It is the season where we get to pitch to our teachers how we have grown as a learner and what areas we still need to improve in other words, the season of mPols. This will be my last mPol ever!

Driving question: What is your learning goal that you want to reach by the end of this school year, and how will you meet it? 

This term we have covered so much so far from Shakespeare (Taming of the Shrew) to horror movies and space monkeys. I have also improved many skills that are transferable to many other situations many of these skills came from the horror unit! 

A reflection from last year:

Reflecting back from last year, one of my goals was to improve my writing and reading skills. To try to accomplish that goal I am enrolled in two English courses, literature and PLP English. So far by being enrolled in these courses has significantly improved those skills and I will keep improving as the year goes on. Another goal I set last year was to manage my time wisely in order to meet certain deadlines in school. This year especially has certainly been the busiest out of all my years at high school but with the tools I learned last year such as time blocking and Things, I am able to keep up on all of my school work this year. 

Of course once you complete one goal it’s time to make another one. All of our projects so far have either been tasks which involve a group or presenting our work. This year I want to work on this year is my communication skills. When I say communication skills it includes aspects such as presentations and getting my ideas across as well as communicating with a vast group. 

The two main projects where I felt my communication was lacking was the horror movie and the significance presentations. However, on the flip side I showed other skills that were also strong throughout these projects.

Let’s start off with the horror movie…

To start off with I am so proud of our class for all taking the project seriously and committing even though we didn’t quite finish the movie. This project was for sure the most challenging project I have done during my years in PLP. The project took patience, organization, leadership, time management and most importantly, communication.

In this project I also stepped out of my comfort zone and took the initiative to apply for director which is something I would never have done in previous years.

Even though I didn’t get the role I was put in a role that you could say was even more out of my comfort zone, writing the script. As I have said in previous years, English isn’t my strong suit however I decided that this role would significantly benefit me in many ways. The script for sure took patience and it taught me the importance of critique and how to take it in a positive way. In this role, communication was key and this is where we “failed”. The lack of communication with our classmates consequently lead to many malfunctions with the script including the ideas. Moving forward, I have certainly learnt the importance of communication and working as a team. We should have communicated and checked in with our class frequently to make sure there were no surprises so everyone was on board. That being said with all these skills are unquestionably transferable to other projects or even future jobs.

The next project I wanted to touch on is our significance presentations. I really enjoyed this project because we had a great extent of freedom and I got to research and learn about the first monkey in space (space monkey). Similarly to the movie, there were highs and lows to this project. I was able to explore Keynote to create an info graphic that represented the significance of the space monkey.

I used images and diagrams to visually communicate my ideas and this part of the project was a success however on the other hand, the verbal communication of this project had room for improvement. With a tight time limit and technical issues which left me with out a script I struggled to communicate all of the main points of my presentation.

To conclude, I am very proud of my self this year for keeping up to date with my school work since grade 12 is a very busy year. I have learned so much so far not just history and English literature but how to work and function as a team. Even though the movie didn’t turn out the way we wanted, I learned so many life lessons during the process and like all projects I will learn for the mistakes. Like all mPOLs we finish off with a discussion question that will help me achieve my goal.

I have learned that communication is the most important skill in life. Moving forward how can I improve my communications skills whether it be  talking to an audience or conveying important information to a vast group?

It is that time of the year again when we present to our teachers how we have grown as a learner. For our Tpols we are required to answer the question, why do you feel you are ready to advance to the next grade level?

A capture of what we have covered this year

A personal twist

Grade 11 has definitely been the most demanding grade so far. Unlike in grade 10 when all of our classes were enrolled with PLP, this year we had multiple other classes as well as PLP.  It was certainly a challenge to adjust to the new course load. However, I think I did a good job with keeping up with everything. This year we have covered a lot from the Civil Rights Movement to the Cuban Missile Crisis.

The Civil Rights Movement project I think had the most impact on me as a learner. We didn’t just focus on the past events, but we connected them to  contemporary and Canadian events. From connecting events through a timeline, you really see the big picture. You see what is getting better and what mistakes have been repeated. Where I live, you could say it is in its own little bubble and this unit made me step outside that bubble and really delve into events that were covered up.  For the contemporary event I was able to relate my thesis to multiple events. I did lots of outside research so I could get find the most evidence to back up my point. I branched out and watched a documentary that was a similar story to Damilola Taylor (our contemporary event).

As well as video making, this year we covered a lot of literature and really focused on our writing skills. This was definitely a skill that I needed to work on…

I think I will start off with a fail attempt of an essay. This was the first essay we wrote of the year. It was an in class timed essay! The essay was based on the all of the ideas we had covered in the Civil Rights Movement. Let’s just say I had basically forgotten how to write an essay. I did not feel confident about my essay at all when I was done. Moving forward, I realized that I should probably practice writing more and I think our teacher realized that also with the class. After lots of practice we wrote our final essay about the unit, ‘The World On the Brink’. 

The world on the brink essay, in my opinion, was pretty good compared to the first essay I wrote. I spent a lot of time researching and organizing my essay. I used the resources our teachers gave us, such the research data bases. I was able to find speeches and documents that I could incorporate in my essay. I even was able to use other events that JFK was involved in to backup my point and how he learnt from previous mistakes. The post I wrote to tie the unit together, connected all of the events we focused on and how they relate to each other. I also made some small graphics to make my post more interesting. 

Finally, I wanted to highlight my PGP progress. In PGP this year we covered a lot!! The biggest take away for me in the course, was how to stay productive and setting achievable goals.

At the beginning of the year we made many short and long term goals. Looking back now I was able to reach some of these goals school related and in my personal life. I think what made me achieve them was by writing them down. I learnt that by writing down your goals, it reminds you everyday of what you are working towards. Even having my dream board visible was a good motivator to try and strive for my goals. In PGP as I mentioned earlier, I discovered many new tools to stay productive. After reading the 7 Habits of Mind, I reminded myself to prioritize and to “put first things first”. This was a good quote for me. With all of the course work and outside school activities I had this year, it was important to prioritize to get tasks done. 

Overall I think it is fair to say that I am ready to advance to the next grade level. I think all my skills from PGP will be useful next year especially for grade 12! I have also really learned how to stay motivated and how to stay determined. Also with my growth as a learner, from writing skills to time management, I think I will be ready for next year.