I recently sat through a trial that our science class had created based on the Kinetic Molecular Theory. One side tried to disprove it and the other tried to prove it true. In the end, the jury decided that KMT was true. In the cross-examination I noticed that if you are not a credible scientist, in the end your evidence really means absolutely nothing. You must always control your variables. If I conduct another experiment, I will make sure that I control my variables. I will also make sure my data is both valid and reliable. During the trial, one of the team’s strongest points of evidence was destroyed during the cross-examination because there was a large discrepancy between to trial times, and as I know, a good, credible scientist will do more re-trials if anomalies like that occur.

In the actual trial, I was put in as part of the jury. During the trial I took lots of notes, and in the end, I helped to decide the final verdict: the KMT was true. Throughout the last week, I learned a lot about the KMT and was able to partially catch up with the work I missed.

Last week the Grade 7s went on their experience week trip. 40 people went to Beijing and 112 people (including me) went to Chiang Mai, a part of northern Thailand very close to Burma. We were there for 6 days from May 6th ~ May 11th and I enjoyed it a lot. We were split into 8 groups of 14 and we always had different activities each day. The climate in Thailand was incredibly hot and I seemed to constantly be walking through sweat.

While I was there, I think I demonstrated the Learner Profile Attribute: Risk-taker, because I was always doing things I was secretly very afraid of. An example of this is the confidence course, which was a series of obstacles suspended over a yucky-looking brownish lake. I was so afraid of doing it that when it was almost my turn I “ran to the bathroom” for 5 minutes trying to build up the courage to do something. I came back, and the first time I tried to get across the lake, instead of trying to walk across the chain that was strung between two tires, I just stood there, shaking and fell off the tire that was still on dry land. However, I wanted to prove something (I’m still not sure what) to myself so I decided to go again. I actually faced my fears and made it across the chain. I was so ecstatic that I had made it across that instead of continuing on with the course, I jumped off the tire with the dumbest smile on my face. At the end of the activity session, I was voted by the rest of the group to be “The Most Determined Person”.

Another example of this is the rock climbing course. I was very afraid that I wouldn’t be able to hoist myself up the wall, would fall to the ground and go splat. However, I thought about what happened on the confidence course and jumped right in. I scaled the entire wall, which was better than some people did. Sadly, after I reached the top and rung the bell, just when I though I was out of the danger zone, I heard everyone saying “WOW!” and looked down. My stomach practically flew into my brain and my heart stopped. I grabbed the wall as tight as I could, but that meant I wouldn’t be able to come down, so I had to get over my fear. I let go and started jumping down the wall like James Bond. I really felt like him so just to emphasize the awesomeness of my James Bond jumps, I shot Mrs. Kirchner and another student on the way down with my awe-inspiring imaginary gun. I actually enjoyed it a lot!

While I was there, I also think that I demonstrated the Learner Profile Attribute: Communicator. I think the most prominent example of this was when we volunteered at the school to play with the children. We played many games with them and had to use hand gestures to describe what to do because of the language barrier. To help you imagine how difficult this was, I need you to imagine trying to teach a martian how to play wink murder. I became particularly attached to this one kid named Kun Chew Ah. He though I was amazing at soccer and practiced his goalie skills with me. (I actually barely know how to play soccer…) He also taught me how to write his name, but I have already forgotten. We drew pictures together to communicate or used hand gestures. Kun Chew Ah tried to get my attention at several points by yelling in Thai, but he realized the easiest way for him to get my attention was by manhandling me. I was yanked along by him for most of the afternoon.

Some things really surprised me while I was there. One of them was how homesick some people got after only 1 week where they were able to communicate with their family using a phone. This was crazy to me, as I had just been gone for three months without any communication. Another thing that surprised me was the state of living for the children. I feel very bad for the kids there who have to live in poverty. They accept our donations and smile but that only goes a certain length. Personally, I believe the problem with charities nowadays is that you are unable to see your money put to use. If you knew that by sharing your wealth with someone, you were making their lives easier and you were able to meet them and see how much you’ve helped that would definitely make more people want to help charities or foster children. Some of the children there were actually malnourished and unhealthy. They are significantly shorter than average kids. My friend Kun Chew Ah was only at my ribs, yet he was only a year younger than me. This seemed to be the case with most of the children.

In conclusion, this trip really helped me to become aware of some of my strengths and weaknesses and opened my eyes up to a new part of the world. I think the trip has inspired me to take a more active role in helping underprivileged children around the world.

Today in math class we are studying patterns. I am looking at Human Ingenuity as my AOI (Area of Interaction) because patterns help us to make sense of our world. For example, if one classmate gave me 1 cent today and then it grew exponentially, I could use rules to find out how much he would give me on the 100th day. Wow! If that happened, I’d be pretty happy!

Today in class we talked about the story of the Lorax, and why that story is so important to Hong Kong. Ocean Park, one of Hong Kong’s major amusement parks is planning to expand onto another hill. That cannot happen because there are many living organisms that may be endangered on that hill, and the construction will kill them off.

It is important that we let the government know, because after scientists told the government about the fact they had just sold one of the few coral beaches in Hong Kong that harbored an threatened sea horse species, their excuse was “We didn’t know.” Many incidents like this have occurred in Hong Kong. One of these incidents were the Lamma Island turtles, which were hunted to the point of no return and went extinct. Another example in Hong Kong is the sea, which has been filled with concrete in Chek Lap Kok airport, the Disneyland area and the Central waterfront.

The AOI of this unit “Diversity and Adaptation” is Environments and there are many reasons why. Diversity can only really be achieved in a controlled environment. If we want to have diverse animal species living in one environment, that environment cannot be specifically suited to just one animal, as the rest will perish. Adaptation involves adapting to the environment, therefore if the environment is changed, animals will have to unfairly adapt to fit our needs.

To see the photobook, you will have to click on each individual slide to make it bigger.

There are 20 slimy, yucky sea animals in a vacuum sealed jar. There are 8 piranhas, 4 electric eels and 8 vicious great white sharks. They are all the same size thanks to the latest advances in shrinking technology. What are the chances of pulling the same type of sea animal twice?

Click Here For The Answer!

I found this poem while researching about it’s author Victor Hugo for a French project. It is about his daughter’s grave and the grief her death caused him. She drowned with her fiance in the River Seine when she was 19 years old.

Demain, dès l’aube

Victor Hugo

Demain, dès l’aube, à l’heure où blanchit la campagne,
Je partirai. Vois-tu, je sais que tu m’attends.
J’irai par la forêt, j’irai par la montagne.
Je ne puis demeurer loin de toi plus longtemps.

Tomorrow, at dawn, at the hour that whitens the countryside

I will leave. You see, I know that you wait for me.

I will go by the forest, I will go by the mountain

I cannot remain far from you any longer.
Je marcherai les yeux fixés sur mes pensées,
Sans rien voir au dehors, sans entendre aucun bruit,
Seul, inconnu, le dos courbé, les mains croisées,
Triste, et le jour pour moi sera comme la nuit.

With eyes fixed on my thoughts, I will walk

Without anything to see outside, without hearing any noise

Alone, unknown, bent, hands crossed,

Sadness, and the day to me will be like the night.
Je ne regarderai ni l’or du soir qui tombe,
Ni les voiles au loin descendant vers Harfleur,
Et quand j’arriverai, je mettrai sur ta tombe
Un bouquet de houx vert et de bruyère en fleur.

Neither will I see the gilding of nightfall

Nor the mist lowering itself over Harfleur

And when having arrived, I will put on your tomb

A bouquet of green holly and heather in bloom

Translation: http://caravanofdreams.wordpress.com/2008/09/20/demain-des-laube-by-victor-hugo/

Photo: http://johnmchoul.wordpress.com/2012/03/17/a-rose-is-a-rose/

Today was the student led learning review or as the most of us like to call it, the SLLR. That means that the students show their parents what they have recently been learning and how they have been learning. It was one hour long and I got to show my parents my recent learning at school. The purpose of the SLLR was to share my learning journey.

My parents said: “School here was a lot different from when he went to school. It is much more interactive and there is much more usage of multimedia tools than the 1970s US.” They said that my strengths were how I was learning (internet, multimedia etc.) and how we focus on a variety of subjects, but one of my weakness was “disdaining Chinese as this thing he ‘has to do’ rather than another cool tool for communication.” This was very similar to the goal-making conference earlier this year in the way that I was sort of nervous around my parents. I think that next year will help me with that because there will be much more parent involvement in school. My parents were surprised by all the technology that surrounds us nowadays.

They thought that I had grown most in literacy. Preparing for the SLLR helped me better understand myself as a learner by letting me see some of my strengths and weaknesses. The most challenging part of the SLLR was when I was trying to get my parents to do sit-ups. I failed miserably in that area. If I had to do this again, I would make sure that everything was bilingual so my mom would understand more. The best part of my SLLR was when my parents applauded and commended  my effort in the end.

I am glad the SLLR is over, because I had been wondering how I would do for the past few days and getting slightly worried. I fulfilled my purpose, which was to share my learning journey with my parents and I think I got through almost all of the ideas I was trying to convey. Overall, I think that the SLLR is a hard, but effective way to present our learning to our parents.

Today our class watched a movie called “Rabbit-Proof Fence” in the LLAC. It was about young Australian aborigines who are taken away to camps to teach them to become servants for being half-castes. Three young girls from a place called Jigalong get sent there and they go on a quest to get back home by walking 1,500 miles. I thought the white people were kind of stupid because they thought they were doing the aborigines a favor by taking them away from their family and eradicating their race, but I could easily see that they were happy just where they were. I think that this shows that the past shapes what our world is like today because some of the aborigine children died there, or never went back to their parents. If that happened in the U. S., it would be on the front page of every newspaper in the world, yet here it was happening for years. Everybody deserves to have access to equal opportunities and this movie shows that they didn’t have many opportunities. We are lucky to have a nice life without kidnappings and constant worrying.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Today our class watched a video by Jason Russell to support the project KONY 2012, a project that aims to make Joseph Kony famous, not to celebrate him, but to raise awareness of this issue and raise support for the arrest of Joseph Kony.

After watching this video, I feel shocked that I did not ever know about this ongoing issue that has been going on for more then 20 years. I really appreciate my life but I feel that it is unfair that other kids get born into these kinds of situations.

I was very surprised that the U. S. government did not listen and do anything about this problem in the first place, just because it wasn’t their problem. Then when they came back with the many young children, they all agreed. Most of the time, people hear about an issue and just nod their heads and turn away, but sometimes, people take action. The U. S. government only really takes action when the U. S. citizens want action, and that rarely happens.

This is related to our action cycle because it is an example of a very good action. I really liked the part where they had a triangle with money at the top and how they showed that technology can completely flip that cycle right around.

Many of their words really strike me as powerful. I really thought the part where they said our world is a Facebook world. I think that statement is really powerful because 750 million people are on Facebook so it is a great way to spread messages. This video really shows that one person can really make a difference.

There are other perspectives though, check out these sites:

http://justiceinconflict.org/2012/03/07/taking-kony-2012-down-a-notch/

http://visiblechildren.tumblr.com/