘the conflicts between humans and nature’. Everyone had their own takes on a theme, so everybody had to write a them statement according to their opinions on the theme that they chose. My theme statement was, ‘people enjoy the natural resources that nature gives us, but sometimes we take more than we should because of the temptations’.

Process

Their were many steps of this project that we had to get done, and the first step was to choose a theme and write a theme statement. After we had that, we had to design a prototype for our model, and plan out how we were going to include our theme statement, a box, and include a scene or an element from the movie in our model. This was my prototype:After we had the prototype, the next step was to plan out what we were going to buy, where to buy it, and when to buy it. Then it was time for building! We had a week to build our models, and to get everything that we thought we needed to get done, done. Once everybody had their boxes complete, we planned our room decoration with everyone else in our room group. Every group had a different decoration theme, and had three days to plan and decorate our rooms. Finally it was the day of exhibition. After school, everyone went to their rooms and started decorating. Around 4:30, we had dinner, and at 5:30 the exhibition doors opened for the public to come in and enjoy. After the doors closed at 8:30 everyone started cleaning up and going home.

Strengths

Something that I felt in my opinion went well during this process was the teamwork and cooperation of everybody while decorating the rooms in a short amount of time, and cleaning up after exhibition. I was very happy and impressed at the fact that everyone was able to work well together to clean up quickly and get home. I also think that everyone did really well presenting their boxes to the public, and with the social interaction that they had to engage in while presenting their boxes.

Challenges

Some challenges that I think that we faced during this exhibition process was the food and drinks that were meant for the guests. A lot of people were taking their own foods, or going to other peoples rooms taking their foods during decoration, and I think that was a really big problem. Another challenge that we faced were that some older grades were either being too bossy, or not contributing to the work at all. I feel that a lot of the rooms could have used more man power.  I think that these were some of the challenges that we faced, but something that we can overcome and improve on the next time we do an exhibition or something similar to one.

Overall, I think that this process was a fun and interesting one, and it helped us learn a lesson of cooperation, time management, and a better understanding of what the fantasy world of Avatar teaches us. Thank you for reading this blog, and I hope to see your feedback! See you at my next update!

Images’ Usefulness

How might I use the still image to create and communicate through technology? Well, I think that there are several ways to create and communicate using still images. We can communicate to others by using emojis. We use emojis all the time to express what we’re feeling. When we find something funny we might send a laughing emoji, or if we feel sad than we can send a crying emoji. Emojis are something that everyone around the world uses, and it’s a very simple way to communicate yourself to others using still images. We can create things using images as well. For example, when you are making a slideshow or a presentation, instead of having just words, we can use images to make the information easy to process. You might include a diagram to show what the words can’t explain, and you can make visual graphs and charts to further prove your point. Visual representations are very helpful and make the presentation more easy to listen to and the information is easier to take in. Still images make presentations and slideshows complete when creating them. And those are just some examples of how you can use images to create and communicate! There are many many creative ways that you can use the images for many different things.

Keynote

I the slides you see below are some of the assignments that I did in making interesting images! The title page was a collage, and I walked a round my school and took pictures of letters to spell out my name!

Skills

I learned a lot of new camera and photography skills through this unit, but my top three favorite ones are these;

1. I liked the markup skills that we learned that I used to animate photos. I really like this skill because its such a useful and fun skill to use to add a pop of color or your own artistic twist to your photos.
2. I liked the bird’s eye view skill that we learned, because I love how if you get the right lighting and timing, the main item in the photo looks like it was cropped in, even though it wasn’t. I find that effect to creative and fun, and I think that it makes the photo that much better.
3. I also really liked the grid setting for the camera app, because it helps me take better photos, and it makes the item in the image the center of attention, and really helps draw the audience’s focus to it.

There are lots of things that you can do with images, and skills you can use to make those images. Those were just a few of my favorites that I listed out, and I hope that this post has inspired you to go and explore your own skills and make your own images to express and communicate! Good luck!

K-Pop: Why it Matters to Me

Hi, I’m Esther, and I’m from Korea, which is one of the reasons why K-Pop matters to me. In this blog, I’m going to be talking about K-Pop, why it matters to me, and some fun and informational facts about it!

Culture

Like I said before, one of the reasons why K-Pop matters so much to me is because it’s a big part of my culture. I’m from Korea, and K-Pop stands for Korean-Pop. I love that the songs have a mix of our language and English into them, and how when it’s performed, they have a very complicated, beautiful, and fun choreography to go with the songs. K-Pop helped make Korea more popular around the world when bands do their world tours, and they also made billions of dollars that helped the Korean Government, so it’s a big part of my culture.

Memories

Another reason why K-Pop is so important to me is because of the memories that are tied to it. I remember the first time I ever heard a K-Pop song. I was in kindergarten, in a summer camp in Toronto, visiting their for the summer. I was still living in Korea at the time, and could barely speak English. But in that summer camp, there were a group of Korean teenagers and they were really nice and funny. On the last day of summer camp, they performed a K-Pop song called Cheer Up by the band TWICE. I was in love with the beats, and choreography, and as soon as I got in the car, I asked my mom to play the song on loop for me on the speakers. I listened to K-Pop throughout all the challenging times in my life, and most of my favorite songs include those that helped me through the challenging times.

Entertainment

Not only do K-Pop idols perform and make music, but they film Korean tv programs as well. It is so entertaining to watch because on the programs, they do so many funny and creative challenges that always crack me up and make me feel better, if I was ever feeling down. For example, on of my favorite episode to go back to and watch is the StrayKids family role play episodes. I love how they dressed up as different members of a family and played their parts in their own way, and my favorite part about all Korean programs are that (excluding dramas) they don’t have any scripts, so they just make it up as they go. That makes all their reactions and wording in the programs are actually them being themselves, and I find that so entertaining and fun to watch.

Motivation

Last, but certainly not least, I love k-pop because it gives me so much motivation to keep going, when I feel like giving up on something. For example, when I’m doing homework and I don’t feel motivated to do it properly, I take a break to watch a k-pop tv program and then blast some of my favorite K-pop songs from my favorite group (which is BTS or Stray Kids). I also love the messages that they put into their songs or their live streams, and it cheers me up when I need it the most. This picture below is one that I edited on keynote, and it is my take on three of the BTS albums that I mashed together; Love Yourself 承 ‘Her’, Love Yourself 轉 ‘Tear’, and Love Yourself 結 ‘Answer’.

Fun Facts

I know that so far, it has been all about my experiences and opinions on K-Pop, but now it’s time some fun facts!

Did you know…

1. BlackPink is the first girl group to perform in Coachella.
2. You can become a trainee to become an idol starting at the age of 12.
3. BTS raised over 3 billion dollars to support the Korean government.
4. BTS is the first K-Pop group to be nominated for the Grammys.
5. Korea created an idol that is an AI.
6. Idols from a different country are becoming more popular.
7. The first K-Pop album was released in 1925.

So that was my fun facts and opinions on K-Pop, and now you know a little bit more about it! I hope you enjoyed and I hope for your feedback, and to see you at my next post! Bye!

Process

The process of blogging my previous post was not as hard as I thought it would be. The first thing that I did was brainstorm. I rounded up all the facts that I knew about K-Pop and split them up. One section was about the why I loved K-Pop, another section was on how I got into K-Pop, and another section was about some facts that I knew that I thought would be interesting. Then I got started on the draft. I had to keep going back on the expectations that this blog post had to meet, and tried to include them into my writing to make this project an extending. I wrote about the reasons why love K-Pop and how I got into it, then at the bottom I wrote about the fun facts that I thought people would find entertaining. After I had my draft, I edited a photo from Pixabay to go with one of the paragraphs that I wrote. Then I went back to my work and began editing the things that needed to be edited and deleted things that needed to be deleted. After uploading my post, I got peer feedback, and they pointed out the punctuational, grammatical, and spelling errors that they found in my post, so I went back on it again to edit and fix the things that they pointed out was incorrect. Overall, I think that the process of this blog post went much smoother and faster and more professionally than the process of my very first blog.

Differences

Something different about the previous post and all my other ones were that instead of just introducing myself and writing about things that I thought they would want to know about me, I got to write about something that I wanted to write about. I got to write about the good things about it and the words came flowing naturally to me, but for my introduction posts, I had to really sit and think about what to write, and what exclude, and what facts about me I thought everyone would want to read about. I think that this post was really a fun project, and I really liked that I got to really geek-out to my extent, and even though I had some expectations to meet, I wasn’t as hard to reach as all the other ones were. I feel that there was a big difference with the process, my opinion, the result of this post and the other previous posts.

Enjoyment

I really enjoyed creating this post, because like I said before, I really enjoyed the fact that I got to get really into my passion and I really had fun writing about it, hoping that everyone out there would enjoy it too, but mostly, this project was about me, and it gave me an opportunity to geek-out, and pour out my knowledge and passion without anyone judging, because I had the excuse to say that this was my assignment. So yes, my answer is I really, genuinely enjoyed this assignment.

Discovery

Something new that I learned/discovered about myself is that I really am a geek! I didn’t really know before, since I never got the chance to geek out, and discover how much I really enjoyed a topic, but writing this page made me realize how much of a geek I was about K-Pop. This discovery also helped me appreciate the music and their creators a lot more than I did before, and got me even more into K-Pop than I was before. I think that this experience was a good one for me, and I discovered things about myself that benefits me, and somehow others too.

Challenges

The challenges that I faced through this process was surprisingly, not a lot. I already mentioned that writing the page was a breeze, but if I really think about it, the most challenging thing about making the page was probably the brainstorming. I had a hard time deciding what topic to do, because it turns out that I had many things that I wanted to geek-out about. After I decided on what I wanted to write about, I also had a bit of a hard time raking up all the information in my brain that I needed for this blog. But I was able to overcome all of these challenges, and after all the hard things were done and taken care of, the drafting and revising was a breeze.

Simplicity

The easiest part of this process was, like I said before, the drafting and editing. I already knew what I was going to write about, and the information I needed to write it, so the words came really easily to me, and the typing and revising was quite enjoyable.

Continuation

I am going to be posting on my blogs, to update and write about things that I like more, and I’m most likely going to upload some recipes as well, but I don’t think that my posts will be as often. I really want to post more geek-out posts, so you can expect more random and geeky updates. Thank you for reading this post, and all my previous ones as well! I promise to update soon!