BLOGE

Ok so its the time of the year for another

pole!!!

However there are no M’s only T’s

welcome to my

TPOL!!!

(that was supposed to be all dramatic) anywho let’s get started

The big question is.

“Why do you feel you are ready to advance to the next grade level?”

To be honest I really don’t think I am ready to advance to grade 9 but I’m willing to embrace any challenge that comes my way, although homework could be a difficult one because I’m struggling with it right now. But I’m hopeful that with the support of LAC again and my teachers I will be able to achieve a better mind set and more independence.

Ok so in the idea of moving forward, I first want to reflect on what I think I have done Well this year.

After a year of using my iPad for all my learning I have learnt the ropes of showbie, Basecamp and a great deal of other apps. The apps I enjoy the most are sketches pro and super impose x

From my mpol I identified several projects that I feel I worked well on. I will review these again and then add in areas that I feel I have improved in since then.

I was proud of my Laser light show in scimatics

(you can read more about this here https://www.blog44.ca/cadeno/2022/01/30/lllllaaaaaaaassssseeeeerrrrrssss/..) 

I was proud of the fact that I fixed my groups project when it wasn’t working properly. I redid the calculations while my group looked at other projects and fixed it. I was proud that I kept preserving to get a good result and make it work. Here is a picture of the fixed laser show. 

In addition since February in Scimatics I am proud of the scratch game I made. Although it wasn’t a very fun game I am still proud of the skills I learned while developing it. These include, learning how to make a clicker game with coding and importing graphics that I had drawn into the game. 

Here is my scratch game and you can try it if you want.

I also feel I have written a good story for my comic book on viruses. It reflects the true story of when I had meningitis when I was 8. Having researched this topic I feel that I have gained a new understanding of the disease. Once I read up on it I started to think that I may have some of the long term side effects of this illness including difficulty concentrating, anxiety and sleep issues. 

We haven’t done maker since February but I really enjoyed this class. I was proud of this a picture I produced during the constructive creative communication project. It captured the mood I was given and showed good editing skills as well as colour, texture and use of light. I got a rainbow for it.

This was how it turned out.

I like the dark edges that are blurred in contrast with the bright colours and the comedy of the emoji. Also my teacher said I did an exemplary blog post on this project. You can read it here. 

https://www.blog44.ca/cadeno/2021/12/02/make-not-take/

I miss the maker photography work 

Humanities

In the first part of the year I really enjoyed studying the book “the Outsiders”. I think it was an intriguing story with great characters and many plots twists and turned. The element of this project that I am most proud of was the tableau performances that my group produced for the winter exhibition.

Since my mpol the humanities project I think I have done best in is new beginnings. Although I haven’t handed my work in on time I feel I have gained a better understanding of settlement in Canada and the impact it had on the indigenous population. I do however feel I did better in the first half of the year in humanities than in the second because I feel I have lost focus.

I will now talk about where I could have improved my learning this year

Areas of my learning I could have improved in schematics since the mpol is the ultimate design challenge. Although I enjoyed using Tinkercad to design my lunchbox and I think I did a good presentation ( you can watch it on my blog here https://www.blog44.ca/cadeno/2022/05/26/trangles-and-squares-and-cylinders-and-cubes-and-cuboids-and-prisms-and-tinkercad-and-oh-my-god-i-am-kinda-just-rambling-because-i-cant-really-think-of-a-good-name-so-here-we-are-and-i-should/) and understood all the math, I had already learnt it in England. I did not a make a good blog. I found that part uninteresting. I didn’t feel I learnt a great deal in this project as all the math involved I already knew from grades 5,6 and 7 in England. I didn’t really understand why we had to find a large surface area, it’s seemed pointless, therefore I didn’t engage in reflecting on this work.

In humanities I feel I have worked relatively well in class but have not handed my work in on time very well, usually it was late and somethings I did not complete it. I feel currently I have issues with concentration. I can’t seem to focus on what I’m supposed to be working on and I don’t really know why. 

At the end of the last mpol I stated -Going forward I think I need to get better at making my ideas heard, focusing my time more, doing my homework on time.

Having written this blog I feel I have not completed my homework on time as much as I should. The focusing my time has not really changed however, I do feel I am now more able to get my ideas across and heard within a group and class.

I am hoping that maybe in grade 9 I improve my learning capabilities 

Thanks for being here

Sighing off is caden bubye 

NOT!

So basically we studied the renaissance but I wasn’t there for most of it as I went on holiday to England to visit my Dad. Whoop Whoop. In case you didn’t know my mum and I live in Canada and my dad lives in England. So I thought I’d write a blog combining the renaissance and my trip! So you can see all my great holiday snaps!

This is a picture I took of Shakespeare which was graffitied on a wall near the New Globe theatre on the South Bank in London. Shakespeare was swag during the renaissance and wrote a ton of plays which Queen Elizabeth the 1st liked. He also invented the word ‘Swag’.

Did you know he built the Old Globe Theatre which was actually not in the same place as the New Globe – the New Globe is a replica of the one Shakespeare built in Shoreditch (which is like 10 minutes away in the car).

This is Tower Bridge, it was built after the battle of Hastings in 1066 – it was built before the renaissance. There are a few buildings in London that were built in the renaissance that are still standing one in Greenwich, one in Westminster and St Paul’s church in Covent Garden.

This is Stonehenge it was built waaaaaayyyyyy before the renaissance.

This is me and my best friend Raph in the arcade – arcades didn’t exist in the renaissance – they had fun by going to plays, betting on bear and dog fights and reading things printed with the newly invented printing press and painting ceilings in chapels. I think arcades are way less cruel and safer.

This is my Grandma – she assures me she was not around during the renaissance – I have my doubts!

This is me riding the pirate ship at Chessington World of Adventure – pirate ships did exist in the renaissance – the Spanish Armada came in ships like this to attack the coast of the UK but failed.

This is me at the theatre watching Les Miserables – its set in the French Revolution which happened not long after the renaissance in the 1700s in France. It was sad and poggers. Most people cried but I bled ( giant nose bleed 5 minutes before the end!)

This is me having tea with the Queen – She is Elizabeth II, her name sake Elizabeth I was queen during the renaissance. This is me with Raph’s Grandad – he wants to cut my hair – he was definitely alive during the renaissance!! (Joke I love Raph’s grandad). If you ever figure out how to get onto the internet then HI!!

This is me and my friend Raph – we are stupid – a bit like the fools who entertained the royal court in the renaissance but way cooler.

Anyway thats the highlights of my holiday….

So I did do a bit of work too –

I learned that the renaissance was full of change but also cruelty. Religious figures were very powerful but often corrupt. I learnt there were some cool inventions like parachutes and the printing press and that’s when Shakespeare did his thing in London and Stratford upon Avon. I also learnt about medical progress and wrote this paragraph and made the tryptic.

Renaissance Medicine

In this paragraph I will discus how research into medicine during the renaissance shaped modern medicine as we know it. During the renaissance, several people made a significant impact with their work on medical studies and anatomy research but few brought about change in their own lifetimes. Between 1400-1600AD medical research was untaken in a way that had not been seen before. Through the recording of dissections of cadavers, people like Leonardo DaVinci, Vesalius, William Harvey and Ambrose Pare made many discoveries that would have significant impacts beyond their lifetimes.  

Without the research undertaken by these, scholars and physicians much of modern medicine would not have been possible, they paved the way to a greater understanding of human anatomy and offered insightful ideas that were later developed by other doctors to build the phenomenal medical knowledge we see today.

In the early renaissance several scholars including Linacre, Erasmus, Leonicello and Sylvia’s began scholarly discussions about human anatomy which opened the door to the creation of the London college of Physicians in 1518. However, it wasn’t until the mid renaissance that significant long term works were produced. In 1543 Vesalius used the newly invented printing press to publish a work called a “Human Factory,” which detailed human anatomy on a new level and described surgical procedures undertaken on dead bodies. Ambrose Pare, a French field surgeon, used first hand experiences during the war to introduce the concept of forensic pathology and William Harvey at the later end of the period discovered general circulation and made significant contributions to the understanding of cardiovascular anatomy. Leonardo DaVinci also documented over 200 pages of anatomy.  

As a result of this research many medical advances were possible, surgical techniques were developed, doctors had a greater understanding of elements within the body, the door to further medical research had been opened. Paracelsus discovered chemical and mineral balance within the blood and in the late 1600s bacteria was looked at under a microscope for the first time, leading to vaccination. The revolutionary thinking and discoveries of the renaissance began the snowball of discoveries that are the basis for modern medicine. 

In February me and my besties (class) went on a learning advance to a place called Loon Lake near Maple Ridge in BC. We travelled by bus and spent 4 days learning both in and outside. The trip had its ups and downs but I leant a lot along the way. 

Here is an ebook I made about the trip. One of the hardest things to do in this book was to add pictures because I was having fun on the trip and forgot to take many! So I got some from my friends. 

The 4 day trip was tough for me as I find being away from home difficult but after a wobble on the first night I changed to a quiet room with my friend and managed to stay for the full 4 days which I’m proud of. 

On the trip we did nature walks, worked in a large classroom doing DI with everyone together – this was challenging. We also learnt new skills like archery when we played battle archery – working as a team was important for this activity but also the whole trip. I got to know some more people from Seycove and enjoyed the evening entertainment. Most of the food was also pretty good. 

What was different from school I hear you ask? Well, not much accept we got to have LOTS OF FUUUUNNNNN!!! And we had to stay up until 10pm, pass out, then wake up for 7am. 

I’m guessing you’re wandering What did I learn? NOFINK! Just kidding – I learnt about my class mates, the wondrous outdoors and the renaissance but most importantly I learned about myself. I miss my family while I’m away but I can still have fun.

What did you achieve random kid on the internet, I hear you say? My team won battle archery against the grade nines! I told my team some good strategies for keeping in cover and we shot with good accuracy. 

What would I do differently next time, was that your question? Next time I would have been clearer with the teachers how important being in a quiet room with Judah was to me with all my difficulties being away from home and I would take more pictures so writing my blog will not be so hard!!!!

Ok so there’s this thing called the Mpol at my school and dude I am soooooo nervous. But hopefully I do well. You might be thinking

”why are you tellingme this random child I found on the internet”

and that reason I don’t really know but i’m required to do this by my school soooooo here it is.

At the start of my year at high school I was pretty chill as I’d been to high school back in England ( in England you start school in grade 7) but when i got there it was very different as I am in PLP which is very different to normal school.

There was an upset in the system so I did not get any of the apps required to have at the beginning so this was a problem for the first lesson but only the first lesson.

Now I had these very important apps.

Basecamp. 

This is the home base of all info , what we are learning, why we are learning things, different projects we are doing, and a lot more.

Showbie.

Showbie is where you hand in all of your work and assignments are posted.

So now we know about the start off the year let’s move a bit further.

The first exhibition was a presentation evening where the parents visited school, walked around listening to iPad presentations from their own child and others and then offered feedback on what they did well and what they could improve on. This went quite well even though everyone was expecting to flop. I made a post about it so go check it out at My maker experience also I have a video of the presentation I showed so here it is (warning it’s cringe) it was my first one!

Now onto our first humanities. We did a whole project on advertising which was surprisingly fun.        What we had to do was make an add in our groups for our assigned business. My group got Honey doughnuts. If you don’t know what Honeys is it’s a doughnut shop in Deep Cove in North Vancouver. Here’s a link to there website. https://honeydoughnuts.com/  

Now I feel like I didn’t do great in this project because I didn’t really feel able to express my ideas as it felt like one person in my group was taking over and squashing any ideas that they didn’t have or like but I think our poster turned out pretty good. Here it is …

From this project I took away the need to express myself more and ensure that the whole group works together to complete things – its still a work in progress for some people I’m trying more to have my ideas heard. I had a similar issue with my Scimatics board game where I listened to partner and what they wanted as they were my friend even though it wasn’t what I wanted and so our game ended up being very restricted as they wanted to basically do a version of snakes and ladders and not invent our own game. I would make my own choice next time.

Ok so I’m not going to go on about all the projects we have done this last 6 months I’m now going to share some more specific elements that were highs and lows of my learning.

SCIMATICS 

So what I am most proud of is my Laser light show. (you can read more about this here https://www.blog44.ca/cadeno/2022/01/30/lllllaaaaaaaassssseeeeerrrrrssss/..) I’m most proud of the fact that I fixed my groups project when it wasn’t working properly. Our group worked well on the whole but there were a few issues with the calculations that were made and the laser did not line up properly to make a triangle. I redid the calculations while my group looked at other projects and fixed it. I was proud that I kept preserving to get a good result and make it work. Here is a picture of the fixed laser show.

The element I’m least proud of in Scimatics, as I mentioned before, is my board game. I didn’t express my ideas or thoughts so I ended up making a game that I wasn’t engaged or interested in, that was boring and had no way of being creative. We should not have based our game on an exiting game and invented a new one. I had a lot of ideas for a game that could not be used and wish we had done it differently.

Humanities 

I really enjoyed studying the book “the Outsiders”. I think kit was an intriguing story with great characters and many plots twists and turned. The element of this project that I am most proud of was the tableau performances that my group produced for the winter exhibition. I think my group worked really well and we planned and delivered clearly our scene on the evening and I did well playing Marcia.

The element I think I could improve most for this project and (others) is my blog post – I need to not just say what we did but also explain better what I learnt.

Also for humanities I enjoyed our poetry project and think I produced an engaging ebook with some clever poems. Also I think I did very well well on the test. Here is my ebook

Maker 

The thing I’m most proud of is a picture I produced during the constructive creative communication project. It captured the mood I was given and showed good editing skills as well as colour, texture and use of light. I got a rainbow for it. Here it is.

https://www.blog44.ca/cadeno/2021/12/02/make-not-take/

I think what I could have improved the most was the first keynote presentation I did. I didnt really put much effort into making it fancy or imaginative although I think I presented reasonably well.

Going forward I think I need to get better at making my ideas heard, focusing my time more, doing my homework on time.

So this project I got to use frikin lasers.

And I know what you might be thinking random person on the interweb

“wElL tHaT dOeSn’T sEeM sAfE fOr A kId To Be DoInG. yOu CoUlD bLiNd SoMeOnE.”Most of us probably know that so it will not stop us.

Anyways lets jump on right in to the rest of the blog post.

First of all we needed to make a project start mind map to plan out what questions we had and our thoughts on what they (lasers) are. We wrote examples of what we knew and how they are used. This is how mine looked.

Then we edited it at the end of the project which is now when I’m writing this post but I’ll show that to you later.

Next we did a TOOOOOON of workbooks and textbooks but I’m not gonna bore you with all that, so I’ll put some of them here but you don’t have to read them.

From this we learned about different uses for lasers but more importantly we learned about the law of reflection. If you want a super in depth understanding of it then look it up but here is a brief explanation. With pictures of course.

So the law of reflection basically is all light travels in straight lines. The light that travels towards a surface is the incident ray. When the incident ray hits the surface the normal ray is at 90 degrees. What ever angle the incident ray hits the surface in relation to the normal it’s reflective ray bounces off at exactly the same angle in relation to the normal. That is called the reflected ray. See diagram below.

Next we did the law of reflection lab where we tested our understanding of the law and proved it with an experiment. During the experiment we had a laser, paper, pencil and mirror. We placed the mirror on the paper and drew the normal line. Then we shone the laser onto the mirror and recorded the incident ray and the reflected ray. We then measured their angles in relation to the normal line to see if they matched – guess what? They did!

Then we did a TOOOOOONNNNNNNNNNN of math workbooks which taught us Pythagorean theorem. Which basically is that the sum of the square on the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares on the other 2 sides. A squared + B squared = C squared see diagram below. This also meant we knew about how to calculate missing lengths and  angles in triangles.

Next we used a laser simulator, to make a right angled triangle that was a Pythagorean triple and proved the law of reflection and Pythagorean theorem.

We were then able to use all this understanding to create group laser displays. We designed and made a board using mirrors that when they were set at the correct angles the laser light bounced off to create a triangle. We chose a space theme for our background here is our making process.

Finally to review the curricular competencies.

Competency 1 – I think I worked well in class and with my group and completed all tasks.

Competency 2 – I think both my simulator and law of reflection labs, as well as our final project show that I am able to understand all the steps in an experiment and follow them in a scientific way. I can draw conclusions and make precise calculations and measurements and when at first my groups laser did not work I was able to recalibrate the angles and adjust the mirrors accordingly.

Competency 3 – I think i contributed to my group well and even though there were some errors at first we were able to correct them and produce a great laser display.

Ok so lastly back to that mind map I showed you at the start with some added info! Enjoy