Hello, and welcome back to another blog post! In our latest project, we have been focusing on advertising and targeting goods or services at certain groups of people. Our driving question for this project was “How do we make our medium, a message,” and was focused around what media is, how we use it to send out a message to the public, and how it affects our daily lives.

Because of the type of project we were doing, we decided to use this project as an opportunity to go on a field study! On this trip, we went to the Oregon Coast, and went as far as New Port, Oregon! We got to do all sorts of crazy things, but they still had to be related to the project. 

We were all assigned businesses that we had to design an ad for. My group had the Columbia River Maritime Museum, which was a museum located by the Columbia river that has a numerous amount of exhibits and interactive displays, which make it unique. 

We also stopped at a number of amazing restaurants, many of which were only in the US. My favourites would have been the buffets we went to, because we could eat as much as we wanted! The best meal that we had by far would have been Kam Meng, an amazing Chinese restaurant. 

For our final stop, we went to Wolf Haven, an organization who takes in and rehabilitates wolves that wouldn’t have been able to survive on their own. We learned a lot about wolves and their habits, but also a great deal about the land and why they chose to build Wolf Haven in that exact spot.

I learned a lot about our business before we went on the trip, to make sure that I was prepared to interview the people who ran the museum. Sadly, they were too busy to answer our questions, so we had to improvise heavily with our ads. 

The trip wasn’t completely about ads! We got to do a number of cool things while on the trip, including zip lining, laser tag, and go-carting! It was an amazing experience, and I got to go with my friends.

Surviving with people from school for a whole week can be challenging, but it was worth it for some of the moments and the experiences we had. I mean, those kind of things are cool, but they’re just so much better to share with friends!

The trip itself had some up and downs. The bus broke down while we were close to our campsite, and we had to wait in the bus for over an hour. But because of that, we got to ride in a limo! We also stayed in yurts for most of the trip, which was cramped, but fun!

This is the book that I created that documented the trip! Enjoy!

Hello, and welcome back to another blog post! In our latest humanities project, we looked at the consequences of European colonization. This project has been focused on shifting our perspective to the other side of colonization, not just how the Europeans were affected by colonization. We have done a number of different activities, all to answer the driving question, and to see colonization from a different perspective. In our first keystone, we took a piece of art that was created by the artist C.W Jeffreys and created a chart to analyze the deeper meanings in the piece, and to take a closer look at the description of the painting to answer the questions Who, What, When, Where, and Why?

In our second keystone, we took a painting or drawing created by the same artist and recreated it to represent a different worldview. The painting that I chose is titled “Madeleine De
Vercheres Defends Her Father’s Fort,” and is a depiction of a standoff between a small group of European settlers and the natives. I changed the painting to show the Native perspective of the event. I altered the position of Madeleine so that it looked like she was behind the gate. I made these changes because I don’t think that the original painting showed the native perspective of the situation. It seemed to show the settlers as victims to the natives, which doesn’t connect to the driving question of “What Did European Settlement Mean For All Involved?”

In our final keystone, we took the original painting and the reinterpreted image and wrote a script to an Augmented Reality video. In our video, we had to explain why we made the changes to the image that we had made and how it related to the project. My AR video was centred around the perspective of the natives, and why they had chosen to attack the settlers. You can find out all about it in my AR video! Here is a link to the finished version:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GKWbmMO38c6BkmLQjgLKyinaYlixYQOp/view

To reflect on the project, I think that I did a rather good job of answering the driving question in my project, and I also just had a lot of fun with the project overall! I think that I learned a lot about European exploration, and how the natives saw the situation. Thanks for reading!

Hello, and welcome back to another blog post! In our latest science project, called Mind over Matter, we looked at the structure of an atom and theories like the kinetic molecular theory. In our first project, we learned about the correspondences between mass, density, and volume. Our final project for the keystone was to pick an object in the science room, and find the mass, density, and volume of the object. I believe that I chose a small metal block that was sitting on the table, and it was pretty east to find each measurement. 

In our second keystone, we looked at diffusion, and did experiments with gummy bears to learn how to create our own experiments and to do them ourselves. This was a really fun project even though we didn’t get to eat the gummy bears, it was very interesting. My experiment was to find out whether a gummy bear would diffuse faster in normal water or in sugar water. Here is my slideshow that I made to see the results!

In our final keystone, we examined the structure of subatomic particles and atoms, and got to make video games using the coding software Scratch. My game was a maze game where you were an atom and you had to navigate through a maze without touching the sides. It didn’t have much to do with the project, but it was really fun to play! Making it was incredibly difficult, but I definitely learned a lot about using scratch! This was probably my favourite project of the three, because I loved the process of making the game, even if it wasn’t the best thing I’ve ever made. Here is my game!

Because you can’t see the instructions for the game here, you have to use the arrow keys to navigate through the maze without touching the sides. There are three levels. Enjoy!

I’ve definitely learned a lot through this project, both creating things online and doing experiments in a lab. This has been one of my favourite overall projects so far, and I’m excited to see what we will do next in science!

Hello, and welcome back to another blog post! In our latest project, we got to take a deep dive into the world of microorganisms. We learned about many of the different cells that are in our bodies, the body’s ways to ward off invaders, and the importance of vaccines.

In our first keystone, we went around the school and took a sample of a surface that we believed would have a lot of bacteria. We then placed it in a Petri dish to grow. The point of the experiment was to see just how dirty the school really is, and how quickly bacteria grows.

In the second portion of the project, we looked at the different cells that inhabit our body and keep us safe. We got to make little character cards of all of the cells we learned about, and give them personalities. This one was my favourite of the keystones, as they were easy to make our own. We learned a lot about the innate immune system through this project, in a way that was really interesting.

In the third keystone, we examined the different types of vaccines and how they are made. We got to look at the different types of vaccines, and what exactly they do to help boost your immune system. We made posters with some of the myths that are common when we talk about vaccines. Some of these myths are that vaccines have trackers in them so that the government can keep tabs on you, that vaccines can change your DNA, or that vaccines such as the one for Covid-19 was too rushed so it’s totally ineffective. We looked at these myths and showed that these are just that: myths.

To reflect on the project as a whole, I would say that it was a lot of fun, and I learned a lot of amazing things about the human body. Thank you for reading, and have a great day!

Hello, and welcome back to another blog post! In our latest project, we looked at the journeys of some early explorers, and wrote a story based on their expeditions. I picked Jacques Cartier, a French explorer who was trying to find a new route to Asia due to an order by his king. I really enjoyed this project because I got to be creative with the writing aspect of it. We also got to create images to integrate into our story, and create a book using the app Book Creator.

The first keystone was different from the second and third, however, in which we created a Viking character card that showed an accurate description of a Viking and showed the differences between the way that the Vikings are portrayed through the media and the way that they actually lived. This project was probably my favourite of the three, as I got to design the Viking and give him a personality. I think that I did a fairly good job of portraying the way that Vikings really lived, as apposed to the myths that have become norms for our modern day society.

Reflecting on the project, I probably could’ve added more detail to my images and worked harder on my graphic design, but in the end I think that it turned out all right.

Here is my book! 

Thank you for coming to my presentation of learning. I am an expert of my own learning. I am also responsible and accountable for my own learning. You can expect me to give an honest evaluation of my progress. We will discuss my strengths and opportunities for growth. Thank you in advance for listening and offering feedback I can use to improve as a learner. 

Over the past few months, I’ve grown a lot as a PLP learner, and also a person. PLP is a program that allows us to take responsibility for our own learning, while also creating work that we can be proud of. I’ve gained a lot of new skills from the projects that we have done, and a lot of valuable experiences. This is not to say that I haven’t made any mistakes, of course, seeing as revision is part of the learning process. 

In our first project, we looked at the book The Outsiders, and examined worldview as an idea. While working on this project, we were advised to think about how the things that we’ve seen and experienced affect our own personality and worldview. We learned to see the world through the perspectives of the main characters, which allowed us to take a closer look at our own worldview, and the worldview of those around us. After we had finished reading the book, we were assigned the task of creating movie posters for The Outsiders, which allowed us to recreate our favourite scene from the book. This not only let us to get creative with it, but it also meant that we got to think like the characters, and take on a new worldview, which was basically the main goal of the entire project. I believe that I did a rather good job of examining different worldviews, but if I had to go back and do a better job, I would have added more detail to the littler things, and payed closer attention to the story. 

In Maker, we began work on our big life journal, which was a learning resource that was created for the purpose of letting us express our hopes and dreams for the future, as well as the progress we plan to make towards them, and what we are doing now. This project gave us the chance to create a plan for our future, but also explore things that we never would have thought about normally. I think that I learned a lot about PLP and about myself through this project, which was a huge goal for me in school. 

Another project that we’ve done ( and possibly my favourite) has to be the project that we did on the Crusades in humanities. In this project we spent a lot of time learning about the history of religions, why sparks flew between them, and how the crusades played out. We got to make slideshows about the crusades which allowed us to add animations and personalize them, which might’ve been my favourite part of the whole project. This was very important to my learning experience because it let me get creative, while still sticking the the guidelines and making a historically accurate resource. 

When we’re in PLP, I feel like I can get things done easier than I can in normal classes. This form of learning is better suited to my needs, and which is why I have been able to make so much progress as a learner. Every project that we have done has brought me a little bit closer to becoming a sophisticated learner.

I know that I’ve been talking a bit formally about my learning so far, so I apologize about that. This has been a lot of fun for me, which is something that I think is an important part of the learning experience. Through the courses that I have taken this semester, I have been able to enjoy school more than I would have through normal classes, because of the performance based learning. 

When I first started with PLP, I was still a little bit confused about how the program worked. I was very behind and confused, and I wasn’t getting the best marks. But after a little while, I started to understand a little more about the programs, and I started to get better grades. I was able to go from suns to rainbows because I started to understand the projects that we were doing. I grew a lot more because I had a slow start than if I had understood immediately. 

Despite having originally the chosen accomplished proficiency for humanities, I soon understood that I could go beyond and aim for extending instead. I had originally thought that I would only be able to reach accomplished, but it seems that I was wrong to assume that. I instead revised my learning plan to show accomplished in all of my PLP classes.

Now that we re halfway through grade eight, I think that I have fallen into the rhythm of PLP. I am more used to the layout of the projects and how we work in groups, as well as how to ask for help when I need it. Even though I am not always satisfied with my work, I always put lots of effort in, and I think that’s what counts. 

If there is one thing that I would like to accomplish in the rest of the school year, that would be to get extending marks inn all of my PLP classes. This may seem ambitious, but if I strive for all extending, then I will have to work hard to achieve that, which is something that really matters to me. 

A FAIL that I had this year would have been our triptychs. I am not the best at using photoshop, so my first drafts were horrendous. However, after many many tries, I was able to create decent work.  Next time, instead of just trying to wing it, I will ask for help or watch a tutorial instead.

Right now, we are looking at TikToks that show how difficult life is for a teacher, but we have to spin them to show what a pain teachers can be. I am a little bit worried about this one, because I’m not completely sure if they are ready for what I have, but I still think that it’ll be an amazing learning opportunity! To summarize everything that I have said, I have grown a lot from when I first started PLP to where I am right now, and it’s all thanks to PLP. Thank you for listening!  

Hello, and welcome to another blog post! In our latest project we worked learned about how ideas from Europe and Asia changed the world during the Renaissance. I learned how to use different photo apps to edit our images. We were working on creating triptychs, a popular form of storytelling at the time. In these triptychs, we had to include the new innovations that were popular during the renaissance (left), what they have evolved into during the modern era (middle), and the original ideas that were common before the Renaissance (right)

We started by creating drafts of our triptych, which were just sketches. These were meant to show the evolution of the ideas from the Renaissance, and answer the driving question. Below is a slideshow showing the evolution of my drafts.

Here is my finished triptych, and below is my explanation of my triptych.

Hello and thank you for coming to my blog! Today I have crated an artbook to show all of the new skills that I have gained in sketches pro! Below is my artbook, which I made through book creator.

I hope that you have learned something new things about sketches pro, and that you have learned a little bit about our PLP projects. Thank you for reading my book, and have a great day!

Hello, and welcome to my blog post about the PLP winter exhibition! In this project we extracted themes from the movie Avatar, which were then turned into projects that we presented to the Seycove community. Alright, lets dive in!

When we first began our project, we were tasked with watching the movie Avatar, and were told to pay close attention to the theme of the movie. This was difficult because of how long and complicated the movie is, but in the end, we all decided on our themes. 

Next, we brainstormed ways that we could incorporate our themes, and the driving question (which was what does James Cameron’s fantasy world of Avatar teach us about our own world), into a project that could be presented at our Winter Exhibition. 

The theme that I chose to portray in my project was the disrespect of the culture and beliefs of the Na’vi. My original design included a box with one of their sacred trees on top of it growing down into the inside of the box, symbolizing how important it was to the Na’vi, and how the humans just took a huge bulldozer and killed it in the movie. I found it difficult to explain my work when I was asked about it, because it didn’t clearly show what I wanted it to. But after a lot of time spent creating, and a lot of mental preparation, was finally ready to present at the exhibition.

The winter exhibition is a time when all of the learners in the PLP program get to showcase what they have learned throughout the past semester to other students, parents, and community members. We all had to bring out own supplies and decorate the rooms ourselves. It was incredibly stressful and difficult, but in the end, it was worth it for the final result. I had to do a lot of explaining, and after a full day of school it was a lot, but it was still a lot of fun to do with my friends!

After the exhibition, we had to clean the school so that classes could continue normally the next day. The next day went about as normal, which was a relief. However, on the last day of school, we got to do something really fun. It had been over a decade since the first Avatar movie was released, and the second movie was finally coming out! We all got to watch it together which was really fun, and our semester ended on a happy note! Thank you so much for reading, and have a great day!

Hello everyone and welcome to my blog post about the Making Interesting Images project! For this project, we learned how to take different types of photos from different angles. I really loved the way that we were allowed to take photos of whatever we wanted to, which allowed for a lot of customization. 

The point of this project was to let us play around with our camera app and photo editing, and also to make us better photographers. Our task was to create still images that could tell a story, and really immerse the viewer into the photo. We had the opportunity to take portraits, landscapes, and even just pictures of everyday objects. The difference was the angles. We took everyday things and got to turn them into interesting images, which was then assignment.

The three skills that I learned that I found the most useful were probably learning how to use photoshop, where to place your subject on your screen, and how to create emotions through taking meaningful photos. I think that photoshop is an incredibly useful tool when it comes to PLP, because it really lets us work on our projects to the fullest degree. Learning how to be a good photographer is important because taking pictures is something that everyone does, no matter the reason. Learning how to take affective pictures is not just a skill for school, it’s a life skill.  Learning how to show emotions through your work is something that is very valuable, as it lets the audience connect with your creations.

Finally, I would like to talk about how the project really played out. We mostly spent the whole time trying to figure out what to take pictures of, and how to adjust our camera settings. In the end, it was a fun project that we all got to spend doing with our friends. Thank you for reading, and have a great day!