Goal: I want to improve on my critical thinker skills by thinking more outside the box during projects.
Math: I can achieve this goal by doing the exceeding questions (if I have enough time) during summative tests. Another way of showing this is during a project, I can demonstrate more critical thinking by following the criteria and also reaching for an exceeding by demonstrating more understanding.
Science: I can achieve this goal by demonstrating exceptional thinking and adding more text or elements that show that I understand a lot more in projects. Basically the same as in math.
This was when we presented our project to parents. I chose to make this visual project because I’d rather make something out of my hands than to make it on the device. Partially because I think that I’ll get distracted, but more because it’s kind of boring to me to make something about the telephone on a device.
I think that I did well on making the telephone because it looks interesting with the buttons and feels like a real telephone. Something I think that I can work on is adding more colors onto the background to make it more eye-catching. I was about to put a photo of a person in the 1900s reaching out for the telephone in an office, but that idea didn’t work because I had no more time to do that.
Goal Progress: I achieved the goal that said for me to get more exceedings in all subjects. I also achieved the athletic goal that says to reach 38 seconds for 50 back.
Challenges: I struggled to PB every time in every round for swimming. I overcame it by practicing more often to improve my skills.
New Insights: It was super hard to improve my 50 fr or 50 butterfly 2 seconds in like half a year. I thought I could PB every time, but it was actually way harder.
Accomplishments: I’m proud that I got more exceedings now than when school first started, maybe because I found my way to learn?
Revised Goal: Probably not, because my goals are reachable and necessary, it’s just a matter of time that I reach them. For example, for the athletic goals, even though I didn’t improve 2 seconds now, for the next few months before school, I could probably improve.
Support System: I received comfort from my friends when I found that I was struggling on grades, and these comforts helped me work harder and receive better grades.
Next Steps: I will continue going to swim practices and try to improve on my skills and speed. For the exceeding part, I will practice math at home and watch more news to get better grades (news for social studies).
I understand how to write an equation to get the new number from the original number and the percentage. I also understand all the vocabulary we learned in this unit. I also understand what is percent change and how to calculate it.
What new information did you learn in this unit?
There were lots of new informations that I learned in this unit. I knew close to none of the vocabularies, such as depreciation, commission, simple interest, etc. I also learned how to calculate percent change. Then, I learned to calculate the final bill including sales tax and tip, I searched on google and found out that china’s VAT (Value Added Tax) is around 13% as the standard rate.
What was interesting in this unit?
I found learning how to calculate percent change interesting because percent change can be used everywhere. Maybe calculating the price difference from two bakeries, and I can find out which has a better deal. It was really interesting for me that our summative project is actually calculating percent change and finding out the nicest deal for two restaurants. I think it was really fun comparing my favorite restaurant with a restaurant I’ve never gone to before. Their dishes were basically the same, but their prices have a big difference.
What was tricky for you in this unit?
One thing that was tricky for me was solving equations. I remember in one of the check for understandings, there was a problem where only two of the n, p, and os (shown in the sheet below), was presented and I had to solve the last variable’s value. It was easy when the percentage and original number was given, but when the new number and percentage was given, I didn’t know how to simplify the equation anymore. So I think that’s a place I should work on.
For this essay, at first, we completed a graphic organizer that includes all the evidences that needs to be included in the final essay. Then, we started our essay with the claim, evidence and reasoning about the positive and negative impacts of the transportation/communication. After writing that, we learned how to write an effective introduction and conclusion, and after that, added it into our essay.
One thing I did well in my essay was choosing relative and effective evidences that fit the claim. One thing that I still need to learn is to write how the evidence links to the claim in the reasoning instead of explaining the evidence.
Part 1 : The essential question I chose to answer was “What happens inside our bodies when we get sick? In this summative process, I learned about the different body systems, cells, tissues, and organelles that interact during the Alzheimer’s disease. This relates to the idea that the body is a system of subsystems made up of groups of cells because in the CER that I wrote, I mentioned that the mitochondria and the nucleus interact by sending stress signals to the cell. Which leads to weird gene expressions, and then to body systems malfunctioning, in this case, is the nervous system. So the nucleus and the mitochondria are organelles, and the nerve cells are cells. Then, the nervous system is a body system. Therefore, the body is a system of subsystems made up of groups of cells (plus organelles).
Part 2:
The learning experience that was most impactful and memorable for me is the dissections of the pig heart, the pig lung, and the bullfrog. It was the best experience for me because I love doing something actually by hand to learn instead of watching videos or doing something on the computer. I also think that these dissections are the most impactful is because I can actually see by eye all of the tissues and blood veins and body systems in these organs, which was really interesting and memorable. Another very impactful experience was when we had the group works, the best one is the VR body project. We picked the nervous system, and it was SO SO SO interesting for me because we could do it all by ourselves, which essentially made me feel like I achieved something really cool. It was also memorable because I learned what it was really to “be” in the body, looking at all the tissues and organs, the knowledge was memorable.
Part 3:
Something that I would like to improve on is remembering to put all labels that are required all the model, the title, the labels, etc. I often forget to put a title label on my visual model and that leads to me getting 2.5s. I can improve on that by reviewing the checklist of required labels to make sure that I can achieve an L3.
This is my artwork I created. It’s name is “Books instead of Phones”. My intended audience is towards everyone. Not only students that are using too much phones, also adults and elders. Books are for everyone, not only for students enrolled in educational classes. Even people that are old should read books. These two stickers are intended to prompt people to read more books than using phones because books bring knowledge. Thus, I used some design strategies to enhance the impact on the audience. For example, for the round sticker, I used to design strategy of Repetition and Familiarity. I wrote big words: “Books Bring Knowledge”, this is a short but strong slogan that can stay in audience’s minds. I also used the Visual Symbolism, color psychology because both of my stickers uses the main color of brown and beige. These colors have a calm and steady impact on audience, making them feel that reading books can bring happiness and stress relief. Moving onto the book-shaped sticker, I used the design strategy of juxtaposition. I put a person looking at the phone at the left, putting question marks and anger marks, but on the other side, I drew a person reading a book, and light bulbs and stars beside her, symbolizing ideas and knowledge. This puts an impact on the audience by making them feel that phones often bring anger and tension into their world, but books bring knowledge, ideas, and new things to them. Similarly, Before-and-After Comparison was also used, notice that there is an arrow in the middle of the phone person and the book person, explaining contrast of a person using phone and a person reading a book.
I understand how to make scale copies of an original figure, and I also understand what the term “Scale Factor” means and I know what the term “Scales” mean. I also understand the formula: Scale Factor squared multiplied by the original area is the new area of the scaled copy. Then, I know what similar figures mean, it means the shapes that have the same form but they don’t have the same size, two similar figures result in one of the figures being a scaled copy of the other figure. Finally, I know how to write a CER based on given information in a problem.
N: What new information did you learn in this unit?
I learned a lot of new information in this unit. At first, I believe it was either in the pretest or the Check For Understanding quiz, I didn’t understand what was a scale factor, I didn’t know this term before. Then, during class, I learned that it’s the number you multiply from x to y. And x and y has to be similar figures. I also learned how to identify the “scale” between 2 similar figures.
I: What was interesting in this unit?
Something that was interesting during this unit is when I learned how to identify the scale between 2 similar figures. I didn’t understand the concept quite yet and first, but after a few classes, I kind of mastered the technique of identifying the scale.
T: What was tricky for you in this unit?
There was a few things that was tricky. For example, I remember that there was a tricky problem that includes inches and feet. So I didn’t read the problem carefully enough and didn’t convert the units, leading to a wrong scale. Another thing that was tricky is when I forgot the formula of the original area to the scaled copy’s area. I kind of mess up when I think that it’s the original area squared instead of the scale factor squared.
How do your final clay piece and name drawing reflect different aspects of your identity (who you are)?
My clay piece and name drawing reflects my identity of who I am. For example, my final clay piece is a scaled copy of my real room. And that reflects my identity because I like my room really much, and lots of things in it like the bed and the violin reflects my identity as well because I love them. My name drawing reflects my identity because in the name drawing, I included elements like the violin and the headphones, that reflects my identity because these two objects are what I use daily. Also, I used the main colors pink and blue because they are my favorite colors. I also included a small figure of Kazuha because she is a anime character I really like, that relates to my favorites and my hobbies.
How did you demonstrate persistence while creating these two works of art?
I demonstrated persistence by not giving up in the clay project. There was a huge problem because my clay was very dry by the time I was in the middle of the project, and I had to use a lot of time to deal with the clay and while continuing the project, so I think that shows my persistence while creating the project. Also, I demonstrated persistence during the name drawing project by not giving up when I messed up a little because I traced my drawing with pencil and it didn’t look good.
From what I learned, I know that to identify if a graph or table shows a proportional relationship, I have to see if the line starts at the origin (0,0) and if the line is straight. For the table, I can use the formula: k=y/x. When y is the value on the right of the table and x is the value on the left of the table. The table is only proportional when all the COPs of the y/x’ are the same.
N: What new information did you learn in this unit?
I learned the formula: k=y/x and y=kx. I also learned to identify proportional relationships. I then learned there was this “Constant of Proportionality” in math
I: What was interesting in this unit?
I think that the vocab “COP” is pretty interesting in this unit. I also think that the summative we did was fun and interesting since we could work with a friend of our own and both design a party AND identify COPs or identifying proportional relationships.
T: What was tricky for you in this unit?
Something tricky was in the summative we did. Agnes and I had some calculation errors for identifying the COPs between values. Maybe it was a calculation error, or we mixed up y and x.
