Astronomy Parents' Blog Post

Something that my dad learned was that there isn't any proof as to seeing life forms in our galaxy. Another thing that my dad learned from my lab lesson is that NASA has been using the Hubble Telescope to take many of the amazing pictures of the galaxy that we've seen everywhere. My dad thought that I could've been a bit more confident towards my topic, but still showed confidence throughout my presentation, he thought I needed to do a bit more practice, without looking at my notes too often. One question that my dad had was how long would it take to make a suitable and most accurate telescope in order to find life on the galaxies?

Project Adventure Reflection

Throughout our class period today, I feel as many of the task roles have showed throughout my group. I think for myself, the task roles that would best represent me would be the helper. I also feel as everyone in my group including myself also share the task role of the brainstormer/initiator. In class today I showed the task role of the helper, especially when I helped by collecting all of the needed equipment. For example, I went to the equipment area to collect dodgeball, hula hoops, jump ropes, and spots. By doing this, I quickened group movement by helping and doing things for my group. At the beginning, I helped collect all of the equipment, and helped place the right materials in the right area. Another situation where I showed the task role as the helper was when I helped collect all of the dodgeballs that were all scattered around the field, as well as the coloured spots. Though the whole group showed this task role all together, I showed the task role of being a brainstormer/initiator, as well as the rest of my group because once we were playing one round of our new game, we all knew that something was wrong and that we had to change something. Once I realised what we had done wrong, I made the suggestion of putting more dodgeballs, and putting them closer to the obstacles in order to make the game easier and more fair. One task role that I want to work on next class is the encourager, though our group mainly agreed on most of the suggestions, I feel as we lacked a bit of encouragement, so I would like to work on this factor a bit more. Overall, I feel as in today's class I showed the task roles of the helper, and a bit of the brainstormer/initiator.  

Science Burning Question Reflection

We have just recently started our astronomy unit, and was asked to come up with a burning question that interested not only you, but as well as your partners as well. Our burning question is Can there be other living forms in our galaxies' goldilocks zone, if so why are we not aware of them? This interested me because over the years I've always known about the galaxies, but weren't truly aware of how the galaxies work. Another thing that interested me is life forms being in the galaxy itself, I saw that there have been many debates over life forms in the galaxies but we never seemed to have the answer as of how or what type of life forms, so that really inspired us to do a bit more research. Something that we are still quite confused about relating to our burning question is whether there are actually living forms in our galaxies. We have done a little bit of research relating to it, but haven't gotten a clear answer. We've seen traces of fossils on one of the planets, we've seen that there might be a few other civilisations in the Milky Way. Other than that there hasn't been much of an answer as to whether there have been a trace of life forms. In order to get these answers we will continue to doing more research, and find a lab/lesson in order to help our understanding of the galaxies and it's life forms and in order to help the audience understand our topic more. We need to do a bit more research, and find more details that we could connect to each other in order to find the answer.

ESO. Wide Field Imager View of a Milky Way Look-alike NGC 6744. Digital image. Http://commons.wikimedia.org/. N.p., 1 June 2011. Web. 14 May 2015.

Always With The Questions

Now that I have finished my research and observation, I have a few questions and a few things that I still want to know about my animal. I think that one question that I have is why are white faced sakis more likely to show aggressive behaviours towards other species/primates instead of other males? As I researched, I found out that male white faced sakis don't have as much interaction with other males in the wild, due to the fact that they are usually found in family groupings. But when I was at the zoo, they were grouped as band, and didn't show aggressive behaviour toward each other, instead showed it to the lemurs. How has living in the wild, in a family grouping affected them when moving to the zoo or into captivity? Another question that I have about white faced sakis is how do they defend themselves, for example since they have canine teeth do they use their teeth? As I continued on in my research, I didn't really find much about how they actually fight. So my top two questions is why are white faced sakis more likely to show aggressive behaviours towards other species/primates? And the other questions is how do white faced sakis defend themselves while fighting? If money and time were not an issue, something that I would do to find out the answers is fly myself to northern & central South America and watch white faced sakis in the wild, instead of watching them in captivity. While in the wild, I would like to watch white faced sakis in their natural habitat and in a family grouping. I think that during my stay, I would also want to watch some male on male behaviours if there were any, or I would also like to see how white faced sakis fight. I think that with unlimited money I would like to see what their canines look like up close, since I wasn't able to see any pictures of them. I think that by going into the wild to watch their behaviours up close would really answer my questions. I think this because when other primates come into their territory, the dominate gender which is the male will most likely defend their territory and family. And if there were two dominate males, I would be able to see why they are not very likely to fight. All in all, I hope to find the answers to my questions very soon.

White Faced Saki Blog Post #1

Throughout my research on the White Faced Saki, I've learnt so many things about not only them, but also other primates. I think that one of the most interesting things that I've learnt about White Faced Sakis is that unlike other primates, they have non-prehensile tails. This shocked me the most because looking at their habitat which is neo-tropical rainforests, moist lowlands, and spend most of their times in the tree tops. I thought that with this type of habitat, White Faced Sakis would have a prehensile tail because they would be able to use it to grasp onto tree branches helping them travel. Instead they have a non-prehensile tail. I learnt that the reason why they have a non-prehensile tail is due to the fact that they use it to balance when on tree branches. If I were to put myself in Jane Goodall's shoes something that I would want to learn about the White Faced Saki they're impact on the rainforest, or their impact on the ecosystem. I think that I want to learn about this because every primate has a different effect on the rainforest, so I want to know how they effect it's environment. I think that if I were to be in her shoes, and were able to see them in the wild, up-close, I would want to see their behaviours  in real life. I think that I would want to see all their social behaviours and interactions and how they differ from other primates up-close.

Digital Life Pledge

I know I spend a lot of time on social media such as Instagram, Facebook, Skype, etc. I constantly check it from time to time through out my day. Due to this, I've constantly procrastinated my homework or I will be doing my homework at one time, then stop and scroll through my phone. I tend to not talk face to face with my parents as much now.

I pledge to not go on social media when the time is not right, for example I will only go on social media when I am taking a break from homework or during my free time. I pledge to stop looking at my phone during dinner, and to stop constantly looking at my phone for hours.

Darwin's Theory Game Results

What helped the species that survived 1 million years, had many adaptations that was a mix of all the different species. It had many more adaptations that helped them live through the harshest environments and situations. When the species were going through the winter, you had to make sure you had animals that had a lot of fur in order to stay warm. When the species were living in an environment where fruits or their food sources were at higher distances or heights, you had to make sure your species had a long neck that is long enough in order to reach the food. When the species were going through a situation where predators were invading their homes, you had to make sure that they had long enough legs to run away and stripes in order to hide from them. In order to live one million years, you had to pick the species with a mix of all of those adaptations. With the stripes, long legs, long necks, and fur this species is able to live longer through the harshest environments and are able to live long enough to reproduce.

My Favourite Animal's Adaptations

For today's science homework we were asked to write a blog post about our favourite animal's adaptations and how those adaptations help this animal survive in their environment. Well, my favourite animal is the penguin, and it has many different physical, structural adaptations that help them be successful in their environment. One adaptation that some of the penguin species have are bare patches around their eyes that play as heat windows. Theres areas have no feathers which allows excess heat to escape. These patches become very pink once the penguin is warm. These patches around their eyes help these penguins be successful in their environment because penguins are usually found in colder areas, or when found in warmer areas they use these patches around their eyes to keep them cooled down. Another adaptation is penguins have almond-shaped glands beneath the skin above their eyes which helps them filter out the excess salt from the ocean. The salt drips down their beak, then the penguins make a sneeze-like sound, and then are able to shake the salt off. This adaptation helps them in their environment because penguins usually find their food source in the ocean, eating krill and other sea creatures, penguins tend to spend a lot time in the ocean. With these glands this helps them get rid of the salts. The third interesting adaptation that penguins have that they have a downy under portion of feathers that traps a layer of air against their skin. This layer of air is then warmed by body heat, their feathers overlap and form a barrier, keeping water away from the skin. This layer of skin, helps penguins stay warm from the harshest of winters. This helps them be successful in their environment, because as said before penguins are usually found in colder areas, and by having a layer of blubber and this downy under portion of feathers that traps air helps them stay warm. The fourth adaptation is their webbed feet. A penguins' webbed feet enable penguins to shoot through the water at speeds up to 15 miles per hour. Another thing that the penguin's webbed feet does is they help the penguin steer it's way through the water. The position of their feet on the lower part of the body aids in both steering and hydrodynamics. Penguins also use their webbed feet to release heat. This adaptation helps them be successful in their environment because as said before, penguins spend a lot of time in the water and swimming in the ocean, their webbed feet helps them guide themselves in the right directions. This adaptation also helps them because as said before, penguins tend to be found in colder areas and since their webbed feet provide heat, it helps them stay warm. The last interesting adaptation is that penguins have black backs and white bellies, this pattern of colours is called countershading and helps the penguins camouflage them when it is in the water. And as said before, penguins spend most of their time in the ocean, having these colour is an effective form of protection. Countershading also helps the penguins hunt with more success. This adaptation helps the penguins be more successful in their environment because since this countershading camouflages them when they are in the water, they are able to hide from predators and are able to protect themselves. This also helps them safely and effectively hunt their food underwater. Overall, penguins have many adaptations that help them be successful in their environments.

Poetry Podcast

Genius Hour Update #7

Today in class, I continued on my research. I think that I've learnt a lot more this class, I think that some transferable knowledge is the three factors that make up success on youtube. The article I read that really helped me was written by Freddie Wong, a fellow youtuber, who makes skits and short films. He mentioned in the article that there aren't any secrets behind the success on youtube, it's about defining your goals, listening to your audience and making quality content. This led me to further learning, and it helped connect the dots of what actually helped with success on youtube. It helped me come up with some sort of answer to my driving question. What makes a successful youtuber has many factors to it, by making high quality content with good lighting and a good quality camera, will attract viewers to watch your videos. By keeping a consistent schedule with your content, and making youtube videos that you enjoy making, this will make viewers want to come back to your channel, soon building your fan base and support, getting more views and doing something you love will bring you success.

Infomercial Reflection

What is the message your infomercial is attempting to convey? 
The message that our infomercial is trying to convey is that you don't need a picture perfect body to be the picture perfect image. We decided to convey this message because many youths in today's society struggle with eating disorders and body images due to the fact that media and many other factors influence people to be a specific image. By conveying to people that you don't need a perfect body in order to fit into today's society would really help decrease the risk of having or developing an eating disorder. 
What are the facts to support this message?

• Up to 24 million people of all ages and genders suffer from an eating disorder (anorexia, bulimia and binge eating disorder) in the United States.
• 86% report onset of eating disorder by age 20; 43% report onset between ages of 16 and 20.6.
• In a survey of 185 female students on a college campus, 58% felt pressure to be a certain weight, and of the 83% that dieted for weight loss, 44% were of normal weight.
• 69% of girls in 5th-12th grade reported that magazine pictures influenced their idea of a perfect body shape.
• From ages 15-24, anorexia is the most common cause of death.

What are the visuals to support this message?

Throughout the video, we show visuals that support these facts. And at the end we show a picture of a person looking at their reflection, we then have the caption of our message. We thought that if we show the audience the negative effects of having an eating disorder and what it does to one's body, that we would be able to convey the message to accept your body and to not want to be somebody else.

What is the audio to support this message?

We included some sad/happy song, during the clips of where we give the audience facts about eating disorders, the song that we included was sort of sad yet not depressingly sad. We didn't do any voice overs, because we thought that it would give off a better voice and mood if we weren't speaking.

How have you presented your message in a way that will engage your audience?

We used video clips that we film ourselves, and picture. I think that this will engage the audience because the clips that we show relate to the facts, instead of including video clips that don't connect to the message at all.

Genius Hour Update

Today's class period, I continued to watch videos on the making of a successful youtube channel. One new piece on information that I have received from the youtube channel, youtube.com/drawwithjazza is that when you first get started you should be finding a way to be different from the other channels who are trying to do the same thing as you. I think that this piece of information really helped my research, because it makes me think of the youtubers that are currently very big on youtube, what makes them different from the other channels that are doing the same exact thing. I think that one thing that really makes them different is their personality, but I think that I still need to continue to research about this situation/question. I think that I'm planning on making my own youtube video as my final project, but I'm not quite sure what my video should be about. I think that I will continue to do more research to help me support my question and the definite answer to the question.

Dairy Farm Field Trip

Passion Hour Update

Today, I continued on my research by watching youtubers and other youtube channels. At the beginning of this class, I had the thought of using one specific youtuber as a mentor. I thought that if I was able to direct message them, maybe I would be able to have more of the questions I have answered by them. I know that she may not answer them, but I decided to go for it. I asked the questions, "How do you maintain a successful youtube channel? What factors make up a successful youtube account? And do you think that having connections on youtube affect your success?" Another thing that I did today was answering many different surveys that were sent by other students in the class. I think that I will continue to plan on researching, and to think of ideas for my final project.

Genius Hour Update

At the beginning of the class, I wasn't quite sure how I wanted to interpret my question. I was confused on whether I would be focusing on how youtubers were becoming successful in earning money. Or whether I was focusing on how youtubers were becoming successful in a way that attracted viewers to watch their videos leading them to earning more subscribers. I continued to think about it and began to realise that both of those things mentioned above were factors to success for a youtuber. And that's when I began to organise my research and information. I began to search up videos on youtube about how some of the youtubers began a successful YouTube channel, and how they maintained to keep it successful. I started off watching a few videos from some of the youtubers that I had watched before, I could say that I used them as a mentor. What I had realised was how both of them had mentioned a few factors about good quality videos and how to built up a successful youtube channel. They talked a lot about lenses, cameras, lighting, backgrounds, etc and how these little things could make a video look professional and put together. Another factor would be fanbase and networking, but I had realised that if someone just started off making videos they wouldn't instantly have a fanbase. So I thought that having better quality videos would attract subscribers and viewers, soon building a network. I think that with a bit more research, I'll be able to see how I want to make my project. I had an idea of making my own youtube video, but I wasn't too sure. I'm looking forward to continuing my research and to starting my project.

Genius Hour Entry #2

As mentioned in the previous blog post, we have just started a new project called the Passion Project or also known as the Genius Hour. The first step of this project was to create a driving question to lead us and to use during this project. So today in class, we began deciding on our driving questions. In the beginning of class today, I was mostly worried because I had no idea what my passions was. I had an idea of what my passions were, but I wasn't sure how to make my passion into a driving question. I think that after discussing with others, it really helped me decide which passion to pick and what question I could ask. At the beginning of the discussion, I was a bit frustrated. I began to feel frustrated because no matter how many times I repeated the question, I couldn't make it into a deeper driving question. After minutes and minutes of deciding which passion to follow for this project, I had decided to do something on video content and video makers like YouTubers. I think that after finally deciding which passion to decide on, I thought that, that made the process easier. Almost at the end of the hour, I had finally decided on a question. The question was, "What is it that makes a YouTuber successful (or not)?" Overall, I'm looking forward to beginning this project.

Genius Project Blog Entry #1

Recently in RLA we've been introduced to a project called the Genius Hour or the Passion Project. This project allows students to follow their passions, students are allowed as much freedom to create a project that reflects on their passions. I think that one thing that excites me about this project is how much freedom we get. We're allowed to pick a driving questions that pushes us to create a project that we like, so long it's built on our passions. I think that having freedom in this project excites me because usually we don't have much say in the type of project. Usually in our RLA class, we are given a topic to find research about, and to create something specific like a video or a story. I think that with this project, the possibilities are endless, we are able to follow our passions and we're allowed to be different from others. And in this case, being different and doing something different from others is a good thing.

Although this project does seem fun and is a great way for us, the students to follow our passions. There are a few things that do frighten me about it. I think that one thing about this project that frightens me is how much freedom we get and how many passions I have. I think that having many passions may be a bit frighting because since we have many passions that we are passionate about it's difficult to decide which passions to do the project on. For me, I'm not quite sure what passions I have. It frightens me because without knowing what passions we have it gives me more of a difficulty to decide what I want to do the project on. I think that having way too much freedom in this also frightens me because since I'm so used to having been told what to do I think that with too much freedom I would get stuck and may get confused in the middle. I think that at the moment what frightens me the most is what I decide to do my project on. Overall, I think that I'm quite excited about this project.

Realistic Fiction

Above is a story that Amelia and I have written, she has written the sequel which is the second story that is included. One of the writing techniques that I am really proud of that I included in my story was the again and again of the mentioning of "her" or "she." Obviously, when I mentioned the "her" or the "she" I wasn't talking about Ember, I was writing about a character that was very important. Using this again and again technique, it really helped build tension throughout the story and leaded to the plot twist at the end. I was really proud of my plot twist at the end, and I thought that by using a sign post it would really help build up the plot. Another scene that I really enjoyed writing and was proud of the fight between Ember and her father. I thought that I was really proud of that scene because the change in Ember's personality really shined through. Overall, Amelia and I really enjoyed writing these stories. 

RLA Quilt Reflection

I think that by creating a quilt square based on my book, made my understanding of the book grow even more. I think that one thing that helped my understanding grow with this project, is that everything and every single detail we put onto our quilt square had to relate or represent something that had to do with the book. This meant that if you chose a specific colour or material, it would have to relate to your theme or you golden line. When I was creating the ripped up door, I had a deeper think about what it really represented. As I wrote about it, I realised that the ripped up pieces of paper really represented her life, how it was all broken up into little piece which showed how many problems she had, but every piece was glued together to represent her "new life." I think that this project helped me have a better understanding on not only the book, but also the different themes. What I was originally planning on showcasing in my quilt patch, was the theme, "changes that happen in your life, may come with many flaws, but you should always accept it." After fully understanding the book, and creating this, helped my understanding of the characters and the theme grow even more. Though Kira-Kira by Cynthia Kadohata, may have many themes being mentioned many times throughout the book. The biggest theme I've learnt from the book and quilt square was that, "Even when your life seems like it's falling apart, we have to accept that it's a sign that we're still alive." Overall, I thought that this project helped my understanding of the book grow a lot.

Our Food Supply Is In Jeopardy

We've all heard of farmers or crop growers spraying their crops with insecticides. What we weren't aware of is how hurtful it is to not only our population, but also the pollinator's population. What we didn't know was the our food supply is in jeopardy. Everyday, farmers or crop growers are using insecticides to protect our food, which is their crops. You may ask, "How does that make our food supply in jeopardy? Isn't it a good thing that they're using insecticides to spray our foods, it means that we won't find insects in them and that they won't be chewed up by bugs, right? " To answer your question, no. We never want farmers or crop growers to be spraying our food, because not only is it affecting the insect population, but also our population. Insects are the main reason why our food supply is high at the moment. The reason why insects help us with our food supply is because insects such as bees and butterflies are the ones who pollinate the flowers//plants to reproduce into the fruits and vegetables we eat today. If we continue to spray insects, our the flowers//crops will not be able to be pollinated by these insects. If these flowers are not being pollinated, our food supplies will decrease. Imagine a world, where our food supplies are starting to decrease. We all know that if our world doesn't have enough food, our population will start decreasing, and soon the world will no longer exist without humans. Bees, which are one of those insects that are able to pollinate, are reducing by 35%. Bees are pollinating 1/3 of our food supplies. While for monarch butterflies, their population reduced from 1 billion to 35 million. But what can we do about this problem? Well, I think that we should encourage farmers and crop growers to stop spraying their crops and flowers. This will than allow insects to pollinate the flowers//plants, soon we won't have to worry about our food supplies being in jeopardy. We need to take action, to not only help their population, but also to help our population.