Welcome back to another great year of learning!

As our second proper PLP project in grade 10, we studied and created memorials to apologize to certain minorities living in British Columbia.  We worked extensively, learning about different aspects of our history and the injustices we imposed on these groups.  Overall, it was a really interesting project, and I learned a lot about British Columbia’s dark history.

Driving Question:  How can we keep an apology alive so the wrongs of the past are remembered and not repeated today?

To start of the project, we had to research about past memorials, and British Columbia’s dark discriminatory history.  Multiple different races, like the Chinese, Japanese, and South Asians were prejudices against throughout the development of Canada.  These different and diverse races all had unfair laws enforced onto them, only due to the colour of their skin.

The Chinese population had multiple discriminatory immigration polices implemented against them.  At first, they started with head taxes, charging a $50 dollar fee every time a Chinese person moved to Canada.  This did not stop them though, which led to a third of the population in British Columbia being Chinese Canadians.  Overtime, they increased the price from $100, $500, and eventually outright banning the immigration of Chinese people.  Not only that, as the European population slowly increased, they were faced with increased racism.

The second population that were discriminated against were the South Asians.  Like the Chinese population, Punjabi people moved over to Canada at around the gold rush.  They came in great numbers, which eventually led to a hate of them.  Since India was under the British commonwealth like Canada, they were unable to outright ban their immigration.  However, the government officials were able to think up a way to stop the immigration of the South Asians.  They implemented the one passage law, making all immigrants only be able to move to Canada if they came straight from their country of origin.  This caused the Indians to be unable to move over, due to them having to transit through either Japan or Hong Kong.

The last major population that were oppressed in British Columbia’s history, was the Japanese.  As World War II started, Canadians slowly came to fear of Japanese people living in BC.  This led to them interning them in different places across the countryside.  Thousands of Japanese loss their privileges and riches, which included houses, boats, and personal belongings.  Not only did they lose them, but the government of BC sold each item off in an auction, making it impossible for them to reclaim their items.  Only 9 years after the war were they allowed to leave these camps, and go back to the beach.

Why would they move to Canada?

At this time, gold was discovered in North America and saw people were able to make a lot of money.  This caused most people saw North America as a “golden land,” they heard of being able to get untold riches if they immigrated over.  The Asians started off in California, and slowly worked their way up towards British Columbia.  Though they were heavily mistreated against, they continued to work in hopes of being able to hit the jackpot.

Research:

https://dodos-win-hw2.craft.me/LiFZ9BQRuvaRFp

What were we creating for our project?

For our project we were tasked to create memorials for one of the targeted groups within BC’s history.  To do this, we worked in groups of three to plan, build and reflect on the assigned group we worked on.  I worked with Daniel and Caden, to create a memorial that reflected Chinese past hardships.

We thought out the idea to create traditional Chinese cut outs that symbolize the push and pull factors of living in Canada with a Chinese person in the middle.  We also encased it in a luggage to show that the Chinese people never were able to fully open up their culture, and that it was still left in their suitcase.  We also added lights to shine through the paper cut outs to make it nice.

To conclude this project, I think that this project went pretty well, and my group worked great together.  We were able to finish our project even in a short time span that we were given.  If I did this project again, I would like to have gotten an interview with someone who has researched this topic, and what there opinion might be.

Thanks for reading

-Chris

Good afternoon,

Welcome back to my blog, this is the second project that I have finished in my grade 10 year.  In this project, we learnt about the significance of Canadian contribution to World War II, and how it shaped us into a nation.  We learnt about our history, and how we may prevent another conflict that could potentially destroy the world.  Enjoy reading…?

Driving Question:

Why is it so important to learn about Canada’s involvement in WWII?

https://www.craft.me/s/Hm8IXMDjQWdYAR

To start of our project, we needed to actually know what happened during the war.  Lots of people died throughout 1939-1945, however, it was mostly civilian casualties unlike the prior war.  The results of World War I heavily influenced and helped lead to World War II, by putting most countries in political turmoil and in an economic depression. These factors helped eventually lead to World War II. With this, the consequences of World War II had a major impact on the world. Military alliances, technology, and wars, are still a result of the Second World War. Along the way, we learned about Canada’s significant involvement in the war, and how it helped the allies claim the victory. To put the knowledge we had learn to the test, we did a set of Kahoots. During this part of the project, I feel like I learn the most, and understand how I will be answering the driving question.

While building our knowledge about World War II was important, we also needed to learn how to write both formally and properly.  We used a type of formatting called the PEE technique, to make sure that we include the necessary information required within each of our points.  It stands for: P, point, E, evidence, E, explanation.  This method gave us a way to fit in all of information.  We also learned about the structure of an essay, and how each paragraph serves a different purpose.

After this, we had to put our knowledge to the test by creating a group keynote presentation on the consequences of World War II, that we would show to the entire class. My group chose the topic of the United Nations, and its consequences after the Second World War.  For this keystone, I worked with Magnus, Kira, and Luca.  I mostly worked on the causes/ founding of the United Nations, and why it came about.  It was formed after World War II, to maintain peace and stability within all nations in the world.  This would also allow each countries power to be monitored and regulated if it need be.  Learning about a specific topic that was a direct consequence really showed the effects World War II it had on the war.  I was now using the knowledge we had gained in the previous keystone to create something.

Before being able to start our essay, we needed to create multiple different ideas to base of our writing.  I came up with multiple ideas, some include the technological advancements made during that time, the causes of World War II, that shows why they were so significant, political/economical changes between different countries after the war, and the affect it had on people living at around that time.

https://dodos-win-hw2.craft.me/HS8pUg75gVvah0

To put our knowledge we had gained throughout this project to the test, we were tasked with creating a five paragraphed essay that covers over a certain topic to do with World War II.  I chose the topic of the causes of World War II, and why they were so significant.  Without World War I or the economic depression, the biggest war in mankind would not have been fought.  Even though the consequences were significant, I feel like these factors are just as important.  I wrote a lot about ideologies, and how the rise of nationalism helped dictators rise to the top.  If you would like to read my essay, click here:

https://www.craft.me/s/HceySlZStQZt2H

To answer the driving question, Canada’s involvement was a major event in our nation’s short history.  This was once of the only major conflicts that we had participated in, and had heavily contributed to the allied victory.  I think that it is important to know about our previous generations sacrifices, and how they managed to prevail with almost no hope.  Learning about our past is also a way that we could prevent another major conflict in the future from happening.

Overall, I think that I did a great job in learning about our past, and how it has shaped us into the world it is today.  However, I feel like my final essay could have been tied more about Canada, and less about Europe.  I found it hard trying to find ways Canada contributed to the start of World War II, which made me not mention it very much in my final project.  To conclude, I believe that I did a great job, but could have improved in some areas.

Good afternoon,

I have been researching about the topic of what the “Canadian Identity” is, and how does it affect us as Canadians.  We did variety of things to boost our learning centered towards this topic.  The core-competency that we covering was the importance of questions and having conversation.  I feel like our final keystone, a human library, really ties in with these goals that we set of to achieve.  This project has been really meaningful, allowing me to uncover what truly makes a Canadian.

We first set of our project by doing lots of research, going into our past and trying to figure out rights, and views then.  We had a really strong belief that we were non-American.  The American media often spills over the border, making our culture and people often very similar.  This made an ad calling us out as “non-American” one of the most popular pieces of media that traveled across Canada.  Next, we learned about hate-crimes rising throughout Canada, and how we could create a fair society.  This led to us making NTK’s (need to knows) relating to women history.  We tried creating in depth questions, in preparation of the research project that we were about to do in the next keystone.  I think that this trial run really helped us learn to make connections between different topics that related to each other.

https://www.craft.me/s/q32Uaw4v0WQV3U

https://www.craft.me/s/nwUCp41xRX6wLJ

After we finished our first keystone, we slowly transitioned into a research topic that interested us, and related to the driving question.  I chose to learn more about the Chinese-Canadians living here, and how they affected the “Canadian Identity.”   I decided to learn about this because I myself am a Chinese-Canadian, and wanted to learn more about our past.  This whole topic made me learn about my history, and how we were mistreated.  Throughout the 1800s, people living in Canada wanted to build an intercontinental railway that connected each coast.  This enormous project would be very hard to achieve with their current labour force, so they decided to look east to find more cheaper workers.  This is when they found China, a large country with lots of workers willing to immigrate to a new country.  During this time, living in China was very tough, if you were not wealthy or high-ranked, you would be treated like dirt.  When they saw a chance too start anew in a different country, they decided to take it.  The company responsible of the building of the CPR managed to save between 3-5 million dollars by doing this.  For my second keystone, I made an entire document that goes into more detail about my topic.

https://www.craft.me/s/k2spiQCIQPViGr

For our final keystone, we were creating a human library.  What is a human library?  A human library is where a person plays the role of a book.  The readers “borrow” this book to have meaningful conversations talking about their past experiences.  A human library aims to create a safe space where people open up too new people.

For this part of the project, we were tasked in finding a “book” and bringing them as a guest in this human library.  The book that I decided on was my mum.  She was a Chinese-Canadian woman who was born in Vancouver, but traveled between multiple provinces living in very small towns.  Her parents would open small Chinese restaurants across the prairies in order to make money.  They eventually settled down in Edmonton, where she studied biochemistry in UOA.  She later moved to a small country called Brunei, located in South East Asia so that she could start up a business.  15 years later, she moved back to Vancouver, where she is living now.

Our assignment after finishing the human library, was to create a reflection journal that answered a bunch of questions.  During the human library, I feel like I was able to achieve a meaningful conversation with the books that I had conversed with.  The conversations I had were all very unique, each person having their own different past experiences.  One of the books I talked to came from South Africa, and how it was very dangerous living during that time.  Here is my reflection journal:

https://www.craft.me/s/BW2PerkvDh3W0I

How does the human library relate to “Canadian Identity?”

Canada’s overall identity is very diverse, we have people coming from all sorts of places.  Our country is like a collage of different places, all living in the same place now.  We were able to see this in action during the human library, different Canadian’s showing their uniqueness.

Overall, this project has been really insightful for me.  You never really think about what the “Canadian Identity” is, until you look at it from an outsiders perspective.  I genuinely enjoyed learning about this, and how we shape our nation.  Next year, I look forward to seeing what the next batch of grade 10’s human library will look like.

Thanks for reading,

Chris

Hey!

For our final project in grade 9, we have learnt about Canada’s history during WWI and how they were significant during it.  Canada was a driving factor that prevented the German army to conquering WWI, they fought and won many vital battles that eventually led to the ally’s victory.  For the exhibiton, we were tasked to create a museum about World War I.  So this project was displayed in the Spring Exhibition 2023.  I hope you enjoy reading about my last project in grade 9!  Hope to see you in grade 10!

The first thing we learnt about was museums, and how it works.  We went to a local museum located in Lonsdale, called Monova.  It showed North Vancouvers history, and was split into different sections like industry, passion, etc.  We learnt to engage our audience with their senses, make exhibits interactive and much more.  For keystone 1, I wrote a bunch of notes and answered questions about how museums work.

https://www.craft.me/s/qneqMf2nUu8H1Q

After learning about museums, we learnt about was famous battles during WWI that Canada fought in.  The Battle of Somme, Battle 0f Ypres, Battle of Vimmy ridge were all significant fights that Canada took the lead in.  They were successful in conquering many areas which had Great Britain and France struggling to deal with.  However, life in the war was not all that good.  In propaganda ads, they portrayed fighting in the front lines, glorious, and patriotic.  You would be “serving your country” with honour.  In reality, it was filled with death and destruction, with diseases that plagued through the trenches.  Life back in Cananda was also difficult, they enlisted “soldiers of soil” to increase farming to send to the front lines in Europe.  Not only that, but immigrants also that migrated into Canada were sent into internment camps.  This resulted in families being separated, people being mistreated and much more.  I took interest in this topic and decided to write my keystone 2 paragraph on it.

https://www.craft.me/s/yM1JUlJYa4czWP

For the final keystone, that we would be presenting in the exhibition, I chose to be in the group “Creation Vs Destruction.”  I feel like this really shows what happened during World War I.  Even though there were a lot of new technology used for destruction, there were also some good items such as radios, plastic surgeries, and others.  I used this idea and created a digital slider to contrast the inventions created during the World War I era.  This allowed it to be interactive and interesting to the audience.    Along with it, I wrote out a bunch of paragraphs, listing out each invention in more detail.

Overall, I quite enjoyed this project, it was fun and interesting learning about Canada’s history.  However, if I could go back and do this project again, I feel like I could have improved my final product (digital slider).  As I mentioned within my tPOL, instead of just making one digital slider, I could have made 4 different sliders, that would each fill the four computers that I had.  I feel like this was a missed opportunity because it would have been a lot more interesting and interactive.   Apart from that, I think I’ve had a really successful grade 9 year!

See you next year!

-Chris

Hello everyone!

This is part 2 of the Revolution on Nation X!  I just finished doing this project and have created multiple different things along the way.  Enjoy!

Driving Question:  How did revolutions bring down empires and change societies around the world?

We started off by doing a simulation on Nation X, we role played as different citizens within a corrupt country and got to choose what we do.  If you are interested more on reading about this, I have created a full blog post on this.  Click here for the full summary.  After that, we reflected on what happened.   When a government is corrupt, the lower-class people will revolt from the royalty.

Brinton Graphic

For our first keystone, we had to create a Brinton Graphic that showed the anatomy of the revolution.  A revolution has 4different stages, moderate (people are not super happy), incubation (the moderates start protesting that is unsuccessful), crisis (the radicals have fully attacked and declared war on the nobilities) and recovery (the nation slowly getting better).  It had to include all 4 stages and other key information that was happening.  I think I did a pretty good job, I added 2 extra stages, setting the scene and conclusion so that it could have more information.

Graphic Organizer

For the graphic organizer, I had to choose a revolution to research on.  I found the French Revolution quite interesting; it included famous people like King Louis and Napoleon.  A couple other people chose the French revolution, Cameron B, Jackson, Mackenzie, Logan and Evangeline.  The organizer was required to include:

• A timeline
• Key figures
• The revolution’s name and date
• Key triggers
• Underlying conditions
• Continuity and change
• Ineffectiveness and effectiveness of the revolution.

We then presented it to our other group members and made changed on advice that was given.

Revolution Trial Video

The last keystone that was part of the project was a revolution video that had to prove whether the revolution was effective or ineffective.  Our group had to argue that it was effective, so we had to bring up points and evidence to back up our claim.  Some of the things we brought up was how Napoleon took control of France and lead many successful military conquests.  We also created an affidavit to plan out arguments inside the video.  Overall, I think that the video we produced was not the best due to the short time span we had.  Cameron B, one of the main roles, also had to leave midway through filming to go to Yukon.  Some parts were also not audible because of the fact that some of us were wearing masks.  The editing could have also been improved in some aspects.

Conclusion

In conclusion, I found this project quite fun, the starting simulation was also one of my favourite projects that we did.  The only thing that I feel like we could have done better was create a better revolution trial video.  However, I am quite proud of all the other work that I created.  I think the graphic organizer and crane Brinton graphic was pretty well made.

To answer the driving question, revolution was a big part of our society.  Many of them shaped the world to how it is today.  Some of the big revolutions created new things to benefit citizens.  In the French revolution, the declaration of human rights and man was created to better the living conditions.  Corrupt governments/royalties would exploit the lower-class citizens and use them for more money, resources and other things.  On top of that, the peasants would usually live in famine and poor conditions.  These are some of the underlying causes for the people to revolt.

Thanks for reading!

-Chris