Guess where I was last week? Beijing!

We (grade 7) all went away last week on a trip to Chiang Mai (thailand) or Beijing (where I went) and it was quite fun. Throughout the week we did a variety of different activities all around the city and even out of it. A notable thing we did was probably hiking on the great wall, camping and visiting place like the forbidden city and the temple of heaven. I got to use my chinese language skills quite a lot on this trip so I think it was useful for me. Also I met a lot of new people and made new friends which is nice. A lot of the people on the trip, I didn’t know very well and now I feel a lot closer to the other small group of students that went. It was really fun to get to know new people in the grade.

Two attributes I think I showed on this trip are principled and balanced. I think I was principled because during the trip we had quite a lot of free time and we had to keep mature in public places. I feel as if I handled this quite well and that’s why I felt I did a good job. Also balanced as I feel I showed a range of skills during the trip. We not only looked at sights, walked around and learnt but I think I did pretty well at hiking and the other outdoors-y activities which makes me think I was rather balanced.
Here is a few pictures of our trip taken by moi:

Hiking at the Great Wall

Pedicab Tour

Me, at the temple of heaven!

MARCH 18th:

Coming soon to a theater no where near you. Produced by the CDNIS Design team, my group and others. An informative but very exclusive documentary about the Wong Tai Sin temple in Kowloon!
As I said in my other post (DEAD Day Reflection post will be up soon, WordPress deleted it for me so I’ll have to type it again) we’re making a documentary. It’s not exactly been made yet so for now you can follow the action on my heritage humanities site (<- click here to go to it)

MAY 3rd:

HI GUYS :D (yes this post was made a while ago, but it’s time-travelled to now!)
After waiting… *drumroll* HERE IS MY DOCUMENTARY! YAY!

Click here to view the embedded video.

I hope you enjoyed it. Go to my HK Heritage site to read even more about the process :)

Our science court case is now over! The case was the people against KMT (kinetic molecular theory). We had to research whether or not the theory worked and how we could prove/disprove KMT. I was on the side of prosecution and we ended up winning the case! This was surprising for me as I know the theory works but I assume that we won because we had a better argument. I can’t really answer the question of whether I thought this was good or not because I wasn’t present for most of the case and therefore can’t really provide evidence. I was a lawyer during the case but I didn’t end up doing all too much because as I’ve said before: I wasn’t there for most of the time. I did however, write and deliver the opening statement. If I could’ve chosen another job, I think I would’ve liked to be on the jury but I’m not sure that would’ve worked out considering I would’ve missed the arguments but… yeah.
I learnt quite a lot throughout the process. Such as the kmt and its statements. I feel like I wasn’t too open-minded during the science process as I was only trying to find faults in the theory. With the amount of experiments we ended up doing though, I think I’ve improved on the overall science process and since become a better scientist. Really short entry, but things are going by quickly :D

Another unit finished, another iFolio post. Our last math unit was about fractions and decimals. On the stress and learning level chart, I would say I’m about a 3, so neutral and a bit concerned. This is because, though I wasn’t overly worried about the work, I still was just a little bit. I wanted to do well and I knew that if I was to achieve that goal, I would have to actually try. The unit was not a walk in the park as well. It was quite challenging. I assume we all knew the basics to fractions and decimals but I found that it was the operations that proved more difficult. I had never learnt how to divide or multiply decimals properly before this unit and it took me a while to get the hang of it. Of course I can still improve and I probably have a long way to go with improving but I’m glad I was able to actually do it. I tried pretty hard in this unit. At the start, I don’t think I was concentrating very much but this changed when I realized that if I wanted to do well I had to focus. After that, I think I got more confident with my work. I think the effort showed on my test because I actually got a better mark than I had expected. I can’t remember many of the activities we did in this unit but I think it was more fun when the activities didn’t consist of having to write stuff down. Though there’s nothing wrong with worksheets, it’s just more enjoyable sometimes to do something different. :)

Time for a new post. This one’s about a project we’ve been doing in english class. Recently we’ve been learning about the world of refugees. We’ve read books like The Other Side of Truth and have learnt vocabulary such as; displaced person, asylum seeker etc. We’ve just finished the unit by making a presentation about refugees. I was researching into the refugees of the United Kingdom and their lives. Actually though, there’s only about 2% of the world’s refugees in the UK so… it was a bit difficult at points.

For the book, The Other Side of Truth, I liked the story line and general idea of it (two kids forced to move because of their fathers job in the newspaper and their mother’s death) but at times it seemed really long-winded and a bit frustrating. Also, though the situations of refugees was very well presented, some parts weren’t realistic.

During the project, I had originally planned to make a movie about the refugees but it changed to being  a keynote. This is probably because I felt it was easier to make the keynote presentation rather than the movie. Not only do I feel more comfortable with the software of keynote over iMovie, another reason was the time we were given. Though yes, we had time in class to do it, there wasn’t all too much time apart from that, I felt. Researching also was a bit troublesome because of the topic I chose. As I said earlier, there’s less than 2% of the world’s refugees in the UK so I had to scrounge around to find some of the sources I used for pictures and information. I like the project at the same time though because I learnt so much and I’ll be able to see the world and refugees in it a bit differently with time. If I could do it again, I think I would try to make better use of my time. Though I did manage to finish it and I was happy with the end project, I should have put more time aside for actually making the keynote and voice recordings. I worked alone on this project and you can watch it here : )

As an author of an article, biography or in my case a short story, you have to make many decision to benefit your story. Here we go with todays blog post! Recently in English class we did a presentation AFTER writing a short story about a personal experience. After weeks and lessons of writing, adding and revising our stories, we finally managed to produce a story. We weren’t getting assessed on this though! In the end we made a presentation about one of the concepts/skills used in our story. I chose imagery. I felt I used this quite well in my story. At the bottom of the post I have a screenshot of my story. Can you see the sensory language and images I’ve tried to provoke. I’m very proud of my story actually. I also think my presentation went well. I thought it would be scary as I grew to dislike public speaking but I’m rather happy with how it turned out. I felt a lot more confident than usual. Somewhat comfortable as well : )

I’m still not sure what my grade is but I hope that I’ve done well!

In TAP (Teacher advisory program) today, we were talking about good and bad habits. There are millions of habits that can be take positively or negatively depending on who you are. One habit I want to work on is staying focused. A lot of things have been going on recently and I hope that after the CNY break I’ll be able to stay on topic again. I might be able to achieve this in a variety of ways. 1) I could give myself  breaks during work so I can run off steam for a while and then go straight back to work. 2) I could shut off everything during work to avoid distractions.

Just a short reflection today : )

We’ve just finished our patterns unit in math yaaaaaay! We’ve already done both of our tests and I feel that things went quite well. My favorite thing about this unit was actually trying to find patterns. I love brain teasers and every time we had to find a pattern my mind felt stimulated and it was really interesting. My least favorite part was also finding the patterns. We had a love-hate relationship. When we hard a really hard one to do, I didn’t enjoy it as much because often I got caught up on the one question and continued working on that for ages. Also graphing, I found, was not difficult but I could easily make errors in it and this is what I disliked about it sometimes. I’m glad that we did this unit though. I can find patterns with decimals and negative numbers (going towards the more advanced research) now and it’s made the tests that we did SO MUCH easier. A lot of things I learnt from the other units helped. Such as knowing exponents, multiplication tables etc. There were still some parts of the test that I didn’t understand and though I don’t have any specific questions I think I would still like to continue my learning with patterns as to further my knowledge. The study of patterns can help me with life. As we get into higher grades or whatever I do when I’m older, I’m sure it will help to know how to find and monitor patterns. Here is an example of my learning in the patterns unit. It will surely be evidence enough. 

This is a table I made for a problem in class the other day. It proves that I can not only find patterns but I can make tables and more.

Thanks : )
~Samantha

For science, we had to create a bird that was perfectly suited to it’s own environment (which we also had to create) I really enjoyed this task as it allowed us to let our creative juices flow as well as learn a thing or two. After about a week of this project and getting the grades back, I present to you: The Kadius (Tenebris Rimor)

This bird  has many structural and behavioral adaptations. Many of them are adapted for hunting in the underground canyon, where it lives.

Deep underneath the city of Rome, Italy an underground canyon had recently been discovered. The canyon stretches on for about 300 square miles, with many wide  passages and a small amount ledges. The lowest point of the canyon is an estimated 1000 meters below the elevation of Rome (66 feet above sea level.) Though seemingly barren from first look, the canyon is thriving with insects and small rodents. They reside in the many gaps and holes in the canyon walls. The rocks that make up the canyon are mainly composed of sandstone. The sandstone appears a dark orange-brown in the canyon’s dim lighting. The lighting is dark because there are not many light sources and the air is sticky and humid due to lack of fresh air and outside breezes. Despite this, many wind currents run through the canyon. On these wind currents, soar a brand new discovery. A new species of bird that has been named Tenebris Rimor which means dark explorer in Latin. The common name for this bird is Kadius, after the man who first discovered this underground canyon. In the canyon, the Kadius is highest on the food chain, with no other predators. The Kadius eats whatever it can find in the canyon gaps, consisting of a diet of mainly insects and small rodents. A few structural features include: Climbing type talons, a long, thin tweezer beak, short legs with hyperextended knees, dark colouration etc. The adaptations were all meant for the environment created. As well as this, we got to create  the behavioral adaptations. Some of mind had to do with breeding or hunting.

Altogether, I really enjoyed the build-a-bird project and hope that we’ll get a chance to do other projects like this as I think it went well.

We are now at the end of our Shi Huangdi Unit! Time to reflect! Over the unit, we’ve learnt many, many skills that have helped us finish tasks such as our group poster project and essay relating to the first emperor of China. Here is an example of some of the skills we have learnt during this unit in the form of a whiteboard mind map!

From the evidence provided you can tell that we learnt many, many new skills. This mind map was made from all of the students in our class’s answers so it proves that we actually learnt something! Shocker, right? Some prominent skills that I feel we learnt were to do with researching and the actual essay writing. We needed to do a lot of research for this project and truth be told, I learnt a lot about researching. Also I did not really understand how to structure an essay before! But now I know. We learnt many tips and methods to help us write our essays. There were many other skills we took away from this unit. A bit of oral communication from a presentation, some group work skills. Another important aspect? Organization. Without this particular skill my mind would have been all over the place. As well as my papers. What do YOU, reader out there, think some important skills would be?