Hey there loyal viewers, it’s Jason, and today, I’m going to be talking about Take your Kid to Work Day. Now, before I start, for unknown reasons, I could not go to my own parents’ work, so I went with my friend Sam to his parents’ work, which is to sell solar panels.
For take your kid to work day, we were tasked with making a video all about our experiences, as well as making an accompanying post about our process and what we learned, so without further ado, I present to you,
Solar Science
So, on Take Your Kid to Work Day, my friend and I set off to Amray Solar in Burnaby, BC, so learn about solar panels.
The point of my video was to teach the viewers all about the way solar panels work, how they are installed, and how they are distributed. We also had to use our video-making skills to make it look more professional.
So on November 14th, Sam and I arrived around 9:30, and we had a couple of hours to film, interview, and learn. As soon as we stepped in the door, we got straight to work collecting lots of B-Roll (background footage). We also got to experience what a regular day in the office was like, including making many calls and deliveries. Along the way, we were able to snag a few interviews with the workers about the business and the skills required. We also were lucky enough for them to give us a live demonstration.
At the start, we looked around the office a while, although it wasn’t too interesting because all we looked at was people taking calls. The real fun happened when we entered the warehouse. We filmed solid B-Roll there and were able to experience the life of a Solar Panel Salesman.
After shooting B-Roll, the office workers approached us and asked if we wanted a demonstration. We (obviously) said yes. This was a great opportunity for our videos to show a live demonstration os the true power of solar panels. We were getting 14 volts in cloudy weather, so imaging what we would have gotten in the sun!
After that, Gary, one of the employees, graciously let us interview him an ask a few questions, mostly about the company itself, How day-to-day operations go, and what skills are required for the job.
Alright, without further ado, here’s the completed video!
Eyyyyyy, what’s going on. Once again, it’s Jason, and I’m back with yet another SBC post.
Today, I’m taking a dip in the pool known as science. In this week’s challenges, we had to choose scientific topics and do a bit of research on them. If you know me at all, you probably know that imma pick something unnecessarily advanced, and something that has to do explosions. Let’s take a look at nuclear reactors!
So, nuclear reactors take usage of something called nuclear fission to power them. Nuclear fission is when an unstable type of atom or element, such as plutonium or uranium (the usual stuff), has its nucleus ripped in half. I kid you not. In case you didn’t know, the nucleus is the centre of the atom. Here’s a diagram:
Uranium, for example, is incredibly unstable due to an unbalance of protons and neutrons (the stuff in the nucleus). When the nucleus splits, energy is released and can cause many chain reactions, which is why many of the atoms are complied together. That’s how nuclear energy is released. However, nuclear fusion is when two halves of a nucleus are combined. This is capable of producing a ton of energy, but is incredibly hard to harness, which is why it’s better to stick to fission. If my text is hard to understand, here’s a few videos about it.
The reason I picked these topics was simple. I wanted to figure out how nuclear reactions and fissions worked. Nuclear energy is often talked about, but not a lot of people actually know how it works. Also, I’ve also been a huge fan of Mr. Burns from The Simpsons.
Now, I’m also required to make a little quiz about nuclear fission and fusion, so I’ll make a little “two truths and a lie” below. However, I’m going to tweak that a little bit. It is now: 6 truths and 3 lies. The rules are simple. I have listed 9 facts below. Pick out the ones you think that are lies. Check the answer key below afterwards for the answers. Once again, as I said on my emoji quiz, please don’t cheat.
1: Nuclear fusion is used in reactors.
2: Atoms are made up of protons, electrons, and neutrons.
3: Uranium and Plutonium are commonly used as they are unstable.
4: Stability depends on the number of neutrons and electrons.
5: The nucleus is the centre of the atom.
6: The nucleus is made up of proton and electrons.
7: Nuclear fission is when the nucleus is ripped apart.
8: Nuclear fusion is incredibly hard to harness.
9: Mr. Burns runs the nuclear power plant and has an assistant named Smithers.
Alright. Ready for the answers?
are you sure?
better not be cheating!
Ok. The answers were (drumroll) numbers:
1, 4, and 6!
Get them right? Good job I’d you did, or didn’t. I hope you learned something, and if you didn’t, you’re either some sort of genius or I’ve failed.
In this project, we made little videos about events that we were attending. In my case, I have no social life so I just made my own live event. Ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you, the N.V.S.R.N.P.M.L.P.P.T…… I think.
Since I have a ping pong table in my house that I never use, I decided to make good use of it. I hosted a ping pong tournament, but with only 2 other people. Turns out the time limit was 2 minutes. I had actually had a ton of good stuff planned. I had a big headset and a sports broadcast of sorts between my 2 competitors, but didn’t have enough space.
So, I did the best I could with the footage I had and cranked out this video. I tried to utilise all my iMovie skills, Ken Burns, speed changes, music (non-copyrighted) downloading and whatnot. So, I hope you enjoy!
Wow, what a shocking outcome, eh? That ending really surprised me. Dang. Well, I guess that’s it. This video taught me a lot of new skills and it was really fun (and also very frustrating) to film.
These are the very questions that have plagued our generation for all of time. Today, I’m going to settle these questions once and for all. I’m Jason (or am I?), and today, I’m going to be attempting to get the public opinion on these tough questions.
As you may know, I’m currently tangled up in a little something called the Student Blogging Challenge. Every week, I complete a set of tasks. For this week, the theme was getting to know your audience and their differences/similarities. As I read the challenges, I thought to myself, what better way to get to know your audience than to divide them up based on their personal opinions.
I’ve gone and created a few google forms to help answer this question, the first of which being about you, my loyal fans.
Ok. Hopefully you’ve filled out all the forms so that I can better understand my audience. That’s it! If you haven’t filled out the forms yet then please do. Thanks for everyone that did. Alright. Bye.
Now, if you’ve read my posts, you’ll know that I do not use emojis very much. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever actually used an emoji in my blog ever. Well, today that’s all going to change, for I, Jason Guan, am going to post my first ever emoji into a blog post. Are you ready? Here we go!
Believe it or not, the laughing/crying emoji is actually the most commonly used emoji in the world. I know several people (including myself) who are prone to using this emoji. This emoji is also one of my favourites.
To get into the emoji spirit, I’ve created a little guessing game, kind of like charades, about famous movies. Please don’t cheat as that just ruins the game. I hope you enjoy!
Hey y’all. It’s Jason and it’s your lucky day as it is now time for yet another Student Blogging Challenge post. This post is gonna be about one of the biggest issues about image usage: Copyright.
In this post, I’ll be covering how to use images that are protected from copyright and I’ll give you several ways to do so. Let’s get started.
#1: Using your own image
The easiest way to bypass copyright is just to use your own image. Take your own photo or draw your own image. For example, if you’re doing a post on the history of lights, then the easiest way is just to go and take a picture of the lights in your house for this post.
Perhaps you consider yourself a skilled artist (I am not). If you would like, another easy way is just to draw your own image.
#2: Creative Commons
Another option for people who aren’t the best at photography or art, try Creative Commons.
Creative Commons is pretty much non-copyrighted Google Images. Yeah. Mind blown, eh?
Using Creative Commons for images is incredibly powerful as it searches several different royalty free photo websites using your keywords. It’s my, go-to for image usage as I’m terrible at drawing and there’s nothing interesting for me to take pictures of unless I’m on a school trip.
Well, I guess that’s it. I hope you’ve enjoyed this post and more importantly, that you’ve learned something.
Guess what? I’m back! After a short 2-3 month break, I’m back with what might be my biggest post yet. In this post, I will be documenting the horror that is known as Destination Imagination (DI). So, without further ado, wait, I want to clear something up. Despite the negative representation that you might assume from reading this first paragraph and title, just know that I mean these things in a kind, supportive, constructive criticism-esque way.
So, I’ll start by explaining what the actual hel.. heck DI is. Destination Imagination is a contest in which teams of 3-7 children and youth compete various challenges. There are 5 main types of challenges. Technical, Engineering, Scientific, Fine Arts, And Improvisation. In our class, they sent us google forms for what kinds of challenges we wanted to do and I was put into the scientific challenge. Here are some brief summaries of the various challenges available this year. Also, I’ve embedded some DI YouTube videos in this post, so feel free to watch those as well.
Technical: Maze Craze: Teams will create a small RC vehicle capable of entering a randomly selected maze and retrieving an item. They will then create a story for the traveller and act it out while operating the traveller.
Engineering: Drop Zone: Teams will create a freestanding (capable of standing by itself) structure made of cork, wood, and glue. It will be tested with many weights and the team will also have to create a story based around the structure and the dropping of weights.
Scientific (The best one, obviously): Unlikely Attraction: Teams will create an amusement park attraction and a story about the attraction operating in an unlikely location. The location must be someplace attractions would not commonly be found.
Fine Arts: Change Of Tune: Teams must create and rehearse a full musical comprising of song, dance, and an unforgettable event called the spectacle. My guess is that the spectacle should probably be a good surprise and child appropriate, so….
Improv: TREASURE: Ok, so the reason I typed treasure in all caps is because the kids in the video seemed really excited for this one, and I mean REALLY. Anyways, Teams in this challenge will have to research many historical explorers and cultural treasures in order to be prepared, because on the day of the performance, they will be randomly given 2 explorers and a cultural treasure to create an improv show with. They will also receive a randomly picked setback that they will have to work into their play. Also, all they get in terms of props is a white sheet, so some real spooky ghost opportunities there, just sayin’.
Also, every team must do an instant challenge, in which teams are randomly given a challenge and they must think up a solution on the spot.
Now onto our Story. First, we were put into teams. I was grouped up with Fraser,Luciano, and Kyle. We then brainstormed some ideas for what we were going to do. We decided on our attraction being located on Phobos, a moon of mars. The idea was for the ride to curse people that rode it because Phobos is the Greek god of fear. Our initial main ride idea was for this big, weird, mechanical bull spring toy UFO thingy that would just make me look like an idiot if I tried to explain it. I’m not an idiot, right? Right? Come on, someone back me up here! Anyways… we hit a huge speed bump midway through planning. Amazon unfortunately does not sell large springs like you see under every cartoon vehicle’s seat. This is another instance of cartoons blatantly lying To is as kids, right in front of our little gullible faces. After, that whole ordeal, Fraser came up with the idea of making a rocking horse type contraction and making it look like a UFO. Also, we came up with possibly the greatest team name of all time, The Space Cows.
About 2/3 of the way through, we started construction. And boy, did it take a long time. At first, we had to do the measuring, which was maybe 40-45 minutes of absolute, pure, 100% concentrated agony. Then we did something fun. Cutting things with power tools. Unfortunately, nobody trusts me around power tools, and with good reason, so I pretty much acted like a human paperweight.
After that, we all met up again to finish screwing it together and again, I still cannot be trusted with power tools. After that, the other members went and put some cardboard all over it to give it a rounded shape. Finally, we met up for the final time and put silver duct tape all over it to make it look pretty. Here is a timeline compilation to the tune of the Rasta Man himself, Bob Marley.
After all of the hardship, the pain, and all the moments that would have made the average man give up, we persevered thr- you know what, I can’t keep this up for much longer. It wasn’t that bad. Anyways, t’was DI Day. Although emotions were swirling that day, we had one common thought. No one wants to go to school on Saturday. Also, I WILL CRUSH ANY OTHER TEAM THAT TRIES TO TAKE US ON UNTIL THEY ARE NOTHING BUT A LOSING PILE OF DUST! *clears throat* Sorry about that. That was my suppressed rage talking. We all had 1 common goal: To take that W. And (spoiler alert), that’s exactly what we did. That’s right, we WON! I’d like to think my- wait, what? There’s still provincials? Regionals was just a warm up? Wow. Way to crush my happiness, inner me. Anyways, it was pretty nerve-wracking, having to go 2 hours after the opening ceremony. Also, I just was to say, Regionals were chaotic. Feelings were flying, and so were some of the props after the people with the flying feelings got to them. We really had to rush the paint jobs and I think we still did a good job.
That’s Kyle, by the way. I’d link his blog again but I’m too lazy. The link is somewhere up there. If you look hard enough. After the preparation, we were put through an intense line of questioning such as: “do you have any fireworks” and “are you carrying any fire extinguishers”. Not long after that, it was showtime. We put on a great, Oscar worthy performance, even though critics say my back was turned for 1 minute. Anyways, we brought the gold back to Seycove and now we’re ready. Provincials, here come the Space Cows!
