Month: March 2023

Small but mighty: reflection

Hello, and welcome back to another blog post! In our latest project, we got to take a deep dive into the world of microorganisms. We learned about many of the different cells that are in our bodies, the body’s ways to ward off invaders, and the importance of vaccines.

In our first keystone, we went around the school and took a sample of a surface that we believed would have a lot of bacteria. We then placed it in a Petri dish to grow. The point of the experiment was to see just how dirty the school really is, and how quickly bacteria grows.

In the second portion of the project, we looked at the different cells that inhabit our body and keep us safe. We got to make little character cards of all of the cells we learned about, and give them personalities. This one was my favourite of the keystones, as they were easy to make our own. We learned a lot about the innate immune system through this project, in a way that was really interesting.

In the third keystone, we examined the different types of vaccines and how they are made. We got to look at the different types of vaccines, and what exactly they do to help boost your immune system. We made posters with some of the myths that are common when we talk about vaccines. Some of these myths are that vaccines have trackers in them so that the government can keep tabs on you, that vaccines can change your DNA, or that vaccines such as the one for Covid-19 was too rushed so it’s totally ineffective. We looked at these myths and showed that these are just that: myths.

To reflect on the project as a whole, I would say that it was a lot of fun, and I learned a lot of amazing things about the human body. Thank you for reading, and have a great day!

There are a lot of fears and myths when it comes to vaccines, which is a problem with our modern society. Getting sick is something that most people try to avoid, and vaccines are one of the best ways to do that. Some common fears that surround vaccines are that the government is putting microchips into our trackers, or that the COVID-19 vaccine was too rushed, or that vaccines can alter DNA. People who believe things like this have earned a name: antivaxers. Many people are biased against vaccines because of all of the lies that are spread in many ways to the gullible creature that is the human. In short, vaccines were created to help humanity with one of our biggest issues, getting sick, and is not some plot by the government to track or harm us.

Travelogue: An Explorer’s Journey

Hello, and welcome back to another blog post! In our latest project, we looked at the journeys of some early explorers, and wrote a story based on their expeditions. I picked Jacques Cartier, a French explorer who was trying to find a new route to Asia due to an order by his king. I really enjoyed this project because I got to be creative with the writing aspect of it. We also got to create images to integrate into our story, and create a book using the app Book Creator.

The first keystone was different from the second and third, however, in which we created a Viking character card that showed an accurate description of a Viking and showed the differences between the way that the Vikings are portrayed through the media and the way that they actually lived. This project was probably my favourite of the three, as I got to design the Viking and give him a personality. I think that I did a fairly good job of portraying the way that Vikings really lived, as apposed to the myths that have become norms for our modern day society.

Reflecting on the project, I probably could’ve added more detail to my images and worked harder on my graphic design, but in the end I think that it turned out all right.

Here is my book! 

Despite all of the stereotypes that we see about Vikings in the modern era, the Vikings lived very differently from the way that they are shown in the media. One example (and the most obvious one) is the idea that Vikings wore helmets with horns. Although the Vikings did wear helmets, horns were impractical, and pointless.

They may have been powerful warriors who would often burn villages and take slaves, but they weren’t evil. The majority of Vikings were really farmers, who needed money to support their families. They built ships to invade the rest of Europe so that they could claim wealth for their own, not just to kill people and burn their homes.

Most of what we know about the Vikings comes from what was written by the people who were being invaded by the Vikings, and so they are portrayed as savage brutes with axes and shields who would burn towns to the ground and kill everybody! They might as well have been monsters in the eyes of the rest of Europe, who were terrified of being invaded by them. We may not know exactly what the Vikings were like, but we do know that they were still human beings, even if they were skilled warriors who liked to pillage and raid for their own gain.