What did I do?
We read The Giver by Lois Lowry during this unit, and discussed examples of dystopian characteristics in the book. We also wrote academic paragraphs in Commonlit to answer some questions about the book. In addition, we chose topics in The Giver, wrote notes about it, and discussed it with our group. We talked about things like the advantages and disadvantages, the similarities and differences to life today, etc.
What did I learn?
I learned about the seven dystopian characteristics: Totalitarianism, Social Control, Conformity vs. Difference, Constant Surveillance, Dehumanization, Control of Nature, and Illusion of Utopia. When we read The Giver, we tried to find examples of these dystopian characteristics in the book. For example, the delivery of food in The Giver was an example of “Illusion of Utopia” because it was the illusion that everything was perfect, that nobody would ever starve. In reality, it’s true that no one would starve, but it takes away choice.
What worked?
Something that worked was that we chose 8 words from The Giver and wrote them into a paragraph for our vocabulary test. I could always combine the words into a paragraph, even if the topic didn’t really fit with my words. Something else that worked was that I found examples of dystopian characteristics in The Giver, and I could explain why they fit with the particular characteristic. For example, the mating of spouses is an example of Totalitarianism because you cannot even choose your own spouse, the Committee of Elders chooses for you.
What did not work?
Something that did not work was that I didn’t really understand the ending of the book. Jonas and Gabriel sled down a hill, and at the bottom Jonas thought he heard music. But I didn’t really understand why there was a sled and where the music was coming from. I think I will probably understand more about the ending after we watch the movie.
Personal Relevance
This unit was very helpful because if I read other dystopian fiction books in the future, then I can try to identify examples of dystopian characteristics in the book. This unit also made me think about how different the world we live in is to the community in The Giver. For example, we don’t have standard apologies, assigned jobs, or assigned children and spouses. The world we live in has more choices and differences.
During this unit, we made rollercoasters and a video to explain how the rollercoaster worked. First, we collected data with our rollercoasters and wrote them in a lab report. Then, we wrote a script to explain potential energy, kinetic energy, starting points, e.t.c. Finally, we created a movie that showed what we learned during this unit.
Link for roller coaster video:
What did I work on?
During this unit, I worked on an Ötzi CER paragraph and prepared for the final mock trial. A CER paragraph stands for Claim, Evidence, and Reasoning. I developed a claim about whether I believed Ötzi was murdered or not, found evidence to support my claim, and justified my evidence with reasoning. The end-of-unit mock trial had four jobs: prosecution lawyers, defense lawyers, court reporters, and expert witnesses. During the trial, I was an expert witness, and I prepared for it by completing an organizer, which showed potential questions the lawyers would ask me. I also did a lot of research by reading articles and watching videos, so that I would be ready for the trial.
What did I learn?
One thing I learned about was the essential question: Why should we care about the past? We should care about the past because the past shows what we used to be like, and we can reflect on it. We can see what was going well and what could be improved. In addition, we can compare our lives in the past with our lives now, so that we can see how we have improved and what problems or difficulties are still there.
What worked well?
Something that worked well was that I completed all the work before the trial and wrote a notecard with my name, job, and where I went to college. In the organizer I completed, I listed possible questions the lawyers would ask, both open and closed questions, and wrote answers to them. Something else that worked well was that I answered the questions the lawyers asked as best as I could, even if I wasn’t very sure about the answer.
What did not work?
Something that did not work was that I got a little bit nervous during the trial and didn’t answer a lot of questions. Something I could do next time to improve this is I could practice a bit more, or I could write some important information down on my notecards so that I wouldn’t forget. If I didn’t understand the question, then I could also ask the lawyer to repeat or rephrase the question so that I would have more time to think and answer the question.
Personal Relevance
The collaboration and communication skills I practiced are important because in the future I will also need these skills. For the rest of sixth grade and even high school and college, I will also be collaborating with other people, so I need to practice these skills. The communication skills that I practiced are also very important for the future. During the mock trial, I had to communicate quickly with my partner to see who would answer the question or thinking and sharing quickly if we didn’t know the answer. In the future, I will also need to communicate with my peers, and these skills will be very useful.
What did we do?
I baked brownies with my teammates Lizzy and Bryson. We bought the ingredients, stirred them together, baked them, and packaged them to bring to school. Then, we sold them during the bake sale. We put the brownies on tissues and gave them to our customers. During this project, we determined our sell price per serving and tried to sell as many brownies as we could. In the end, we sold all 33 of our brownies and made 261 rmb profit.
What did we learn?
During this fun project, we learned a lot about markups, costs, sells, and profit. A markup percent is the percent that you want to increase your product to to sell. A markup price is the amount of money that you increase your product by. The cost is how much money you spent on making the product. The sell price is how much money you sell your product for in the end. Finally, the profit is how much money you earn after selling everything (the cost subtracted from the sell price).
What worked?
Something that worked was my teammates and I baked very delicious brownies to sell. We collaborated very well during the baking process and also during the bake sale. In addition, we were also polite to our customers and explained the process of how we got our final sell price very patiently to the customers that wanted to know. At the end of the bake sale, we sold all of our brownies and earned 261 rmb of profit.
What did not work?
Something that did not work was that we sold all of our brownies and didn’t have any more for everybody else that came later and wanted to buy our brownies. Something else that didn’t work was we weren’t sure how much money we spent on buying all of the ingredients (the cost) because it was different from the one we had calculated in class. Next time, we could have baked extra brownies for all of the customers and also our family and ourselves so that everybody could taste the brownies we baked.
Personal Relevance
This learning can help me achieve my goals in life because in the future (like future bake sales or when I am an adult) because it taught me a lot of skills like how to determine the markup price and markup percent. This is important because in the future if I want to sell my product then I have to determine a markup price so that I get profit, but it still has to be reasonable so that people will buy it. These skills will be very useful and vital in the future.
During this unit, I:
What did I do?
My partner and I made a car out of paper and put an egg inside of it. Our goal was to protect our egg from breaking or cracking when it struck the concrete block. To do this, we built two seatbelts to keep our egg in place, and added crumple zones to the front, back, and sides of the car. This way, the paper crumple zone would cushion the egg during the impact.
What did I learn?
I learned about Newton’s first and third laws of motion and the safety designs of vehicles throughout this project. Newton’s first law applies to this because the egg wants to keep going when the car hits the concrete. Newton’s third law is shown throughout this project, because the action is the car hitting the concrete, and the reaction is the concrete pushing back with equal and opposite force. I also learned about the safety designs of vehicles (crumple zones and seat belts). The crumple zone crumples on impact to protect the passengers inside.
What worked?
Something that worked was my partner and I followed the criteria and constraints of the challenge. Another thing that worked was that the two seatbelts kept the egg very firmly in place and the egg did not fall out and break. In addition, our car was very securely attached to the wheels and axle, so the wheels didn’t roll off.
What did not work?
Something that did not work was that our crumple zones were not thick enough, so our egg cracked. Another thing that didn’t work was at first, our car didn’t even move on the ramp, so we took of the rubber tires on the car. But then, our car went too fast and crashed really hard onto the concrete block. Something that we could have done was that we could have only took two tires off instead of four. This way, our car would have moved slowly down the ramp and bumped into the concrete more lightly.
Personal relevance
This project applies to real life because real vehicles like cars and trucks also have safety precautions similar to the ones we made. Real cars have crumple zones in the front and back, which protect the people inside. There are also seat belts, which prevent the people from falling forward in the case of a car accident or a sudden brake.
What are we doing?
We are learning about themes and the other elements that make a fictional story interesting and fun to read. When we watched some short videos, we tried to figure out what the author was trying to tell us. Finally, for our end of unit assessment, we wrote a long fictional story and practiced what we learned during this unit.
What are we learning?
We are learning about themes, character development, plot and setting. A theme is what the author is trying to tell you, or a message. It should be shown throughout the story. Character Development is the development of a character’s traits or feelings in the story. A plot is the storyline, or what is going to happen in the story. It includes, the rising action, the climax, and the falling action. The setting is where the story takes place. It can also be very important because the character might be influenced by the setting.
What’s working?
Something that is working is that I included dialogue and I tried to develop my characters’ traits throughout the story. I also created an interesting plot in my story. I got the idea for my story from a Disney movie called Element City. The movie is about people that are made out of different elements (like wood, cloud, fire, and water) living together in a big city.
What did not work?
Something that didn’t work was I didn’t have enough time to finish my story. I didn’t get to the climax, but I introduced my characters and developed a little bit of their traits. Some parts that were difficult to write were the parts explaining how the characters in my story looked. These were difficult because my story is a fantasy story; and the characters all had hair that were made of fire, water, etc. I overcame this by doing the best I could to describe it in my story, and I made sure that my story cover illustrated this.
Personal relevance
Creative writing can help me in real life because as I get to high school and college, I’m going to be writing a lot, so this unit will help me practice my writing skills. I enjoy creative writing because you can write about whatever you want and let your imagination take over, even if it’s silly and random, but the writing still needs to have a storyline and a theme. This is a skill that I will need and use a lot in the future.
What did I do?
I made a small car powered by a balloon with my partner Lizzy. The materials we used were styrofoam, a straw, and a balloon. We used it to learn about Newton’s three laws of acceleration: the law of inertia, the law of acceleration, and the law of action-reaction.
What did I learn?
I learned about Newton’s three laws of acceleration and how they apply to everyday life in this project. Newton’s first law: An object at rest tends to stay at rest, and object in motion tends to stay in motion unless acted upon an unbalanced force. The balloon car involves this law because when the balloon’s air is not released, the balloon stays at rest because of its inertia. Newton’s second law: An object with more mass requires more force to accelerate it. This applies to the balloon car because when my partner and I added washers, the balloon car had more mass; but the amount of force stayed the same, so it was more difficult to move. Newton’s third law: Every action has an equal, opposite reaction. This law is shown in this project because when I release the air in the balloon (action), the car goes forward (reaction).
What worked?
Something that worked was my partner and I worked well together, and the car that we made could go a really long distance when we filled the balloon up with air. We also made sure that we didn’t fill the balloon up too much, or else the balloon would pop. Before we released the air in the balloon, we checked to see if the straw attached to the balloon was round or was squished by the tape. If it was squished, then we had to squeeze it back into shape so that it would run fast.
What did not work?
Something that did not work was that my partner and I accidentally put the big straws under the car as the axle and connected the small straw to the balloon. This didn’t work very well because when we put the small straw with the balloon, the air in the balloon was let out very slowly, so the car didn’t go as fast. We should have put the smaller straw as the axle, and put the bigger straw in the balloon. This way, the air would be let out faster (more force) and the car could also go faster.
Personal Relevance
In this project, we learned about Newton’s three laws of motion. This relates to the real world because everything has Newton’s laws applying to it at all times. Some examples are rollercoasters, cars, and airplanes. For example, airplanes have a lot of mass, so it takes way more force to accelerate it than to accelerate a feather or something with less mass.
The project I am most proud of is the windmill. I made this project with cardboard, string, and paint. I am proud of it because I didn’t use any glue or tape in any part of the project. Instead, I used the hole puncher and put holes in the cardboard pieces so I could tie them together with string. During this project, I learned that glue and tape are very useful, but there are more creative ways that you can also try.
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