In Humanities class, we started a new unit on the Model United Nations. There was a tuning in video that I’ve watched in class introducing me to the MUN, it’s background and it’s eight millennium goals. Today, I found a news article from THIS WEBSITE about the first goal of the MUN, which is to “Eradicate Extreme Poverty and Hunger”. The article’s title is “End of absolute poverty, hunger and disease in sight”, which talks about how extreme poverty has ended within the last 20 years. This means the number of people who lives on less than $1.25 a day fell from 20% of the world’s population to less than 5%. This article talks about how the world is winning the war against poverty due to the fact that GDP growth in developing countries much higher and the world has witnessed “an unparalleled transformation”, meaning that around 700 million fewer people living in absolute poverty than 20 years ago. Also, there were information about how nearly two-thirds of child mortality is due to preventable infectious diseases, such as AIDS, pneumonia, diarrhoea, malaria and neonatal illnesses. But because of the dramatic improvements in public health in poor countries, seven million fewer children die every year compared to 20 years ago.

When I read this news article on how absolute poverty, hunger and disease around the world is starting to end, I feel a sigh of relief because I know that there are many people who raised awareness of people in poverty and had taken action to create a change in people’s lives. I really liked how that this article included many facts and statistics on how the number of people living in poverty line have decreased and had compared it with statistics 20 years ago. This is a great way of letting the readers be aware of the dramatic changes and compare the different between 20 years ago and now. A picture in the article shows how over 370 million children worldwide has been vaccinated to avert five and a half million future deaths. This means that there are organizations which provides medical treatments to children around the world to keep them healthy. A question that I want to ask is “why did extreme poverty around the world improve so much? What actions did citizens and the Model United Nations take to fix this problem?”

Picture credit HERE

Recently in science class, our class finished the KMT Court Case! The aim of the court case is for two teams to prove if the Kinetic Molecular Theory is just a theory or a true statement. To collect enough evidence for the court, we did many experiments related to the KMT such as the Food Coloring experiment, M&M Experiment, Evaporation, Salt Water Experiment and much more. Even though there were many challenges throughout the process of collecting data, me and my group members still had loads of fun learning from the experiments.

What was your job? Explain how you fulfilled our responsibilities?

My job for this KMT Court Case was the expert witness FOR the Kinetic Molecular Theory. An expert witness is someone with knowledge or experience of a particular field or discipline of the case that the court is investigating. An expert witness is an expert who makes this knowledge and experience available to a court to help it understand the issues of a case and therefore let the jours make the decision. The duty of an expert witness is to be truthful as to fact, thorough in technical reasoning, honest as to opinion and complete in coverage of relevant matters.

I fulfilled my responsibilities as a witness because when my team needs someone to present a piece of evidence, I went up to present one experiment data and explained why that proved KMT.

Do you agree with the jury’s verdict? Why or why not? Include at least 5 facts from evidence that was presented during the trail

I agree with the jury’s verdict because my legal team presented many pieces of evidence that all proves that KMT is a true statement. Also, our evidence proves all 8 of the statements as well, meaning that we have everything to support the theory.

1) From the ice cube experiment, we can prove that the hotter the water temperature is, the more kinetic energy there is. In cold temperature, the molecules are still a solid since there are very little Kinetic Energy so the molecules could only vibrate. When heat is added, heat molecules hits the ice cube, causing parts of the ice cube to break off and letting the molecules come out.

2) Also from the ice-cube experiment, we can understand the different molecule movements from different states of matter. In a solid, molecules only vibrates, just like how the ice cube is. So in a liquid, we can understand that molecules move faster because the water moves and shakes around. In a gas, the molecules move so violently that it goes out of the substance, that is why the volume of liquid decreases.

If you could do a different job during the court case,  which would you have volunteered for and why?

If I were to choose a different job during the court case, I would volunteer for the jour because the jour has the simplest and the most interesting job amongst the jobs. During the court case, the jours get to sit by the side and jot down notes on what the two sides say about KMT and their evidence. I like doing this job because I can listen and observe how people present their ideas and be un-biased and fair in judging which team wins. When it’s time for cross-examination, the jours can ask questions to any team or to confirm some evidence/information.

Explain one or more thing you learnt about KMT during these investigations. (give evidence)

I learnt that if I were to prove that the Kinetic Molecular Theory is false, I will have to say that it is some kind of gravity or force that makes the molecules inside matter translate, vibrate and rotate. Also, I understood more about the phase changes of matters from solid to liquid to gas because many people explained the graph of phase change. I learnt that evaporation happens in any temperature about zero and the boiling point for water is at exactly one hundred degrees!

Explain how you improved as a scientist during the KMT investigations and the trial. 

The science KMT court case was a great learning experience. From this court case, I understood how hard and how much pressure there is to be a scientist because there are lots of data and little information that has to be recorded down. Also, I must always control variables and make sure that all the data is valid or else the opponent can make my evidence invalid.

Pictures and documents from the Court Case:  

This is me as the expert witness presenting evidence from the Ice-cube experiment

I believe that I deserve a 7 out of 8 because I showed knowledge and understanding of drawing two – point perspectives. On my workbook, I drew a lot of practice sketches and practicing drawing items so that I can make it perfectly when I’m doing my final copy. Also, I’ve followed all the steps from my practice sheets on how to draw each alphabet so that I won’t do anything wrong. I believe that I have good knowledge on how to draw two vanishing points and deal with a horizon line. In many parts of my art, I applied some shading technique to objects so that they can look more realistic and outstanding.

Furthermore, I’ve followed all the instructions that the teacher gave me on incorporating size change, overlapping, placement, atmosphere perspective, and detail change techniques into my drawing to create the illusion of depth and space. You can also see that I understand the point of having vanishing points because all the lines of objects on my art piece are connected with the vanishing point. I also applied some art techniques into my piece of art such as gradient effect or fading effect. For instance, the flower has fading and gradient effect because a faded it from purple to red, causing it to look very outstanding.

However, I’m not sure if I will get an 8 because some of the objects/items on the drawing are not too realistic such as the mountain Hershey. I believe that everything else on the drawing looks 3-D except the mountains because I didn’t know how to make it look more real.

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I believe that I deserve at least a 9 out of 10 for my application of 2-point perspective because I’ve incorporated a lot of different designs and items into my art, making it look very colorful and detailed. I’ve clearly identified 5 favorite things about me through brainstorming, mind mapping and sketching them out on my art workbook. Besides this, I have accurately created exact 2-point perspective block letters KEONA at the center of my drawing. I believe that created the environment of image in a unifying manner because everything is connected in some ways. For instance, the hot air balloon is resting on the letter “O”; the big flower is curled up with letter K; the mountain of Hershey has a reflection on the lake; the green grass and green letters really match and much more. I purposely placed these different items close to each other so that nothing looks scattered all over the page; instead it looks neat and everything has a sense of harmony.

I’m not sure if I will get a 10 out of 10 because of my coloring skills. In some people’s point of view, the grass ground’s coloring is not that realistic because it just looks like a sheet of green cloth.

This is my two point perspective art piece.

In what ways did you learn in this unit. Which one did you like best? 

In this unit, I learnt my volleyball skills and techniques through many different ways such as asking partner to throw the ball for me to hit, passing the ball around, learning what to do on a volleyball court, playing mini games on the court and much more. I believe that all of these games are very effective because they helped me learn the concepts really quickly. However, I enjoyed having my partner passing the volleyball at me the most. I believe that this is a really easy way of learning one important skill in volleyball at a time. When everyone is mostly a beginner, their hit with the volleyball is not the accurate, so when I try to return the ball back, it never works. So one way that we did it was to let my partner just toss the ball over and let me hit it 10 times before switching over. That way, we can focus on mastering one skill and make sure that the ball goes accurately back to my partner.

Furthermore, as I hit the ball, my partner on the other end observes the technique I use to hit the ball and gives me feedback on how I can improve my posture. This way of learning how to hit the volleyball tests out my accuracy and also how I control the force of the ball. If I hit it too hard, too high or too low, my teammate won’t be able to catch it.
1. What did I do well?

I believe that I did well on mastering the overhead toss with a volleyball. The overhead toss is when you make a diamond shape with your fingers when the ball comes above your head, and then push the ball out of your fingers high into the air. In every volleyball lesson, I started off warming up with this skill because it is very basic and quite easy to do comparing to the other skills. Also, my PE teacher taught me a way to practice their overhead toss and bending down, which was to drop the ball to the ground and when it bounces up, you go underneath it and try to toss it back up into the air. This is a great practice because it trains me to go right under the ball.  As I was practicing this skill, I constantly reminded myself to make my body act like a spring so that it can help the ball go higher into the air and reminded myself to bend my knees and keep legs wide open.

2. What do I need to improve?

Being aware of the ball during a game of volley ball is what I need to imporve most on. When playing a volleyball game, every person on the team has to watch carefully where the ball is falling to and everyone who is near or close to the ball must shuffle to it in case they need to hit it. I am used to playing sports where only one person goes forward to hit it instead of everyone on the team trying to hit it. Being a volleyball player, I must learn how to listen intensivly for my teammate’s signals or communication because this can make the game more effective.

3. What level do I think I have achieved in the unit’s assessment(s).

Judging from my contribution in each game of volleyball and how well I practiced my technique, I think I will get around a 7 out of 8. I believe that I communicated with my teammates most of the time throughout the volleyball game and I think of strategies to help myself improve in a game of volleyball. One strategy that I thought of was to run as fast as I can to the spot the ball is going to land and make sure I get my arms held out like a platform so that the ball can bounce straight off of it.

One of our unit in English is about a book named “The Other Side of Truth” by Beverly Naidoo. I really liked how the novel included real life examples on this that had happened or are going on in Nigeria, the setting of the story. Since there are real examples in the story, I felt really interested to the novel and want to learn more of how people’s lives are on the other side of the world in Africa. Even though the story’s characters are made up, nearly everything is based on events that happened, so I could enjoy the story and at the same time, learn more about the lives of those who are not as lucky as mines. One thing that I didn’t like was that it wasn’t clear in the part why the government framed Folarin for killing the mother. The story talked about how the children re-united with their dad, then suddenly the Nigerian government said that Folarin assassinated their mother, and then afterwards, everyone believed that it was a lie. So I believe that this part went a bit too fast and I had to read it over at least twice to get an idea of this part.

Me and my partner decided to to a project on Afghan refugees and how they are treated in their own country by the Taliban. This is very similar to the novel “The other side of truth” because they both talked about how refugees escaped their own country because they have been treated really badly or abused in their own country. In the novel, Mr. Folarin and his family were receiving death threats from the government who had killed their mother, so despite the huge risk, the family’s two children escaped Nigeria to London by plane. For my project, I researched about the Taliban in Afghanistan and how they have treated Afghan people, which has caused them to flee their own country to become refugees.

One skill that I applied in the project is to make a voiceover. This is actually my first time that I’ve ever made a podcast in my life because I normally just stand in front of the class and present. I learnt throughout the process on how to record my voice on quicktime and then transfer it onto prezi. Also, I understand that it is the best way to start any presentation with the background information, just like how “The Other Side of Truth” did because it can help the audience to tune into my presentation and gain a better understanding of the topic.

This is the overview of my prezi.

I liked how we could make a podcast for this project because then I can share it on a google docs so that people from other class can see my presentation by just clicking a link. This is better than presenting in front of the class because if people want to replay it, they can just go online and watch it again. I dislike how the topics that we got to choose were a bit to narrow, I wished that the topic could be a little broader so I can investigate more about people in the society and how the government runs the country (which still relates to the novel).

For my project, I was mainly the researcher, meaning that I researched most of the information and facts for my presentation, helped made the supporting questions, site the sources and write the script for the podcast. While Nicole, who is better at technology that me focused mostly on creating the prezi, organizing the ideas and uploading the voice overs.

This is one of the slides.

If you want to see the Prezi that I made on Afghan refuge, click HERE.

Recently in math class, we’ve just completed our Fractions and Decimals unit and it’s time to do a reflection. As you can see in the picture above, theres a “Stress and Learning” chart that has a scale from 1 to 5, with 5 being the most difficult and 1 being the most easy. I think that I would fall into the category between 2 to 2.5 because I feel quite confident with the basic knowledge and understanding of fractions and decimal. For example, I know how to convert between fractions and decimals etc. Besides this, I’ve learnt about fractions and decimals a few years ago so I already gained a basic understanding of this unit. However, I’m not completely at level 1 on the scale because I still have some concepts that I need to work on and get more confident at. Also, I need to practice my accuracy on this topic because I may have some mistakes while working on fractions and decimals.

One thing that I really need to remember sometimes is to the decimal places (tenths, hundredths, thousandths etc..) carefully because on my math test, I did one of the decimal places questions wrong. Sometimes I have some misunderstanding of the concept and think that I’m supposed to add one more zero or minus one zero. One thing that I found easy was doing calculations with decimals and fractions. Even before grade 7, I had done many worksheets outside of school that helped me practice on my calculations for decimals and fractions. I find them really straight forward and have a high percentage of getting the correct answer if I concentrate and pay close attention on my calculations.

At home, I memorized the fractions and decimals chart that I copied down on my math booklet because I knew that those information would be very useful in the future. Since I’ve already memorized some common fractions to decimals conversion, during the test, those information came right out of the top of my head so I don’t need to calculate anything. Furthermore, I’ve revised some important math concepts, like how do you determine where to put the decimal point or why is the answer a decimal not a whole number so I know how to explain it in words and models. I was really happy that I revised this at home because on the math test, I remembered what I practiced and explained the reflection questions quite well.

One activity that I enjoyed really much was modeling decimal equations. Actually I’ve never done much modeling in my past previous years because I wasn’t sure how to do it, however in this unit, I learnt a lot about how efficient a model can be to communicate a decimal equation to the readers. After a lot of practice on modeling, I felt really confident about it and I found it very easy and fast to do.

The new music unit was about Haikus and our task was to write a Haiku about any topic that I like and then using Garage Band, create a 60-90 seconds music composition to express the theme of the Haiku. After a long thought, I decided to use the theme Christmas and this is my Haiku:

A jolly Christmas,

Feasts, santa, snow fights and presents.

Jingle Jingle Bells!

I think that my sound effects worked well the most in my composition because they fit in to the Christmas theme really well. For example, when I included the jingle bells effect in my song, it really brings the music to life and lets listeners feel the jolliness and happiness of Christmas times. Besides this, the party horns in the music piece indicates to listeners that this is a cheery song and its about partying on Christmas Day. 

What didn’t work so well in my composition was the organization. Sometimes, I felt like that the music was a bit too messed up here and there because there are too many songs and sound effects at the same time. For instance, there was two Christmas songs playing at the same time in the music composition, which makes the music feel very high in spirit, however, it might be a bit uncomfortable for some people to hear. So because of this, some parts of the song had different rhythms from others, making the piece sound influent and not smooth. 

My hardest decision that I made in my Haiku composition was choosing which Christmas carol or song I’m going to use for the composition. When I searched online, there were many famous songs to pick and all of them were very good and I felt like each song could fit into my music piece really well. So I had to list out my top 5 favorites and then ended up choosing two among them. 

I felt like that my easiest decision that I made in my Haiku composition was the order of the piece of music (the procedure of the audios). When I planned my order on a paper, I already thought of using a bell tower effect to start the composition since it represents Christmas and jingle bells. Then, I would use many jolly effects like children’s laughter and bouncy music to convey the message of happiness and cheerfulness. Afterwards, I can then start my Christmas carols to let listeners know it’s a Christmas-themed music. So there wasn’t much thinking to put everything in procedure since I knew that putting everything in that order would be the most effective for my song. 

I enjoyed the Haiku composition task very much since it was something new that I can do as a music project besides playing the flute and doing activities on Moodle. I am also very new to Garage Band and have never found interest in it. However, when I learnt that I needed to use Garage Band for my Haiku project, I decided to watch some tutorials and explore the application. Soon after, I enjoyed playing around with soundtracks and sound effects on Garage Band and had loads of fun trying out new things. 

Watch my Hong Kong Heritage documentary about the Tin Hau Temple HERE!
If you are interested in the documentary and want to take a look at the “behind the scenes” of this project, go to this website.

The Tin Hau Temple

Picture: www.discoverhongkong.com

Today we had our second D.E.A.D day, meaning design day. Our new project that was just introduced to us today was about the Hong Kong Heritage. The key perspective of this project is to create a documentary on how Hong Kong’s culture has changed on time and to investigate into this, every group of four will focus on one heritage site. It may be an old fire station, cemetery, village or temple etc. Luckily, my group was assigned a heritage site that we liked the most, which was the Tin Hau Temple in Yau Mah Tei. My group members Pedro and Connor and I worked hard on creating research questions and supporting questions for our investigation. At the same time, we brainstormed all the ideas about the different things we want to learn about the Temple and some brief researching about the background and pictures about the Temple. Besides researching about the Temple, we also created a group collaborated “Groogle” docs that we are going to share with every group member and teachers. On Google Sites, each person made their own website to document the process from “Inquiry and Analysis” to “Evaluation”, which is just like a process journal.

The part I liked best was how we could create our own website on Google Sites, this can prevent us from actually writing our journals on paper (which is a lot more tiring). Also, I got to choose my own theme and colors for my site and make it look attractive and well organized.

I wish that we can actually go visit more than one cultural sites in Hong Kong so we can get an even more deeper understanding about how Hong Kong’s culture changed overtime and how it will be preserved.

After learning how to shade a value scale using pencil, we started to shade and color using color pencil. There were four exercise that we did to help practice our coloring and shading skills. The 4 exercises were the color value scale, rainbow color scale, color start and complementary shading. I started off with the color value scale because it was very similar to the pencil value scale. There were 12 shading boxes this time from darkest (black) to the lightest (white). I choose to use the color purple since it is a dark color. Secondly, I created the rainbow Color Value chart showing all the colors in the rainbow, from red to purple twice. While making the color chart I leant how to shade starting from the darkest color at the bottom and fading slowly at the top. I practiced how to control my force of the pencil to make sure that the colors will blend smoothly (smooth transition).

For the color star, I learnt how to mix primary colors together to make secondary colors. For every two corner of the star, I colored in a primary color and in between each primary color, I mixed a secondary color. To make the secondary color look good, I used a wet paintbrush to blend the colors together. Lastly, after all the practicing, I started practicing complementary shading by drawing a pear, an apple and some grapes. The point of this is to never use the color black, so I shaded the darker areas with the opposite colors. For example, the complementary color of red is green, so I used green to shade in the dark areas of the apple. I think that shading with opposite colors makes the drawing more realistic and creates a special effect on the artwork.

Practicing these basic skills can help with the future art works because I can apply shading (dark and light), and color tones to make an art seem more realistic. Shading using color in art is really useful because it can turn a 2-D object into a 3-D object, making it stand out and more eye-catchy. Furthermore, the colors help viewers to indicate where the light comes from in the painting.

I felt like I could’ve improved on making the shading darker on my fruits. At first, I thought that making the fruits darker may take away it’s naturalistic. But after I finished my drawing, I found out that the fruits would look weird if I didn’t add enough shading to it.

On the top left corner is the Color Value Scale, the top right corner is the Rainbow Color and Value, the bottom left is the Color star and the bottom right is the Complementary Shading