I think that apologies are one of the most important things in life. No one is ever perfect, and no group of people has ever been perfect, nor will there ever be a perfect group of people. Wrong decisions are made every day. Apologies are the reason that we do not fall apart and constantly fight with other humans. But what makes a good one? And what can we learn from our past and our country’s past to keep our apologies alive?
First of all I will start this by saying that this blog post will look a little different than my classmates. This is because I was away for the final part of this project (which was the big show your learning section). I still feel that I learned a lot in this project, however, so I’ve decided to make this post even if it will look a little different.
First of all, I will start by saying that this blog post will look a little different than my classmates. This is because I was away for the final part of this project (which was the big show your learning section). I still feel that I learned a lot in this project, however, so I’ve decided to make this post even if it will look a little different.
Let’s get into it! These are the two things we focused on during this project to show our learning.
🧩 Concept: Identity
I can identify and explain how identity matters across different societies and time period. I can apply my understanding of identity to the world today and my place in it.
One of the first things we did in this project was spend six days taking notes and listening to Ms. McWilliam. I enjoyed these lessons—she’s an excellent explainer, and I appreciated how little text was on the slides, which made it easier to stay engaged. Throughout these days, we focused on topics like the Komagata Maru, Japanese internment in Canada, the Chinese Head Tax, the meaning of an apology, and how British Columbia came to be. I was shocked that I had never heard of most of these events before—except for Japanese internment, but only briefly. Learning about them now was eye-opening, and I hope they become a bigger part of the curriculum for younger students in the future. As someone who lives in Vancouver, hearing about the injustices that happened here was both surprising and unsurprising at the same time. It’s disturbing to realize how much of this history is overlooked. These events didn’t just shape laws and policies—they shaped the identities of entire communities, determining who was accepted, who was excluded, and how people saw themselves in Canadian society.
One of the most impactful parts of this learning experience was reading Obasan. The book is written from the perspective of a woman remembering her childhood in a ghost town where her family was interned. Experiencing history through a character’s point of view made it feel so much more real. The novel also showed how different generations of Naomi’s family responded to their internment. Her elders remained silent about their trauma, while younger family members pushed for justice. This highlighted how identity is shaped by lived experiences—those who lived through the internment firsthand may have internalized shame or fear, while later generations, growing up in a different time, had the freedom to speak out. It made me think about how history isn’t just about events—it’s about the lasting impact those events have on people’s sense of belonging and identity. Even today, we can see how past injustices affect the way people of colour navigate Canadian society.
Here are the notes I did in these classes:
✏️ Skill: Supporting Thoughts
I can use my tools and skills to effectively communicate my thinking for a variety of purposes, audiences , and meaning with well-chosen evidence to support my ideas while maintaining excellent grammar.
After learning about all of these topics, we were assigned to make a smart brevity note about one of them. I was assigned the Komagata Maru. While some of my classmates were not excited to make another smart brevity note, I really enjoy making these and appreciated the opportunity to improve on showing my learning in this form.
Here is the note I made.
I am really happy with what I made, but next time I would like to go even deeper. I think that by using a couple more sources, and spending a little more time doing research, I could have made this even better. Yet another thing to improve is my spelling and grammar. Somehow I forgot to put this through grammarly and it shows. ( I normally make it practice to triple check all my assignments for good spelling and grammar so I’m actually quite disappointed that I forgot to do this as it is such an easy fix).
Finally, the last thing I created for this project was something I made up for myself. Yes. I made up a homework assignment. While on vacation. I guess I was feeling confident.
I was in Vienna Austria and my family took a walking tour (I am planning on making a post of this trip too, so stay tuned!). One of the first things we passed was this memorial (for context the last assignment I should have been doing for this project was designing a building a concept for a memorial based on the event assigned to us and showing all the symbolism).
I created this:
https://poets-find-fp9.craft.me/AmSB3855TESI4c
Originally as I am sure you can tell this was supposed to go over more memorials across Europe, but this was the only one I ran into organically and our days were too busy to try to schedule something else in.
When I reached out to my teacher these were the guidelines I was given:
- What does the memorial symbolize?
- What is the story (that you can find) about the memorial?
- how does the location impact the message of the memorial?
- what apology is the memorial keeping alive?
I am really really proud of this piece of work. By having the initiative to do this on my own, I got the chance to customize my work. I also feel that this shows that I am a person who “Demonstrates enthusiasm and curiosity for learning by picking topics I am interested in when given the choice” (this is from my VMV by the way. I was very motivated to complete this and complete it well, because I was truly interested in my work and didn’t want to disappoint myself by creating something not up to my standards.
Finally, the driving question.
How can we keep an apology alive so the wrongs of the past are remembered—and not repeated—today?
I think that this is very important to think about, especially in the current political climate. As time moves onward, it is important to remember the wrong doings of the past. When we remember something we can learn and reflect from it to make sure that what is wrong isn’t repeated. History repeats itself, yes, but when we are properly aware we can prevent this.
Overall I have found my work decent in this project. It was nothing incredible, but I wasn’t completely a mess. I definitely could have been more organized (because of travel and changing some stuff up, I became very off track especially with reading the book even though I did eventually finish it.
Overall I have found my work decent in this project. It was nothing totally incredible, but I wasn’t completely a mess. I definitely could have been more organized (because of travel and changing some stuff up, I became very off track especially with reading the book even though I did eventually finish it.
I look forward to improving in our last term! Until next time,
Neko