Well everyone, it’s been a long year, but it’s finally over (almost). Just one year of high school left! Grade 12 will be a crazy year, and (I never thought I’d be saying this but…) I’m actually feeling pretty prepared.

Grade 12 will be a pretty busy year, with trying to get as high marks as possible while working, saving up money for university and applying to universities. But I think I can handle it, I mean I managed to get through grade 11 in one piece. I’m actually kind of excited for it, it should be a fun year.

This year I’ve learned lots that will prepare me for next year. I managed to balance a heavy work load with my job and sports, and only had a few late nights. This year there was a lot going on… for sure the busiest year yet. I was in 8 academic courses (PLP, Chemistry, Biology, Physics, Pre-Calc 12, French and comparative civilizations) along with 2 choirs. Plus I worked almost every weekend, along with some week nights. Some weeks I had as many as 30 hours of work.

The lack of free time I had this year really taught me how to work hard and get stuff done in the little time I had to do it. It has taught me the importance of time management. Obviously my time management skills still need a lot of work, like I need to learn to have less to do, but they are for sure improving. Plus, next year I’m taking two less courses than this year, they may be a bit harder, but I will likely have more time for each course which will be a welcomed change.

Budgeting my time will be very important next year, but I think I will be able to handle it. As this year went on I improved at not procrastinating and using my time wisely, as needed. Next year my skills at that will only improve, so I’m excited to see what I can get done.

Another thing I developed this year to help with school is even more of a love of learning. Ever since I was young I enjoyed learning, but it still sometimes felt like a chore, but this year my appreciation for gaining knowledge has grown so much more. One thing in PLP that helped with this is the openness of the topics. Being told, “do this”, “fill this out”, “answer these questions”, “take this test” isn’t the most inspiring way to learn, but PLP is different and we actually have choice in what we do. This has made me enjoy learning so much more, and it has reflected on all my courses. Enjoying learning helps makes doing school work actually fun, which will help motivate me to do my homework next year.

One really fun assignment I did this year was the my Canada video.

cEHnEHdEH…eh?

It didn’t exactly relate to what we were learning at the time but it was still a relevant assignment. I filled mine with jokes and made it quite personal, which I think helped me practice my skills of making my work seem like my own. I actually enjoyed making it, which made me put in even more effort and be proud of the final product. When you enjoy your project and what you’re learning your final product is a lot better, which is why I think learning how to love to learn is a very important thing I learned this year that will for sure help next year.

Another important assignment this year was the debate. I’ve never been very good at public speaking but this for sure helped me improve a bit.

Well That’s Debatable

The debates helped me practice thinking on my feet and speaking in front of a larger audience than I’m used to. These skills are very important in general, so I think it is important for me to develop them more, but am off to a good start. Thinking on my feet and being confident in front of large groups will help me next year in so many ways, and even more further in the future.

Along with that, this assignment had assigned groups which is always good practice. It’s interesting working with people you normally wouldn’t and it’s always good practice.
One assignment I’m especially proud of is the podcast blog post.

good luck🍀

Maria and I put a lot of hard work into this podcast and it was actually really fun. We got to hear about first hand war experiences from Helmut Lempke and then create a podcast talking about a relevant concept. One thing that we did in this project that was a bit different was not writing an exact script. We wanted our podcast to be more conversational and less formal, so we just had our general ideas and recorded our conversation about them. The lack of a script proved to us how much we actually knew about his stories. It was nice to show ourselves that we didn’t need to write exactly what to say before saying it. It was actually a really interesting and fun way to make a project and I for sure want to make more podcasts next year. I think this project turned out quite well and is a good example of one that I’m proud of.

I’m not gonna lie, I am very nervous for grade 12, and am not sure if I am completely ready, but I’ll face whatever I have to and work hard. I’m excited to see what I can do with what I learned this year, and expand on my skills. If someone asked me if I am ready for grade 12 I’d probably say yes, because that’s what is expected at this age, but I wouldn’t be sure if it was true. Answering the question “Why do you think you’re ready for the next grade level?” showed me that I may infact be. It’s hard to know for sure until the time comes, but for now I’m confident that Grade 12 will be a good year!