Know Your Limits, Work Within It

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Knowing your rights as a worker is very important. As young workers, we are at a higher risk of getting injured while working. Here are some fun stats about injuries in young workers.

26 young workers are injured every working day.

1 out of every 24 young men are injured.

One young worker is injured every hour.

In these last few classes, we’ve been learning about the risks that could impact us. Different occupations would have different risk factors. Construction jobs would have different risks than  a job in a kitchen. Both have many different risk factors. 

To show some of the risks, I made a little graphic using Sketches Pro. In this graphic, there are two young workers, and one supervisor. 

You may have seen some issues with this picture, though I’ll take some time to take you through them. The first issue is that the young workers have gear that doesn’t fit them. This could be a huge risk factor, because the exact thing that is supposed to be protecting them could be harmful. Having shoes that don’t fit could make it more likely to trip, and have a severe fall. This would be extremely bad for one of the young workers, who is up on a platform, higher than three meters, without a railing or rigging. A fall from this height could be really detrimental to the young worker. 

And finally, probably the most obvious one, is the giant spill on the floor. It may not be obvious, but it is bodily waste, specifically vomit. This young worker does not have the training to deal with this mess, but still, their supervisor wants them to clean it up. As a young worker, you are eager to please your supervisor. From my experience in the workplace, if my supervisor told me to do something, I would most probably do it. But this specific instance is unsafe. Yo7 don’t know what that vomit could contain, and you could get sick. As much as you want to please, your first duty is to yourself.

The Canadian Experience

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Canada. The wonderful, magical cold land of maple syrup and nice people. The thing is, stereo types aren’t very accurate. Although Canada is diverse, throughout history, and to this day, we haven’t always been very accepting of minority groups. In this project, we learned all about different minority groups, focusing on the Chinese minority in Canada in class, and separate minorities for our project. I’ll get to the main project later. First, we’ll talk about Chinese people in Canada, and specifically in Vancouver.

In the late 1800’s and early 1900’s, there were a lot of Chinese immigrants. The thing was, they didn’t want Chinese immigrants. So they enforced the head tax, where Chinese immigrants had to pay $50, to $100, to finally $500 to come into Canada. Once here, they were limited in location. In Vancouver, the Chinese could only live in Chinatown. It’s horrible to think about how hard these people worked to get to Canada, only to be forced to live in certain areas, experiencing Canada completely differently than any white person would’ve.

To deepen our knowledge of Chinese history, and Chinatown, we started reading a book called Jade Peony by Wayson Choy. The book focused around a Chinese family living in Vancouver’s Chinatown. There were three parts to the story, each told from one of the children’s perspectives. It was a very interesting book, and it was interesting to see the different perspective of someone, even though born in Canada, who was living a completely different life than, well, my grandpa. He grew up in Vancouver around the same time. The lifestyle differences were really crazy, and yet, childhood was still similar. Children playing soldiers, reading comics, the idealized childhood experience. 

Since we were learning all about Chinatown, our teachers thought it would be a great idea to take us to Chinatown. While there, we took a tour with the amazing Judy Lam Maxwell. We got to go into a bunch of really cool historical building, learn about Chinatown’s history, and talk to someone who grew up in Chinatown. While there, we made a podcast. Take a listen!

This podcast was different from others we have done in the past. The goal was to record sounds while on location. I found this very difficult. It was hard to know when to record, and when to be looking around, experiencing Chinatown. Overall, I learned a lot from this experience. The biggest this was probably to record as much as possible. Then, when it comes time to edit, you have a lot more to work with. 

Throughout this project, we’d been focusing on perspectives. To finalize the perspective piece, we had to write a positionality paper. It was basically an in-class essay where we explored how our positions impact our experiences with literature. 

I thought it was a really cool topic, and I had a good time writing it. Probably the most challenging part about it was the tone. It was a formal essay, but because it was kinda personal, we were also writing in the first person, using I. We’ve never done it before, so that was probably my biggest challenge. 

Now, finally, we can get to the project of the unit. As we do in PLP 10, it was a podcast. In groups of three or four, we had to research a minority group in Canada to see how they experienced Canada differently. Our minority group was the LGBTQ+ community. Since that is very broad, we decided to focus on three identities within the LGBTQ+ community, those being Pansexual, Bisexual, and Asexual. We wanted to focus on these groups because along with discrimination outside the LGGBTQ+ community, there is also a lot of discrimination towards these groups inside of the LGBTQ+ community. 

For our podcast, we had the pleasure of interviewing Yvette Narlock, an openly queer person at Seycove. It was an amazing experience, and I learned so much. Our podcast is so much better because of her.

This was a really cool experience. Along with learning a bunch about the LGBTQ+ community, the Chinese community, and minorities in Canada, I also got to work on my podcasting skills. I’m still not amazing at podcasting, and this was far from perfect, but I think it went really well. For the future, I will be really aware of audio levels. Other than that, I’m really proud of our work!

The Future Is Friendly Except It’s Not

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Ever since we were little, people have been asking us what we want to be when we grow up. It’s the big question. Now that we’re in high school, we do have to start thinking about this seriously. One way we have been doing this is by using the tool MyBluePrint. MyBluePrint has a lot of surveys to help you understand yourself. It has really helped me understand who I am, how I learn, and has helped narrow down what I want to do after high school.

There were five ‘Who Am I?’ surveys to take. Although I do not think al of it was 100% accurate, it gave me a pretty good look at myself. The first one was…

Learning Styles

The learning styles survey was very interesting to me. I already knew that I learned better by doing, that is why I joined PLP. It was the other results that surprised me. I would probably say I’m more equal in visual and auditory learning. Overall, this survey was very useful because in the future, I will know how to better my learning. If I can continue to learn in a hands-on environment, I will learn more in the long run. This can also help with jobs in the future. By knowing this, I can choose a job where it is primarily hands-on, and have a better experience over all.

The next survey was…

Personality

This survey was probably one of the most interesting surveys. I’ve seen all over the internet how this specific survey has applied to a bunch of people. It was cool to see what I was, for this survey. As I mentioned before, this might not be 100% accurate, but I thought this was pretty close.

This was really interesting to me. I really thought all of these applied really well. The architect likes to work alone, or in small groups. They also don’t like creative constraints, and tend to jump headfirst into a task. They also are more fair when making decisions, rather than about how people will feel. Knowing how I fit in with others in this personality perspective will help me with projects, in school and outside of it.

Interests

This one is pretty much a repeat of the learning styles, not in its purpose, but in its results. The Contractor interest type helps gear you towards your career,  rather than talk about your learning type. The contractor interest type works hands on, again. They don’t like to work with people, and tend to follow their head. This interest type also leads towards a science-based career, which is something I was considering before all of these surveys anyways.

Knowledge

Knowledge was one of the more surprising surveys. I wasn’t surprised by the results, just the magnitude of them.

Science was the top subject area. As I said, this wasn’t surprising. The thing that was surprising was that I got Science for 100%. As I mentioned before, I was considering a science career beforehand. This survey only cemented my ideas. The other two, languages and language arts, weren’t very surprising either. French comes very easily to me, and language arts is one of my better subjects as well. What I did find surprising was that math, which is probably my best subject after science, wasn’t on there. I don’t know if I would consider math as a career, but it was always an option.

Finally, a most controversial survey (in my mind)…

Motivations

This one was weird. I didn’t like having these pointed out to me, but looking at them honestly, I think they’re pretty accurate. I like to see how the stuff I do adds up. Setting goals helps motivate me towards the end product. Knowing this can help me choose a career where there are goals for me to reach.

Now, back to actual real life stuff. On MyBluePrint, there is an option where you can plan out your high school courses. This was really helpful to me because for most universities, you have to take certain courses to get in. Being able to plan the next two years out makes my life a whole lot easier.

There is also a thing where you can plan for after high school. It gives you lots of options into careers you can go into. For our assignment, we had to choose one from each category; University and College, Apprenticeship, and Workforce. It was cool to look at all of my options!

Workforce

I chose this because as it is probably not something I would actually do, it could be an option. It integrates science and hands on work in the forest, which makes a difference. One of the drawbacks is that it is very socially oriented, working with people all day long. That just seems draining to me. Now, we can move onto another section, which I would be more interested in.

Apprenticeship

Both of these positions are very similar. I have an interest in planes and engineering, so these could be interesting careers. They are not extremely Science-based, but it still has some compatibility. The both would be mostly independent work, with some teamwork, not as bad as the Forest and Conservation Worker. If it were to go into an apprenticeship, these could be very interesting!

University and College

This is probably the most plausible course for me. Ever since I was little, I wanted to go to university. I just didn’t know what to do once I got there. Now, I know I want to do something science related. While that narrows it down somewhat, there are still many different sciences I might be interested in. This would be more expensive in the short term, but long term I should be able to earn more.

There are so many options for my future. Honesty, I don’t know what I want to do. I still have a bit of time, though. Hopefully it won’t go by to quickly!

All of The Lakes

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In this past project, we’ve been looking at linear equations, and how to predict things with them, specifically water levels. Emily and I decided to look at the Great Lakes, and see how they were changing. 

One of the Lakes with the most amount of change was probably Lake Superior, with 0.0583 cm increase each month, when they were taking this data. With that number, we were able to create a graph to show how the water was, and would be, increasing. 

In this project, we used a lot of different curricular competencies, one of the, being…

Model with mathematics in situational contexts.

I used this curricular competency when we were taking the concept of the linear equations, and applying them to a real scenario. Using this real-time data, were were able to create graphical models of what would happen overtime, and the adverse effects this would cause. 

Another curricular competency I used was…

Explore, analyze, and apply mathematical ideas using reason, technology, and other tools.

To make these graphs, we used a tool called Desmos, an app on our iPads. Once we had the equation, it was easy to just input it into the application, and graph it. This visualization in real time made it so you could actually, in real time, see the adverse effects of the rise in water. 

Honestly, who knows?

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We have just finished a math project. The project lasted two weeks, on week on lessons, and one week of project time. I missed the entire first week, because I was at Outdoor School. So I really had to draw upon one curricular competency;

Think creatively and with curiosity and wonder when exploring problems.

I had a problem, obviously. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do. Luckily, it was a parter project, so it wasn’t all up to me to figure out how to do everything on my own and do an entire project. Once we had the structure of the project, I devoted myself to trying to figure out what the heck was going on.

I used Khan Academy, my saviour for anything math or science. I had the project outline, and I knew what I was supposed to know. So I learned, listened, practiced, and figured it out all on my own. After that, the project made a lot more sense to me!

 

Hepatoerythopoetic Porphyria with Dr. A Ward At Provincials!

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Provincials. A time of excitement, anxiety, joy. The finally, of sorts. Anyone can go to regionals, or provincials. Globals is the dream for any aspiring team. Of course, PLP wins most of the stuff, and we don’t go to globals. But for the other teams, provincials is the gateway.

 

Most of provincials, for us, is the improvement aspect. From regionals, we had one big thing we wanted to work on: the Symptomatic. If you saw our regionals performance, or the video in my regionals post, you would know that it didn’t go all to smoothly. Fun times with chemicals. Anyways. That was where we focused most of our energies. That, and memorizing our lines. 

We worked really hard on improving, and I think our provincials score shows that. Our performance, although we had a couple bumps, went super well. We changed hour e order of a few things, just tons of little tweaks. I think we did fantastic!

Our Instant Challenge was another story. It was probably the worst one we’ve ever done. The teamwork was there, but communication and the actual completion of the instructions was, well, trash. If I could go back, I would yell at our team “PLAN. BE PREPARED. READ THE INSTRUCTIONS. DO IT AGAIN!”.

Overall, DI this year was a huge success. Coming first in both the regionals and the provincials was amazing. I am very proud of our team, and how we worked together. Extra props to Morgan as this was her first Destination Imagination ever! It was such a fun time, and I learned so much.

Destination Imagination is always a special time, and even more so at provincials. We’ve had all this time to prepare, and then critique, updates, and bam! Another performance. As it is not plausible for PLP to go to globals, this was our last DI tournament for this year, and probably ever, which is sad, but also fantastic. I’ve learned so much over these three years of DI, including communication skills, time management, and teamwork. I am grateful to have been able to do this amazing tournament, as these skills are a huge part of the workforce I intend to enter. Thanks Destination Imagination, it’s been one heck of a ride!

Hepatoerythropoetic Porphyria with Dr. A. Ward

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Destination Imagination, as much as we complain about it, is a huge stepping stone for us. The skills we have learned, and continue to learn, will be extremely beneficial in the long run. Group management, problem solving, and communication are just some of the skills we explore on this journey. So why not add Dora!

Our group was working on the scientific challenge, Medical Mystery. Basically, one or more person had to have a medical condition, and we had to diagnose it. We also had a bunch of other super specific criteria, which was really hard to work in. But eventually, we came up with the idea for a parody of Dora the Explorer, instead it being Flora the Physician (played by Maggie) with her trusty sidekick Socks (played by Tamara) who was suffering from Hepatoerythropoietic Porphyria (definition in presentation video). It was a long and arduous journey, which we are not yet finished. 

My roles in this were creating one of the team choice elements, and making the double vision. The double vision thing was basically that we had to show two or more different perspectives of the presentation at one time. We decided to make a map to demonstrate this. Then, with a pointer on the map (played by Morgan), Flora would be able to show where they were going. It was a bit difficult to figure this out. We had to paint the map, which went well, but then the paint started chipping and flaking. It took a lot of changing plans, and flexibility to fix this problem. Finally, on the day of the regional tournament, we decided to put clear tape over the whole thing, to make sure the paint stayed. And it worked! We used a lot of tape, but the appraisers loved it. I’m really proud of our troubleshooting abilities, and how we worked till the very last minute. 

My other role, as I mentioned before, was a team choice element. For this, we decided that we wanted ‘homemade looking’ medical badges, as Flora thinks she is a medical professional, but is not. So, seeing as I knew kind of how to hand embroider, that was up to me. They took a long time to make, hours actually, but I made three badges that I am very proud of. It really goes to show how the strange hobbies we all have can add to our solutions!

Although we went through some difficulties as a team, we came out on the other end. I worked with some people I’ve never worked with before, and it was interesting to see how each of us were so different. If I were to do this project again, I think I wouldn’t underestimate some people like I did this time. We also needed to make sure we were all on the same page, as that bit us in the end. But overall, we faired very well, and came in first place. I can’t wait for the provincial tournament!

KABOOM, white!

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Chemistry. There are several different parts of chemistry. Last year, we learned about ionic and covalent bonding. This year, we expanded on that, and looked at how that type of bonding stuff happens. *Cue trumpet music* Chemical Reactions!

In this project, we learned all about the different types of chemical reactions: Combustion, Synthesis, Decomposition, Acid-Base Neutralization, Single Replacement and Double Replacement. In this project, we were spilt into 6 different groups, one for each type of reaction, and studied our chosen reaction. My group was studying double replacement reactions. A double replacement reaction is a reaction where the two positively charged ions in an ionic compound switch places, creating two new ionic compounds! 

To focus are learning even more than the specific chemical reaction, we also had to come up with a driving question. The driving question for our project was…

How Do Double Replacement Reactions Help Doctors With Diagnostics?

We chose this question because we had seen something in the textbook that supported this idea. 

Barium Chloride is a very toxic chemical. But it is aqueous, which means it can be dissolved in water. When this solution, diluted in water, is mixed with Sodium Sulfate, also aqueous and diluted in water, a double replacement reaction occurs. This creates Sodium Chloride, an aqueous compound, and Barium Sulfate, a solid.

This mixture is used by doctors for x-rays. As you probably know, x-rays shine through soft tissue, showing doctors the bone. But when you need a soft tissue x-ray, it’s a bit different. Doctors have their patients drink this concoction just before their x-ray. The barium sulfate blocks x-rays, so you can now do soft-tissue x-rays. 

We presented our findings to the Chemistry 11 class. And honestly, our presentation didn’t go wonderfully. If I were to do this again, I probably would’ve had each task a more group focus, rather than one person do the script, one person do the video, and one person the keynote.

For this project, we were also focusing on curricular competencies. One curricular competency I think this project really demonstrated was  to “Connect scientific explorations to careers in science”. Our group did this by connecting our reaction to the field of medicine. This reaction is used by doctors, and was a huge advancement for x-rays. 

Another curricular competency I used a lot in this project was to “Communicate scientific ideas, claims, information, and perhaps a suggested course of action, for a specific purpose and audience, constructing evidence-based arguments and using appropriate scientific language, conventions, and representations”. I feel as though, even though our keynote may have not been accurate, our language and experiment demonstrated our knowledge of the project.

I also used the curricular competency of “Collaboratively and individually planing, selecting, and useing appropriate investigation methods, including field work and lab experiments,  to collect reliable data (qualitative and quantitative)”. I used this, because a) this was a group project and b) we did an experiment to prove our calculations correct.

Finally, I used the curricular competency of “Useing knowledge of scientific concepts to draw conclusions that are consistent with evidence”. We had an equation, and our hypothesis, but we weren’t sure what was going to happen. As we did the experiment, and studied the equations, we understood how this was a double replacement reation.

Ep. 6 – Abigail Foulds and Frank Ward

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2019 marks the 74th anniversary of the end of the Second World War. Even though that seems like a long time, it really isn’t. We still have people greatly impacted by it in our society, with stories about the harsh time. Through these stories, we were able to determine the Legacy of WW2 in Canada.

This project was the study of World War Two, but also the introduction to a new medium that we will now be using more often: sound. This was a podcast project, the first of many. And as this was a sound-based project, we had to do a lot of prep. In maker, we worked with GarageBand to learn how to make music, and manipulate sound. That was fun. GarageBand can be a bit fickle sometimes, but as with everything, practice makes perfect. 

As an introduction into the unit, we had to come up with questions based on images from world war 2. As a group, a lot of our questions were based around Hitler, which was interesting. A lot of my questions were based around the scientific breakthroughs that occurred during the war. As bad as War is, it always pushes the world further, trying to figure out the next best way to kill each other. 

As I mentioned before, this project was a podcast based upon the idea of the legacy of WW2 in Canada. And what better way to do that than to talk to people who actually lived though the war! Our fearless humanities teacher got in contact with the Memory Project, which put us in contact with people who were alive during the war, wether they were veterans, or lived in Europe through the war. We were then put into groups of 3, where we would go interview the people. I was in a group with Maggie and Daniel, though only Maggie and I were able to actually meet our person. Our person was Abigail Foulds. Abigail lived in Holland during the Second World War, and met her husband, a Canadian medical officer, soon after the war. They moved to Canada and got married. It was an amazing experience to meet her.

I also talked to my grandparents for this assignment. My grandfather was born during the depression, so he lived during the war in Canada. My grandma, on the other hand, was born at the very beginning of WW2 in Britain. She had to be sent away from her home to avoid the blitz, which would’ve been terrifying as a young child. In my podcast, I interview my grandpa about living during the war, sine my grandma could remember much.

Throughout all this project work, we were also having mini lessons about big turning points of WW2. I talk about two of these turning points in a podcast that was a mini assignment.

It was difficult at first using GarageBand to edit all the clips together. Other than the little strange assignments we’d get in maker, we hadn’t done much work with it. But what I’ve come to realize is that it’s basically iMovie, which we’ve worked with a lot. It’s just sound instead of images. I’ve also come to realize that I’m way better at editing sound than I am at editing together images and video. My draft one was okay, but I really had to work on my editing because I kept stumbling over my words and trying to edit them out afterwords.

Honestly, I’ve really learned a lot from this project. It’s probably the work I’m most proud of, like ever. Other than the sound of my own voice, which is hideous and awful. I really look forward to working with this medium more and more!

SLCs the Fifth: Once again, MPols

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This is my 5th SLC, and such, is SCLs the 5th. Now that I have all this experience with MPols and the structure, it is different. Adaptation. Anyways. We’ve started a new course thing called PGP, and through that, we’ve got specific things we need to work on throughout our studies. For PLP 10, they are as follows.

Finding Humour

Applying Past Knowledge to New Situations

Questioning and Posing Problems

Remaining Open to Continuous Learning

And so, I will be telling the journey of my learning through these things! Now, I haven’t really done any focusing on the Finding Humour one, but the rest are there. So, let’s go on to the first one…

Applying Past Knowledge to New Situations

This is a very important thing to be able to use, and to a project in which I think I demonstrated this well was the Trigonometry Project; SohCahToa, the Tropical Trig Island.

The past knowledge that was uses in this project was the circuitry. We learned about this a bunch in Grade 9, and the concept really stuck with me. So for our building, we had actual circuits to demonstrate the use of the solar panels!

Questioning and Posing Problems

Questioning and posing problems is very important for PLP students, as most, if not all of our learning is based around a driving question. Asking questions can help if you don’t understand something, or help deepen your learning. There’ve been two projects this year that this was my main focus. The first one is the Chemistry Unit, which we have only recently started. Chemistry intrigues me, and when we are doing book work and experiments, I want to understand everything fully. So I ask questions, either cementing an observation in my mind, or figuring out new concepts.

Remaining Open to Continuous Learning

Now, this is integral for high school. Because of the curriculum change and stuff, we as students sometimes find ourselves learning the same stuff as before, but in a deeper way. One, not project, but kind of focus in PLP, is video-making. We have made tons and tons of videos, and sometimes it gets a little arduous. This year, we have done many videos, and have been focusing in on refining our skills in our Maker Class. We did this a lot during our Recreation Project; “And Action, Wait, *Thunder* Okay Go”.

For this project, we had to be very technical. Before filming, we had to get all of these different forms in, outlining this story and such. They may seem annoying at the time, but they really help you understand your story. Also with the videos, editing it is a skill I’m still working on. I just am not fully adept in the art that is editing. What I can do is write screenplays, which I have done in several of our group video projects.

Another project, or well, area, that this has come in handy, is the PGP course we’ve started this year in PLP. But the thing is, this isn’t a new concept. From the beginning of Grade 8, we’ve been learning about Growth Mindset *groan* and goal setting. It’s just that this course has really made us accountable for our goals. Not only that, but it has made goal setting clearer to me, and helped me understand what I really need to focus on.

And finally, the project all 10s could refer to for this is the Cray Cray Unit.

The Cray Cray Unit, consisting of 3 big assignments including an essay, a video, and the Winter Exhibition, plus the Seattle Trip, was one of the times this was a necessary asset. We understood the topic so deeply after, and I think that was huge.

That is the biggest part of this, the deeper learning. With all of these skills, we will gain a deeper knowledge of all the topics we work on, something that I don’t think you get from regular school.

And that concludes my MPol!