SHello blog today I will be talking about an assignment that really scared me! What is it you ask? We had to write an in class SYNTHESIS ESSAY! It was the first time I had done anything like this, so I was nervous but ready to learn how to approach the assignment. Let me breakdown the whole situation for you. 

Our classes goal was to all write an individual in class synthesis essay about the 2 books we have read in class and one other book/movie that support the thesis statement you created. The essay needed to have a thesis, hook, 3 paragraphs with different points that helped prove our thesis (with quotes, evidence & examples…) and finally a conclusion to end it off. Our thesis had to be influenced by the unit driving question…

“How do authors use text to teach us more about ourselves?”

 

The first book I read was Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli. Click here to learn about why I chose it, and click here to see the movie trailer Kai, Maggie, Tamara, Morgan and I made for the book. As a class we read Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi… And last but not least a short children’s book called Go Show The World, by Wab Kinew. Once I had finished reading all these books and had to start thinking of a thesis for the essay… I ended up researching the authors. I soon learnt that all 3 authors personal experiences have influenced the stories they tell in there books. I then realized, most authors childhoods, careers, and cultures are the reasons why they publish the books they do! So, after a few drafts and the thanks to Ms. Maxwell, I came up with a thesis.

”Authors reflect on their personal experiences through text. They publish books and stories often related to things they have gone through.”

 

Once I was confident with the thesis, I started learning about the many, many, many other things that need to be included in a synthesis essay. There were many worksheets, about things like finding your PAR, creating a hook, etc. They weren’t fun to do, but ended up helping me in the long run. Then, one of the most important parts about this project, the essay outline. This helped me clear up my ideas, and prepare me for the in class write. Before I show you the essay and tell you how I felt about it, here is a Q&A about my perspective on essays.

 

 

Q: Explain what you think is the most important step to preparing for an in class essay. 

A: I personally think that the most important step is to choose a thesis you are extremely confident in, and comfortable with. Because you can’t bring your outline into the in class write, you need to be able to prove your thesis even if you forget about everything you had planned to write down. If you don’t feel you can do that with your thesis, find another one, because realistically you can’t remember every single point you put in your outline and you need to feel confident and educated about your topic enough to give evidence and examples for your thesis without your outline.

Q: Explain what you think your biggest strength in writing is

A: As someone who isn’t the most confident in there writing skills, this is a hard question. People have told me my writing is clear and gets the point across, and I guess I agree with that. I can write a paragraph and have you leave, knowing clearly what I was trying to say. Something I hope to get better at is to be able to word things more nicely… Don’t really know how to explain but I want my writing to have some like Logan or Daniel skill in it. Those two are really good writers in my class who can write anything, and It will sound professional and detailed. 

Q: Briefly discuss your opinion on your book – did this help you or hinder you in writing your essay?

A: I really enjoyed all 3 books I read which yes, did help me while writing the essay. Because I liked them, I remembered the events and characters from it which helped me a lot.

Now, here’s the essay I wrote.

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After handing this in, my teacher was nice enough to give back really helpful and thorough feedback so I can make it better. This honestly wasn’t fun to revise at all as I wrote the essay about a week previously and totally wasn’t in the mood to do some revising, but obviously I still did it. 

Moving on in the school year I want to take this experience with me. What do I want to improve on in my writing? Coming back to the Logan and Daniel type skill, I want to be able to write more fluent, smooth and detailed as there writing is. I want to use more fancy words that sound like there from a thesaurus… Anything that will overall just make my writing better. I will definitely focus on this goal for the rest of the year in blog posts, essays, etc.

The title of this post is exactly what I thought six weeks ago. Before my class and I went to Ottawa and learnt a bunch of things in class. I was fully uneducated on WWI and Canada’s role in it. My class and I learn a lot and did many activities. I’m going to breakdown each of the things that taught me everything that had to do with Canada and WWI.

THE DRIVING QUESTION

This is important; How did WWI impact Canada’s identity? Remember that, im going to answer it later.

INTRO VIDEOS

To prep our brains for all the things we were about to be taught, we watched videos on WWI and why it started. This video specifally:

This guy Indie Neidel makes these really WWI fact filled entertaining videos to watch. We watched a few of these videos and took notes as a class.

THE MAP OF EUROPE AND CANADA

To make everything we learn clearer, Ms. Maxwell taught us what Europe looked like before WWI and made us review the map of Canada. (Which I really needed as I thought Yukon was Nunavut before drawing this map)

In the topic of drawings, we also had to draw something that we think represents why WWI started. Here’s mine.

I decided to highlight NATIONALISM. Why? If all countries thought as themselves and everyone else as equal, WWI wouldn’t have started. Everyone thinks they deserve the best and most. Everyone. No one wants to be 3rd or even second.

BOOK OF CHOICE

Ms maxwell gave us the options from 3 books and I chose “War Horse.” War Horse is about a horse named Joey who lives through WWI and the book is told through his eyes. I decided to read this because I had learned that 8 million horses had died in WWI and I wanted to read one of there stories.

After reading the book we were assigned to tell the story of the book in anyway we wanted. I decided I wanted to do it though drawing.

If you choose to read that, great. If not: I’ll give a little explanation. I drew an eye to repersents Joeys vision of his and everyone in it. Its in green/grey/blue tones because those are the only colors a horse can see.

SHATTERED GROUND

To enhance and see visuals of everything we have learnt so far we used a website called SHATTERED GROUND. Its basically a animated story of a boy who finds his grandfathers pictures and diary. We get to see his grandfathers story through his eyes. Its a really cool website and here is a LINK because I suggest if your intrested in WWI you check it out. The assignment connected to this was to answer a few questions and show your favourite picture from the chapter.

 

OTTAWA

For this WWI term I got to literally fly out to Ottawa to study Vimy Ridge. That experiance was one of the most amazing and educational trips ive ever been on. I’m not going to go into depth on it as I have a blog post about it linked HERE.

THE COMIC

Now, finally, I can tell you about what we did with all this information! My class and I made a 100 page comic on WWI. Everyone had a different topic and had to make a title page, 3 pages of comic, and tell a story of a person related to your topic. I decided to focus on Canada’s Nursing Sisters. Why? Because I learnt a little bit about them in Ottawa and I wanted to know more.

I did an insane amount of research…

Made a comic….

Got critique from the class….

And ended up with this…

I had a lot of fun making these comics because I was so interested in the topic. Now, what did we do with the comic?

COVE CLIFF

On a Wednesday we headed down to our local elementary to share our comic book with the schools grade 6 and 7s. I personally didn’t enjoy it too much as cove cliff makes me feel weird inside, but it was educational for me and the kids.

CONCLUSION + MY ANSWER TO THE DRIVING QUESTION

This term was my favourite in grade 9. I never felt bored while learning about WWI, and looked forward to Humanties class everyday.  The project was educational, fun and not stresfull which was really nice. Anyways, what’s my answer to the driving question?

So….. How did WWI impact Canada’s identity? After learning quite a bit of stuff, I think my answer to that is that its why Canada is Canada. Confederation was before WWI, but WWI is when Britain decided Canada could be an independent nation. Women gained the right to vote, Canada’s economy got better and war technology got better. It’s not all good things though. 66,000 Canadians lost there lives and 172,000 were wounded. One of every ten Canadians who fought in the war did not return. Families, friends and communities were all effected.

WWI made Canada what it is today, because of all the brave and selfless Canadians who went to fight in WWI.