So normally at the end of the year we have to do an SLC. This year we apparently don’t have to do one! Yay! However, we then got told that the SLC had been replaced by a TPOL – a Transitional Presentation of Learning. So here I am trying to reflect on my PLP9 year…

The Good Stuff

Video Production

The big theme for this past school year was having almost all the projects be videos. I figured this would suit me well, as I thought I was already pretty good at making videos as I had been doing them for a long time. On reflection at the end of this year, I feel like my old videos aren’t nearly as good, as I have learned a lot and my video production has improved drastically.

For my first Blue Sky in Grade 8 I made a video about the Star Wars special effects. When I compare that video to the video I made for the Frankenstuffies project at the end of Grade 9 there is a huge difference. This year I learned a lot about how to plan my videos ahead of time, including storyboarding, and also how to effectively edit videos to ensure that they are interesting and fun. I have always been very good at using iMovie, but throughout this year I also learned more about using Adobe After Effects. I enjoy working with these more advanced tools and one summer project I have in mind is to learn more about video production with Adobe Premier Pro.

From this year the videos I’m most proud of are:

Seattle We Are 12

Buzz Lightyear Disney Ride (Florida)

Frankenstuffies

Writing

Prior to this year my writing was still one of my weakest points and something that I found very challenging. This year we did a couple of formal essays along with a fair number of impromptu writing assignments. I feel like this repetition made a big difference to my writing ability. This makes sense to me as I can see the same practice effect on my writing that I get through baseball or hockey drills. Mr Featherstone gave me a lot of good feedback and very effective critique that really improved my writing. Prior to this year I tended to write only the minimum amount required and found producing writing tiring. I realized how much I had changed, when we were sprung with a pop essay on return from Florida and I had no trouble completing a well written essay in the time assigned.

I am happy with this improvement in my writing as I can now write much more quickly and effectively. I know this is a key skill that I will need throughout the rest of my education.

Innovation

One of the reasons I like PLP is that we get to chose our own directions. I have always enjoyed trying something new and attempting to be very innovative. I have challenged myself all year to come up with original ideas for presenting my work and have noticed that quite a few things that I have done have been “imitated” by my classmates. The first example of this was having my iPad in a window of a poster board at the first Grade 8 exhibition. Even though this was last year, at the recent summer exhibition there were still lots of classmates that used this strategy.

In terms of innovation this year I am particularly happy with the scorecards for fitting revolutions to Crane Brinton’s theory, the Steampunk sports blog post and using Mockingbot to create a fully interactive mock-app for the winter Blue Sky project. The good thing about all these examples is that I had a lot of fun doing them. I definitely enjoy my work when I feel like I am doing something new and original.

Crane Brinton’s Revolutions

Steampunk Sports Blog

Harry Potter Mock App  

The Bad Stuff

Reading

Here we are at the end of grade 9 and I have to admit that I still don’t really like to read. I did much better this year with reading the class assigned books and was happy that my novel worksheets were pretty good. However, I still don’t chose to read for fun and I can tell that this is holding me back. If I did read more, I would read more quickly and with better comprehension and that would make my life much easier. I think part of the trouble is that I associate reading with school work and so it never occurs to me to read for fun. I know this is an area that I really need to try and improve.

Mental  Block

I still have times that I get “stuck” and when I feel like that I tend to stop working on anything instead of working through step by step. The biggest times that this happens is when I have more than one piece of work to think about. This causes me a problem as I am then under more pressure to complete everything on time. Avoiding work when I am stuck has been an issue for a long time, but I feel like this year I got better at figuring out how to get unstuck. I found that it helped a lot to talk to classmates or my family to get some inspiration. Usually once I get a starting push I can get the work done without further help.

The Improvements and Goals

Reflection

I am pretty happy with my overall grade 9 year. This year I started to research what university has to offer me and have found a course that I think would be a perfect fit. This featured in my fairy-tale career iMovie that we did in the health and career unit.

The course I want to take is Sports Management which is only offered at two universities in Canada. It is offered all over the US, however getting into a US school from Canada is tougher and more expensive. I understand that getting into either of those two courses in Canada will be highly competitive and so I am already driving towards that goal. I consider that my school marks and the work ethic are really important. I also think that my work as a hockey referee and baseball umpire will be relevant. This year I also started doing a significant amount of volunteering as a coach with my baseball league. I feel like I have matured a lot this year and I am honoured that some of the younger kids look up to me as coach Ryan. I was also happy to receive the Seyhawk award as it shows that my efforts in and outside the classroom have been noticed this year.

My goals for next year are to continue making this type of progress. I want to be a leader and I know I can still improve how much I speak up in class. I am taking Hockey Academy again next year and I am looking forward to continue balancing my academic and sports life.