May 1

Radio Play: Happy Town

Hello, and welcome back to my blog 4x! Today, I will be talking briefly about a recent project we in PLP 10 preformed, a satirical radio play taking place in post-WWII. You may think it’s more WWII related since it’s in the projects driving question (which I will get to in a bit) but, not really.
“A satirical radio play? Taking place in the 1940s? Well, this sounds similar!” Yes, it’s true, the plays storyline takes much inspiration from the movie “Pleasantville”, which aside from one being a show and the other being a radio play, they’re pretty much the same thing. Before I get too off topic, let us get into how exactly this project came to be.

I’m pretty sure that my humanities teacher loves history. I mean, she’s a history teacher so I was kind of expecting her to be, but I digress. We were instructed to take notes while watching a documentary on post-WWII Canadian events, and then think up of ways to incorporate little references to it in our play; alongside considering the driving question:

How do we use a satirical radio play to communicate the shifts in Canadian society following WWII?

I didn’t take any notes, but I do happen to recall a few key events such as Newfoundland joining Canada and stuff. After this, we were all put into groups. People directing the play, people doing sound effects, people who have roles in the play and then people doing advertisements. I was a lucky duck and got to do an advertisements on Tv dinners. You know, those things that people used to buy in the 1950s all the way up until the 2000s when people realized they were horrible for you (who could’ve known, right?). This task was simple enough, at least for me. I whipped up a script and put sound effects in there and that was that, right? Well, I also had to preform this advertisement in front of an audience on YouTube. Wait a minute, you’re streaming this live? On YouTube???? Yes, I didn’t know this all too well but; our class was on livestream in front of a few people on YouTube, like parents and anyone else who cared enough to watch teenagers preform an educational play.
We went through a few test-runs to see if everyone knew what they were doing, and then finally the day had come for us to present, and it went fine. Really, I don’t have a lot to say about the day itself other than that everyone did a great job and it was decently funny at times. But, how would I say that I did? Any improvements I could make?
Yeah, I could improve on actually taking notes when I’m supposed to. Focus is a struggle for me in class, and I know if my parents see this in text they’d kill me, but I usually spend my time listening and drawing, instead of listening and writing notes. Drawing while listening to something else keeps me sharp…!!! And, I would probably fall asleep if I had to listen to a documentary on WWII for an hour while taking notes. You would too, right?!?!?!
I really do like how efficient I was when it came to getting work done. I finished my script quickly, faster than my other group members; and took criticism and suggested revisions and applied them to my work. Obviously my script was pretty much already flawless because I’m 100% perfect and make no mistakes, but seeking advice from peers is okay sometimes.. in case I made a silly mistake…

Well, that’s all for this blog post today. Thank you for reading, and I’ll see you later.

Category: School | LEAVE A COMMENT
April 29

PGP: Financing your Future

Hello, and welcome back to my blog. Expect more posts this month because I was lazy all the other months prior and I’m late on a bunch of stuff, but that’s besides the point. Today, I will talk to you about your finances.  Before you run away and cry, I should specify!! This isn’t actual financing, it’s fictional financing!

Now, you may be asking yourself “what does that even mean?? Please tell me!!!!” And to this I will reply telling you to calm down and that it’s not that serious. I will tell you now what exactly I mean by fictional financing.

I have a teacher named Mr. May, and he thinks that our class is irresponsible with money (that’s a joke) so, he decided that it would only be right to teach us all how to save money for the inevitable end of our lives, college! (That’s also a joke)

Now, we all scratched our heads at this. What’s saving? What’s a college? I don’t understand. Well, Mr. May gently took our hands and lead us through how to save for our futures, how to be smart with money, and even how to choose what credit card would be the best fit for our lifestyles. I don’t know about everyone else in that class, but I was reasonably confused, I didn’t know there were so many credit card types… but we learn something new every day.

Enough of the nitty gritty in between stuff, i‘ll actually get to the point. Mr. May instructed us to create a presentation on how to effectively handle our money in multiple different ways and situations. Now, if you could’ve guessed, I didn’t do it on time and instead did it two weeks after the due date, and it wasn’t very great. But I’ll get to my critique on my work in a little bit after I explain how exactly we were supposed to create a presentation.

We were all given a subject. That be in a group or alone, we all were supposed to present a slideshow on how to effectively shape for or futures, like what jobs to look for, how to save and how to find affordable housing in this day and age. I was chosen to do something about saving for college. Now, after all this hard work of doing research, how do I think I did on my presentation?

Quite honestly, there is little I really like about it. Especially since, and I’ll be honest with you, I didn’t really try on it. Sure, I did the research and stuff, but when it came to writing the presentation it lacks professionalism. Although, the graphics I used are pretty cute, and I like that I decided to put personality into it, instead of it being boring and bland. Here, take a look for yourself:

https://www.canva.com/design/DAGhWQoARwM/EVGnQQYTzOtg1zaSC3Ccsw/edit?utm_content=DAGhWQoARwM&utm_campaign=designshare&utm_medium=link2&utm_source=sharebutton 

Now, I’ve got to hurry and work on a multitude of other late work. Thank you for sticking around!!

Category: School | LEAVE A COMMENT
April 21

Doggies: Things to Consider

Hello, and welcome back to my blog. Today, I will be talking to you about dogs.
Nah, I’m just kidding. This is much less enjoyable and joyous than dogs. But hey, dogs are involved… so I hope that helps.

around two months ago, me and all my other classmates were assigned a project; to make a 10 minute podcast talking about whatever we wanted, and I mean anything. So, in typical Hazel fashion I chose dogs, because I love them and they’re easy to talk about for me. Well, 2 months later I’m lying in bed eating chocolate and waffles, presenting you with a project that I had forgotten about until an hour ago. Crazy how the Human brain works, right?
Anyway. To sum it up for you, I made a podcast about owning dogs, and that it’s not all butterflies and rainbows; sometimes more dogs is not good, despite what many may think. If you’re an outsider looking in, seeing puppies and thinking “that’s so cute, I should get one!” I warn you to do research on the topic before committing. There are so many dogs out there, so many toys, and so much food to choose from. And to best to choose things that fit you, and your pups lifestyle.

Now. What did I learn from this project? Is there anything I would want to change about my work? Anything I like?

Yeah, I guess I liked writing about dogs, especially my own. I even got to draw my own podcast thumbnail, which is neat. But the goods are unfortunately outweighed by the bad. I didn’t get this in on time, and I didn’t even make it long enough. I probably didn’t even add music, just turned up the volume of me speaking and handed it in.
Quite honestly, I have almost given up on even trying multiple times. Not to sound like a bummer, but what’s the point in trying so hard if this is what you’re going to be doing for the rest of your life? Work, work, work. That’s all I’ll be doing. I’ll never be free from the clutches of this dollar society has made up, a mere number that makes up everything this world has to offer. It’s a shame! But at least dogs are cute.

Thats it. Thanks for reading. Feel free to listen to the podcast below if you want.

https://open.spotify.com/show/4SvgDtEsAv2fTFANctb5PK

Category: School | LEAVE A COMMENT
April 21

Destination Imagination Regionals and Nationals

Hello, and welcome back to my blog! Today, I’ll be talking about my DI journeys of misfortune. I’m just kidding around, but I don’t really like DI.

DI started like any other, we were put into our groups. That’s normal and fine, until 2 of our members quit our group, that’s fine too. I was put with three girls who were super best friends, and a dude. So, things were off to a bumpy start, but our team persevered even after all these disasters.

Next was to start on our story. What did we want to do it on? The question was “how can something small make a big impact?” My initial idea was the wheel, But I was quickly outvoted by the three girls in my group when someone suggested bees. I was a bit upset that I was outvoted so quickly, but I didn’t let it get to me as it’s a pretty stupid thing to get upset about.

We continued onward, working on the story and characters over a few weeks, alongside the props. We were on a little bit of a time crunch during the last week, as I was given the task of making the backdrop and my group hadn’t told me what they wanted until a week before.. it’s fine, though, I got it finished.

The day we went to Seycove to present was nerve-wracking and exhausting. I practiced my guitar for a while, but got distracted by the library and ended up missing my own instant challenge. Which is wild. I didn’t have a phone or iPad, so I couldn’t check the time although that’s not really an excuse to flake out on one of two presentations. At least I was reading.

The presentation of our play went fine, nothing crazy. I accidentally dropped my guitar and my group member hit me in the head on accident but that’s just fine too. We finished up and I left instantly, but not without grabbing another donut.

Oh, but what about the nationals? Yes, destination imagination has two parts, and they’re pretty much the same thing; but one has more people in it. Nationals is essentially your presentation but revised and better, but I can’t really say that ours was really revised since we just got rid of the guitar. Speaking of, THE GUITAR!!! That was pretty much my only part in the play and WE WEREN’T EVEN USING IT!!! Dang. That’s a shame.

Anyway, it basically went the exact same as it did last time, except I had no guitar and we were doing it in the music room instead of one of the math rooms.

NOW. What did I learn from this experience? Well, I learned that I hated DI, but I also learned that, for next time.. I should be more prepared for presentations in general, because stuff like this can’t just be whipped up in a day. It takes weeks of commitment by multiple people.

Okay that’s my post!!!!!! It might look rushed, that’s because it kind of is because I have 37868468486487 other assignments to do, but I’m getting to those later. Goodbye!!!

Category: School | LEAVE A COMMENT
February 21

Mentor for a Day

Hello and welcome back to my blog, to match what I am talking about I will make this short and precise because I have 32 other assignments to work on!!! That’s just the PLP way.  Anyway, today I will be talking about my Mentor for a Day project, striving to answer the question:

How can learning from others’ career journeys help us shape our own?

Now that’s a big question, considering the fact that I’m in the 10th grade and my life is looking like a disaster. But, there is no harm in thinking about our future careers; it’s best to be prepared.

We started off this project with figuring out what exactly we wanted to do in the future. Now, asking a bunch of dopey 10th graders (myself included) what they want to do for the rest of their lives is a stretch… but luckily, we aren’t legally assigned this job for the future so obviously we are allowed to change it in the future if we wish.

We were soon ordered to interview someone who does this profession for a living, specifically someone who we are not related to. I, the wonderful and amazing artist I am, chose my art teacher at Seycove, Mr. Clancy. I thought I could take a few notes from someone who has basically been doing art and dreaming of being an artist for nearly their whole life.

Me and Mr. Clancy arranged a date and we got to work as soon as school started. I followed him during his classes, and he taught me a lot about not only his interests, but also teaching. A teacher teaching you how to teach is a bit of a tongue twister; but he actually gave me genuine tips on how to teach a class, which I initially thought would be impossible. But, against all odds; he manages to pull through and teach not only the arts, but also careers; a nice little surprise to me.

It’s hard to say much else than that; it was interesting and fun, but I’ve summarized it well I find. Let’s look through some things I’d keep in mind for next time, and things that I did well. Now, just to flatter myself before getting my ego absolutely tainted for life; let’s go over the positives.

One thing I find I did well in this project? It’s hard to say; but… I think my smart brevity note was pretty amazing. Now, I know what you’re saying; that is a note. It is not an important part of the project, because it’s a note!! Well you’re WRONG!!!!!!! I can be PROUD OF MY WORK if I feel so INCLINED TO!!!!! AND YOU CANT STOP ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Anyway, onto my negative. I don’t think I did any really good work during the project. I know what you’re saying², you’re so perfect and amazing, how do you NOT do something that you’re proud of? Well, the thing is… I’d usually make up some sort of excuse. My dog ate my iPad or I tripped and dropped my iPad into a meatgrinder, and all the apple stores within a 1000 mile radius were imploded, but I don’t feel like making up some elaborate lie, so I’ll tell you the truth.

The truth is… I HATE podcasts. I really do, and this is not a lie! Does that excuse my slacking? No, but it’s got to count for something, right? I mean, how do you expect me to make a good project if I despise the subject we’re slaving over!!! I just don’t feel like it!
I’ve listened to podcasts and didn’t like them. I’ve made podcasts, didn’t like doing that either. It kind of just sounds like the art of talking into a microphone about some story about how autistic people can read minds isn’t for me. because ghosts are real and the world is square, right? That might piss some people off, but I’m not the spiritual type, I’d rather believe in facts instead of old wivestales about how little goblins are going to steal your toenails if you don’t eat all your rabbit stew. Where is this going? I don’t know! But hey, don’t take the mick out of me for not thinking unicorns are real, because they totally are; they’re just in the ocean.

 

Thank you for reading my new blog post, and take care!

 

Category: School | LEAVE A COMMENT
February 16

The Modernized Romeo and Juliet

Hello! I’m Hazel and welcome to my blog! Today, I will be telling you about a project that we wrapped up just last week; Swipe Right For Tragedy. This project revolved around modernizing the classic “Romeo and Juliet” play, written by Shakespeare.

We started off this project, or rather; 80% of this project was based around learning the play. Romeo and Juliet, being as complex as it is; was given to us in a original and translated version so that we could understand what we were reading all the while learning what all these big confusing words meant.

After learning the original play, we got to writing our own modernized version. Now, you could probably imagine how that turned out, with 15 year olds writing this; although it was funny in the end nonetheless.

Last section of this project was actually preforming the play that we wrote. This was probably the easiest part of the play for me; because as soon as it came, it finished. I really like it when projects are like that; quick and without any time to just think about what you’re saying. As I said, this part was pretty quick; and people got a kick out of it (for the most part). Oh yeah, did I tell you that we presented in front of 3 different classes plus some? It was pretty awesome…

Now, onto the reflection.

What did I do well? Well, I’d say I did pretty good on the acting parts. I don’t know about you, but I went home with two bruises on my shins that day…. Because my acting was so believable. I also feel as if I contributed to editing the script after it was written pretty well, making things funnier (at times) and making things sound a little less stiff.

As for the things I could’ve done better.. contributing to the script initially. Now I did say that I helped out with the script, but that was after most of the parts were already written. I feel as if I didn’t have any part in the written portion of the script at all (which is totally on me), which left my group members with a bit more work than they bargained for.

Thank you for coming back to my blog to read my catastrophes, and I’ll see you next time!

Category: School | LEAVE A COMMENT
January 9

Winter Exhibition THE THIRD ONE

Hello and welcome back to my blog! Today, I will be telling you about the first exhibition we’ve done this school-year; The Winter Exhibition!
As you may know, there is an Exhibition for PLP before the end of every semester. There, we present our project that follows the requirements and show it off to relatives, teachers, strangers… amongst others.

PLP Exhibitions encourage you to present yourself and your work in front of a crowd, which may be important in the future with job interviews, collage presentations… you know, big events in your life! These things and more can be practiced and tested at Exhibition.

Now, let’s move on and explain what we actually did. This project is very much different from all the others we have worked on in the past; because they’re centred around US as people!! For all the other exhibitions I’ve done so far, we had to follow a specific narrative; but we got to be ourselves for this project, to which I thoroughly enjoyed. I am the type of person who enjoys doing their own thing, doing things differently and my own way. Now that may sound bad, especially in a program like PLP; but stay with me here.

The name of the project is “Marketing me”. We were ordered to make resume’s and business cards that reflected what we were marketing (an interest or talent that you could make into a career) and show them off at exhibition. The point of the project was to learn how to properly make a resume that could grab employer’s attention, alongside presenting what we may be interested in doing in the future. Of course I based the project around my art since I technically already do that as a job, alongside that being pretty much the only thing I’m currently good at.

Enough about what I did; the real question is HOW I did. Now, I do have my fair share of critiques, but let’s go over what I did well first so I don’t start bawling in the middle of writing this.

Now, one thing that I did enjoy alongside observers was the big fat slab of wood I used as a backboard. It was an oval painted yellow, with an orange boarder and a little smiley face at the top. This represented me because not only do I love smiley faces and the colour yellow, but it’s also bright and colourful like a lot of my art; which is a big representation of my skills and values. Another thing I did that I really liked was actually my very quick Canva document. I made this with all but 5 minutes left before the exhibition started, and I actually managed to cram it in; and I’m glad I did, because it really perfected my booth. It provided an easy way for people to observe more of my art, without having to print it up and stick it up behind me.

Now, onto my many faults. I’m tearing up already thinking about this… but oh well.
One thing I would change would have to be my preparation. I need to seriously learn how to plan ahead of time instead of doing stuff impulsively last minute. With these types of projects it’s bound to screw you over at some point, doesn’t matter if it was fine before or not. Something that I should practice is writing down a plan, where I can look over my thoughts and try to think of ideas to add on or to remove. This would prevent situations where I may have an idea but not have the supplies, time or space for it.

 

Well, that’s pretty much it. Thanks for sticking around and reading my blog post; even if the winter exhibition was 3 weeks ago. I’ll see you next time!!!

Category: School | LEAVE A COMMENT
December 16

WWII and Women in Canada

Hello and welcome to my blog!!! Today, I will be telling you about what I’ve been working on for the past few weeks; and how it went.

Now, in humanities we’ve been doing tons of research on WWII. That be about all the nitty gritty bad stuff, but since that’s not what this post is focused on; I’d invite you to take a look at my other classmates work to get an insight on what happened.

After watching like 3 documentaries, we were told that we would have to create an essay about a WWII-relevant topic by the end of the semester. We would build up to this by doing smart brevity (which I didn’t even know was a word until a week ago) and writing drafts. Overall, we were required to write an essay in a specific format; alongside a “zine” which would just be the essay in a different format with pictures.

We were tasked to answer the driving question of our project: What role of the conflict of WWII contributed to Canadian identity?

My answer to that is; women all around the world would not have as much choice, freedom and rights as they do now if it wasn’t for WWII. With working becoming a norm for women, even being encouraged, was just opening the floodgates for women working in Canada.

Now, usually people would think the writing part of essays is hard. You are WRONG!!!!!!! Writing a 2000 word essay is EASY, it’s the formatting that’s the problem. I don’t think I’ve ever had to do the most goofy revisions ever in my life than with this essay, it’s ridiculous… but I digress. I should get into what I did well on and what I would do better on in the future!!

Now, did I do good on the essay? Personally, I think so; but there are a lot of parts of the process that I would change.
One issue I had was procrastinating. I was obviously not excited to write an essay nor do classwork at home, so I didn’t. But that was a mistake, since I was extremely stressed for the last week of the project; just barely getting it in on time. In fact, I am still stressed out!!
Another thing I would change would be my enthusiasm on this project. Now I know that you cannot change how happy you are to do something you don’t want to do, but school is just a bunch of crap that you don’t want to do all the time. You need to learn how to cope with the crap you don’t want to do; and try to see the bright side of it, such as an aspect of the project that you may enjoy; etc etc.

When it comes to things that I am proud of, I am definitely surprised at my determination to finish the project. Once I got out of the bust of not wanting to do it, I got into making time for the project at home and focusing better at school; acknowledging that it was very important. This came as a surprise to me while reflecting, as I would usually be in a slump about being behind on a project; but it was quite different this time, and I have to give myself credit for that.

Overall, the project went okay. It wasn’t super amazing, but it also wasn’t super bad; and that’s all I could ask for quite honestly. Thank you for reading this blog post, and I’ll see you next time.

Essay:
WWII essay

Zine submission:
Zine Check

Category: School | LEAVE A COMMENT
November 8

Why Does The World Need More Canada?

Hello, and welcome back to my blog! It’s been a very long time, hasn’t it? 

Before you ask about my summer YOU DONT CARE ABOUT THAT. DONT WORRY ABOUT THAT. We’re going to make this quick, so put your big girl pants on and listen as I tell you about PLP’s latest project: Why Does The World Need More Canada?

This project is centered around the country we reside in; Canada! We were assigned it to investigate the current events relating to Canada, and how we could choose a topic and turn it into a podcast. We were told to a create a 4 minute essay that we would use as our script for our podcast. We started doing “thinking Thursdays”, basing our thinking Thursday topic on a short story on CNN (a Canadian news network).

There were a lot of things I liked about this project, and didn’t like. Some things I would change, and others I would keep exactly the same. So, let’s get into the nitty gritty!!

One of the things that I actually find I did do well during this project was the writing. While I am writing this post, I am pausing for a minute every 10 seconds because I have no idea what to write. But for my project, I found that I was very on task and knew what I was going to write before I wrote it. It was very efficient for me, and made me feel more confident in my work for the project.

Another thing I am proud of for this project was the effort I put into it. While I handed it in late… I do believe that I put a lot of time and energy into finishing, and making the best product I could make… somewhat. Though I am much more proud of my writing work rather than my podcast, I still feel like that’s something to be happy about.

Now, onto the things I would work on for the next project; and what I wasn’t so pleased with was my time management. No, this is not specific to anything I did during the project; but I really could’ve managed my time better to hand in work that has my all put into it, instead of something half-assed (sorry but it’s true). For my podcast, I feel as if when I was recording I could’ve added more, but I didn’t make any time to because it was already 2 weeks overdue.

One more thing I’d work on for my next project is my audio quality. It’s kind of self explanatory, but I think I should use a microphone next time. Though, there is not much I’d like to change about my podcast; aside from the fact that I should put more effort into my project next time.

Thank you for reading, and I’m sorry it’s short!

Category: School | LEAVE A COMMENT
June 19

Tpol THE SECOND VERSION????

Hello and welcome to my blog! Today, I will be discussing with you my tPOL, and what I plan to talk about for it. I have a lot to cover, so buckle up!

Now, tPOLs are middle and end of year presentations to show how you’ve advanced in your learning and how you plan to improve on things. You then present this to your parents and a teacher, and are asked questions at the end.. and that’s about it. It sounds simple, but it’s a bit more difficult than that, since it has to be 7 minutes long!

Now that you know what to expect, I can tell you what I plan to present.

Now, I have improved a lot over the two years I’ve been in PLP. That seems like a while, doesn’t it? And I think there are a few projects that I’ve done that represents the better and the worse spots of my projects. Starting off with my first love, my presentations of the crusades and the feudal system. Now, I made this project 2 years ago and it’s STILL one of my favourites, that says a lot! Now, a few things I would like to change about this project is the amount of info I put in. I like it, I’d just add another paragraph or two to each block of text.

Now I find that I represented a good skill in seeking help for this project, as I distinctly remember asking for more time to finish it. I also remember sitting there and finishing it.

Another project that I find I did well on is my WWI comic project. I know, we just did that, but I cannot think about anything else to talk about right now. For my WWI comic project, we had to make a comic about a soldiers experience in WWI. This could be a fictional character, or a real person who was there themselves.

One thing I would want to improve on with this project is my “completing evidence”. My time management wasn’t amazing, and in the future, I would like to give myself more time to work on the project.

But, I did seek out help to the best of my ability, and got support by teachers. I am proud of myself for being able to seek out help so easily and without feeling embarrassed.

 

OK THATS ALL thank you for reading!

 

Category: School | LEAVE A COMMENT