Mary's Blog!!

La Casa

17gartlandm — Thu, 31 May 2012 03:17:29 +0000

In spanish we made a presentation to sell a house. We had to tell the floors, furniture and where everything was. here is my presentation:

la casa de venta

The Refrigerator

17gartlandm — Wed, 23 May 2012 00:25:41 +0000

In science we were studying electricity so we each studied a device which uses electrical energy. I chose the refrigerator. We made a presentation then recorded our voice on voicethread. here is mine:

It was hard to find some good facts and bad facts so I think if I could do this again I would take more time to find pros and cons about the refrigerator. When I explained the cooling system of the refrigerator, it was quite simple but i still think it explained it clearly.overall, i think there is some things I could improve, but there is some things which I did ok at.

Once a Week Drama journal#1

17gartlandm — Fri, 11 May 2012 13:03:24 +0000

Our unit for drama is puppetry and we are learning about all different types of puppetry as well as learning more about gestures and freeze-frames with speech.

Today we got into partners (I got into a group of three because there was one extra person) and one person put the other person/s into a freeze-frame type of thing. The person had to move the other persons facial expressions and position as if the person they were moving was a doll/clay. Once person 1 finishes styling person 2 and 3, then they say 3,2,1, and the people they formed had to say a speech bubble (sentence/word) as if they were a character, so they had to match it to the position that they got put in. I think we do this exercise because this helps with fast thinking, working in a group(improvising), voice (projection, style) and some others. We got a theme to design for this activity and the other activities. After we got into groups of 4 doing a similar exercise, but in scenes which connected.Everybody presented and we did something slightly different.In a group of 4, we got given 4 sentences for four different people to say in that order, while we were in a freeze frame. It went something like this (I don’t remember exactly) A)oh…, there is a monster B)oh my, are you sure? C)unhand me D)I’ll save you penelope… we performed then it was the end of drama.

This was my journal post for drama on the unit puppetry part 1. It’s my 2 period drama class (1h30mins) summary in 1 paragraph.

Science Poster Reflection-ZINC

17gartlandm — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 07:05:51 +0000

in science, we learnt about elements then made a poster about one. I chose the element zinc for my poster and researched about how it is extracted, problems cause by it, what it is used for, how it effects us and some others. Here is my reflection:

I think that my poster was good on the one world criteria because I think that my poster shows how this element effects us and the environment as well as problems that the element has and an interesting fact. I think that I showed this in my poster by writing it, but to improve, I think I should put more pictures to describe things as well that way the poster looks better and is more interesting.

I think that for the communication area I should have made it better because I don’t think I included that much scientific words, or probably not enough anyways.However, I do think my sentences were pretty clear and had scientific information which was good. I also think that those sentences made relevant points about the element. I also included all the information about the refrences I used for pictures and information.

I think the most challenging part of completing this poster, was the choosing what information to put on the poster (I think I put too much information), and organizing it to make it all fit perfectly. When I first started the project, I expected the researching to be hardest, and it was a t first, but after you find one good site, you start to find a lot of good information, and more good sites. I think for me if I were to create another poster, I would create another poster,

I think that If i were to do a different element on this poster and I got a choice, I think I would choose neon because neon has a lot of good information, and the presentation of neon wouldn’t be too hard to do. I also think that neon is an interesting element, also a lot of people might be interested in neon because most of them know a bit about neon.

I enjoyed making this poster and I think that I put enough information, maybe too much, but I’ll know that for next time.

My poster:

Town Through Time Project Reflection

17gartlandm — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 06:26:04 +0000

In this project, we made 2 pictures, one before the industrial revolution, and one during it.(mostly:May did the one during and I did the one before). then we added annotations. here is my reflection:

In this project, I enjoyed it better then writing a long essay, because we only had to put notes and we could draw to show some details, so its really different. I think that some things in my group that was a success was that we both did the same amount of work, we worked well together, the drawing really helped us in our work, we had good annotations. I think that this project worked pretty well. I think everybody handed it in on time, because it’s a lot easier and more fun to draw and design then just do one long essay.I think the way that this assignment was fun and interesting helped more people finish their projects on time.

I really liked this assignments a lot better then most other assignments so I don’t really have much to improve.I think for my group to improve, maybe we should have done it on a bigger piece of paper, so we could fit more in and explain everything we drew, or at least most things.I think that if we were to do things differently, then I think that if we got more time it might have been good because then we could think of more better annotations. Overall, i thought the project was really fun and a good idea, so those ideas are just a few things which we could improve but don’t have to.

As I said before, me and may did an equal amount of work each.When we were researching, we probably did the same amount of research, but for researching, we didn’t plan out who did what, we just researched what we could, and if we found something interesting to write, then we wrote it. When we were planing the drawings, we both put in ideas to use so planning was something we worked together on. When we were making the actual picture, I did the before one, and May did the during one. I helped May to write most of the notations on pieces of paper for her to stick on. I’d say that we both did an equal amount of work throughout the whole project.

What would be some of the major advantages and disadvantages of living in each time period?

Before the industrial revolution:

advantages:No pollution,fresh air, kids didn’t have to work

Disadvantages:Not much technology, no school for most kids, no cure for most diseases

During the industrial revolution:

advantages:different types of jobs,new technology(more advanced)

Disadvantages:kids worked, loads of pollution

after the industrial revolution:

advantages:More technology, less pollution then ‘during’, cleaner cities, more education, less poverty

Disadvantages:more pollution then ‘before’,

If I had to choose one of those time periods to live in, I would definitely choose to live in the ‘after’ time period because it has more technology, cleaner, more types of cures and education. Also comparing to the industrial revolution, it has less pollution.

Second, I would choose the before the industrial revolution. This is because the “during’ time period is horrible. There was way to much pollution, child labour, it was dirty and there was a lot of diseases.comparing the ‘before time period to ‘during’,before sounds like a much nicer time period to live in, although of course ‘before’ isn’t my first choice.

Extra credit analysis:

I think that these maps might be a bit similar to how they are now if it was Ireland, because Ireland is right next to England so England probably would have told Ireland some of their technology. I think England probably learnt all the new information first though. During England’s industrial, I think that Ireland had a famine, so if you did England’s ind.rev. time and drew the picture of Ireland at that time, I think that the Irish people could be poor and farms would be bad. I think that If you took a picture of Ireland during the Irish industrial revolution, then it might have been very similar to England.I’m not really sure though, it’s just a guess.

storytelling

17gartlandm — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 05:36:17 +0000

our unit in Drama was storytelling. After we learnt a lot of techniques of ways to tell a story, we got into groups of 4 and found a folktale/fairytail/legend/myth from our country.In my group was Me,Iruka,Jamie and Axel and we performed a welsh folktale called “old Gwilim).We practices for a few weeks, including adding interesting storytelling techniques and character changes. Today (april 13) we presented them to one grade 4 class. Here is my reflection & what we acted:-80

Iruka-old lady, person in the bar and a fairy

Axel-old gwilim

Jamie-bar tender, narration, wife, guard

Me-narration, fairy, person in bar, person on street

here is the video

7A Drama: Storytelling Performance from YIS Arts on Vimeo.

I think that in my performance i performed quite well. i think this because I thinK i did well with changing voices for the fairy, i added sound effects with Iruka, I think that I did well changing characters from old person, bar person, fairy and narrator. I also think I spoke loud for everyone to hear, which was a big improvement for me. I think some things i could have improved was my voice for the narrator-maybe I should have made it my voice change more to engage the audience better. overall, there was a few things I should improve, and a few things which I did well.( i think I should have made the fairy voice more high pitch, but I didn’t because when we were acting, I thought it was really high pitch already…)I think one things which we all did good was staying in the character that we changed to.

Some difficulties we had was to get the children to answer. This was a difficulty at first because at the beginning when I asked a question, none of them really answered. I don’t think they knew to answer. After a few seconds, one person answered, then a lot of other people answered. I think that if I were to do this again, I should have acted more like I was asking them the question. I could have asked a few people one by one, then more people might answer.this is one way shich I think I should improve in.

Some of my achievements was speaking louder and changing my voice. Also in the practices, when we weren’t doing anything(playing a character) we were just kinda standing around walking around, talking, but in the actual performance, we stayed at the side and did ound effects etc. Even in practices when me and Iruka did the sound effects, they were never on time, together. In the performance, our body percussion and sound effects were together and therefore sounded a lot better.The last thing that we did was that we didn’t pause and didn’t forget any of words so we were just standing their doing nothing..stuck for words.

I think that one group which was successful was Anju, Katie, Ren and Charles’s group. I think that their group’s performance was good because they made the kids laugh. The way they acted made it funny and i think that it was good because kids really enjoy funny things so when they made the kids laugh, the kids started to pay attention more. I also think one thing which made their performance good was that they stayed in character so the kids understood what was happening very clear.One of the last things I think made their group’s performance good was they had volume and made the kids become in the story by asking them questions.
The only problem which I saw in that group was the long pause in the middle of their performance, but other tgen that, everything seemed really good with that group.
here is their video:

7A Drama: Storytelling Performance from YIS Arts on Vimeo.

Las Estaciones de Colores

17gartlandm — Wed, 14 Mar 2012 03:53:26 +0000

In spanish class, we wrote poems about a season. We had to include some specific information, and we could add anything extra. From writing this poem, I learnt some new words which I hope I’ll remember I really enjoyed writing this poem so I hope you enjoy reading it…

My poem:

En otoño yo veo muchos colores

Rojo, amarillo y marrón

Me gusta el Otoño porque

Es como un bosque

Es muy bonita

En Otoño tu llevas muchas ropas

Las camisetas y pantalones cortos

o los jeans y chaquetas,

yo quiero los jeans, y las camisetas

la ropa es bonita

En Otoño no hace calor y no hace frío, es perfecto,

así que tiene muchos actividades

Me gusta Jugar al fútbol con mis amigas,

También en otoño, leer un libro y descansar

Me gusta pasar un rato con las amigas

En otoño yo miro las hojas bailar al suelo

Muchas colores bailar

La hojas son muy bonitas

El Otoño es como un arco iris

El sol es vivo rojo

Las hojas son naranjas, amarillas y marrónes

El cielo es azul celeste

Y la hierba es verde

Los colores son muy bonitos

El Otoño es perfecto

El tiempo es perfecto

Los colores son perfectos

Porque el otoño es la estación perfecta

Y, es bonita

Mary Investigating mining

17gartlandm — Mon, 12 Mar 2012 06:35:11 +0000

In science we did a mining experiment. We wrote our procedures, aim reflection etc. We handed them in and got our grades back and some advice. Now we have to answer two questions. The questions are

Which parts of criteria D and E were you most successful at demonstrating in the assessment?

Which parts of criteria D and E could you have improved on?

Here are my answers:

I think Some things In criteria D and E that I was successful at was one, I wrote the procedure then followed the steps so I didn’t make mistakes.Also in the reflection I evaluated the reflection.Another thing was that I also designed a clear chart and a table explaining our results

I think some things I could have improved on in this experiment was some of my conclusion and reflection. I think it was mostly OK but there was some points there which I could have improved. For example, In the conclusion I only compared our results to one other groups and I don’t think I gave much evidence.

I think I did quite well in this experiment even thought I might have a few things to improve.

Line Drawing Reflection

17gartlandm — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 10:22:15 +0000

This second unit for art, we did line drawings with a at least 3 different pieces of paper.Each paper separated. The background, middle ground and foreground, then at the end we stuck them all together as one piece with spring-like paper to make each layer pop up from the other. My background was the sky, clouds and mountains. My middle ground was the path,bushes and grass. My foreground was people. unit topic:Make your mark Unit question:how can we communicate visually? Unit concept:What are the big ideas?What do we want our students to retain for years in the future?

Some things I got better at during this unit was mostly different lines(of course). I learnt how to draw stipple, crosshatching, hatching, scumble etc.We learnt the names of a lot of types of lines, learnt what type of things you use them for and how to draw them. After practicing I got better and better at it. I even did the background and middle ground of my drawing again to improve the lines and shadows. Which is another thing I got better at during this unit, showing the shadows. I learnt how to show shadows best and curves in items like sphere using lines.I think I got a lot better at drawing with line since this unit because at the beginning of the unit my piece had only a few types of lines, but at the end, I used more line techniques which made it look better. Another thing I improved on was shadows, gradation and tone. In my first try at a line drawing, all the tone was the same, there was no gradation and no shadows. Now in my final peice, I have a light source, more tone and gradation. From my first piece to my last, it became a lot better in a lot of ways like that.

Something I should improve in my work would be the path. When I drew the path, I didn’t really know how to draw it so when I finished, it didn’t look as good as it would if I knew how to draw my path. Another thing for improvement is the rule of thirds. In my piece, the people should have been more to the right or left but they were in the middle of the path so it wasn’t following the rule of thirds. I think that using the rule of thirds in my work would help my picture look better. Even though I think I improved in tones and gradation, I think there is still more to improve. I think this because for one of my bushes, I completely scumbled it, but I think should have left some white spaces where the light is shining. If I leave white spaces and don’t fill it in completely, then it will show light and shadow as well as making the picture look better. The last thing which I should improve is line techniques because some of my line techniques are too similar. I think this because around the mountains in the piece, the water and the sky blend in because for both the mountains, water and sky, they are all lines, there was no stipple or scumble etc. If I changed one of the three to be stipple or a different line technique, it would have shown the separation lines more clear and made my piece look better.

Some ways to improve my artistic skills from this unit would be of course practice. After I practice a few times, I’ll know what type of lines look nice for what, how dark to draw the lines and if the lines should be curved or straight.I think this is important because If I don’t do this, then my piece will take longer to complete and I might have to do it again, which would waste time. However If I did this as practice and planning, then it wouldn’t matter if I made a mistake because then it would be useful for me to know in the future. This would be in my planning and practice when I do this. Then For research I should see what looks nice for water etc and should use similar line techniques in my piece. When I did my research I didn’t research much on line techniques that would be useful to me and easy enough to do. The main one thing these would have helped with would be for me to learn various line techniques then be able to apply various line techniques. I think I need to learn how to do this better so that when I do my final piece, I know various line techniques and which types I should use for the certain things I draw.

This unit I think I improved a lot, especially comparing my first drawing to my final piece, I think that I did improve a lot. In my first drawing, I used less different types of line which made everything look very similar. In my final piece I used different types of lines.I still have somethings which I should improve but I’m proud of my improvements this unit.

My first try at line drawing

My final Piece

Semester 2 goals

17gartlandm — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 03:49:11 +0000

I think one IB learner profile which I should improve in would be communication or risk-taker. I think I should improve in communicate my ideas in class more because if my ideas are correct/good, then it will be better for me. To improve this, I think I should say my ideas in class, and hope they are right, if they are not, then I will know that it is incorrect. I think I should be a risk-taker, because If I don’t know what we are learning about in a new subject, and I don’t understand the topic well, I should try to guess and try because if I do, then I might be correct, but I will also understand the topic better and learn about it faster. To improve this, in class even if I don’t know about the topic well, I should think about what I do know about the topic, or things connected to the topic. Those are two IB learner profiles which I think I should improve in for the end of this year.

I think that one value which I should improve by the end of the year would be to be supportive of others. I this is very important because if your supportive to others and help them keep going, then they’ll do that to you. To improve this, I think I should help my closest friends first, then all my friends, then my classmates. I think that improving to be more supportive of others is good because others need support, and so do I, support helps people keep going so I think it is very important that we support friends and classmates:)