“Laughter is an instant vacation”

In the third quarter in Mr. Raisdana’s class, we created poetry. We started off by asking who liked poetry and was interested in learning about it to who disliked it and had no interest about it. I was one of those people in between. Mr. Raisdana was very confident and said that by the time we were done with this unit, we would’ve all went up the scale, not necessarily to loving poetry, but liking it. Throughout the poetry unit, we learned vocabulary and types of poems that we could write. Almost every day in class, we would read poems by a famous poet, analyze it as a class, and then write one of our own poems similar to the one we read. Lastly, we were assigned a project: to make a poetry book containing our own poems. This was probably the best part in the whole poetry unit because it made it feel like a great accomplishment and adding creativity to the book made it even more personal. Throughout this journal, I will tell you how I accomplished each ESLR and what I didn’t accomplish.

By being a self-directed learner, I accepted responsibility for my own learning. I also took creative risks in developing untried ideas for the poetry book. Almost everyone else bound their book together by holding it together through holes, but I decided to try something untried and just put a ribbon through the middle without holes, which looked much simpler. Also, my book was all paper; it was kind of like a collage of paper with different shapes, sizes, and colors for each page. I think that looked good and it made it more personal because the paper is all very brightly colored and it’s all over the place, but still neat, in a way. If I were to do this again, I would definitely have started a bit earlier, even though I started a few days after it was assigned. At the end, I felt rushed but confident I could finish, so I continued making everything very neat and placing everything carefully. If I had organized all the poems, pictures, and paper where I wanted them to go first, it would’ve been much easier and more efficient. I believe demonstrating competency in goal setting, time management, and organizational skills was the best used to help make and write the book, participate in poetry night, and complete the teen life project. This is because I set goals to finish before the deadline for the teen life project and the book, and have it be really good quality. I believe I did a good job of completing these two projects. I think I did an outstanding job of being a self-directed learner while making and writing the book, participating in poetry night, and completing the teen life project. On a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being poor, and 10 being outstanding, I would give myself a 9.

By being an academic achiever, I demonstrated the ability to work both independently and collaboratively during this poetry unit. When I was working on the book, I was doing it independently and creating it all from my own personal ideas and thoughts, whereas when I was working on the teen life project, I had to interact with others over the internet to get work done. We cooperated well and we could get our work done. On the day of the poetry night, we had a lot of planning and organizing to do, so everyone was assigned jobs and we all worked hard for the time we had. In the end, we had to piece all of the work together which resulted in a fantastic poetry night enjoyable for the whole family. I definitely demonstrated technological literacy and the use of technology as a tool for the efficient and creative completion of a project for the teen life project because we did not get a chance to talk to these people in person, so we had to communicated through comments on the internet. I finished my part of the project well, which proves that I had technological ability, though next time I would have liked to communicate through other ways other than just commenting (ex: email or msn) because I feel that it would be nice to have other things to work with when the learnerblogs site is down. Also for the book, I had to type up poems and print them out to put in my book, and I made different parts of the poems different fonts, which matched the mood at the time. I think I did an admirable job of being an academic achiever, and I would give myself 8 out of 10.

I was a critical thinker because I solved problems using a variety of strategies. When I started the book, I realized that I didn’t know how I was going to bind it, and then I decided to punch holes and tie it together with ribbon. But when it came time to bind it, there were too many pages in the book to hole punch, so I decided to not punch holes and instead tie it through with ribbon. This was a creative and efficient way of binding the book, and also, no one else thought of that. I also gathered, analyzed and processed information from a variety of sources during the teen life project when I posted my ideas and thoughts about what I think the project should have in it. I asked the other people in my group what they thought the poems that I wrote should be like, and what mood they should have in them. Next time, I would’ve asked them to ask me anything about my opinions on how they should do there part. This would’ve allowed more conversation between people. I think I did a worthy job of being a critical thinker, and I would give myself 8 out of 10.

By being an involved citizen, I demonstrated care and concern for the environment. When I made my book, I cut out pictures from magazines instead of printing them off of the internet. Also, I used scraps of leftover paper to decorate and enhance the pages in my book so that I wouldn’t have to throw them away. Next time, I would’ve told people to bring more garbage bags because there was only one, which was obviously not going to be enough. I also interacted respectfully with people of diverse cultures during the teen life project, where I had to talk and work together with people from all over the world. I showed this also during poetry night, where I was in charge of a booth for a while. I talked to parents and showed them how to write poems from a picture, which was quite interesting. I think I did magnificent job of being an involved citizen, and I would give myself 9 out of 10.

Lastly, I was an effective communicator by demonstrating my creative talents to convey ideas when I made my poetry book. I made the book very personal and anyone who knew me well would think so too. I made my book look like a scrapbook because I make scrapbooks and a picture and a caption shows a lot, and in this case the caption would be the poem. Also during the teen life project, I created a poem for the topic ‘air and water pollution’, and I made it sarcastic which is like the way I talk to some people. The idea was to get the main point across but still make it so that it was fun to read. I listened respectfully and asked questions to facilitate understanding and achieve insight during the teen life project. I asked my team members what they thought I should do and told me any ideas they had. A few of them were quite good, which resulted in the final product of my part of the project. Also during the poetry night, I listened and answered any questions the parents had at the booths. For the poetry book, I accepted my teacher’s comments on the poems and changed them. I think I did a great job of being an effective communicator, and I would give myself 8 out of 10.

Overall, I think I did a great job showing how I was being each ESLR. There is obviously more room for improvement, as the notes above say, so I will try to improve to the best of my ability. I think I did a pretty job completing the 6 levels of bloom’s taxonomy, but there’s still room for improvement.

Well, to begin, my name is Catrina and I am 13 years old. I try to be an open minded person, sports are my weakness, and I’ve been told that I have good imagination. I live in an international community, which consists of many different people from different cultures and backgrounds. I think it’s kind of cool actually; you get to see how different people act, speak, and react. Just by going to school with them, I get to know a lot about each of the people in my grade. I actually feel like it’s a community, where I live, since everyone is pretty close together, not physically though. It’s basically the opposite of what it was like where I came from. The grade was not a community at all, and it was really obvious, even to strangers. There were lots of cliques, and everyone was grouped as either popular, basketball/football players, kind of cool but kind of weird, or not cool. There was only one good thing that I could find out of this, which was because your friends chose you over any other cliques, so instead of having a lot of friends who you don’t know really well, you a few really close friends. But there were so many bad things about it, because people who were not popular felt disconnected, like they weren’t even there. I think that it’s great that everyone can get along, and be able to talk to everybody. It’s a really big deal even though people don’t realize it when they categorize people, because their self esteem is affected by this a great deal.

Another I guess you could call “issue” I’m finding interesting is long-distance relationships. But it’s a bit different, because it’s not with a boyfriend or girlfriend, it’s with friends who have moved away from you. Well there’s this one really confusing part to me, why is it that after a few months or years without talking to a really close friend, you have nothing to say to them and you can’t really relate to them anymore? People say, “it’s because you grew apart since you have nothing that you really know about them anymore.” Well sure, you don’t know what’s happened recently in your life, but you were best friends! You had to had something in common, something there is to talk about! Sure, easier said than done, make new friends. But then you have no childhood friends that you still talk to, no friends that you’ve known since you were a child up till now, so you just have really close friends, you move away or they move away, and then you’re done! End of relationship. Yes you email, sure you send a few letters here and there, but what about seeing them at school and having a blast with them at the mall? So maybe you have to live in the same place as them so that you don’t grow apart.

Also, another one of my issues are pollution. Many people drive cars these days, I don’t blame them, but one day, the entire earth will get so polluted that we won’t even be able to live and breathe a normal life. i think people should care more for the enviroment and save natural resources around the world before they run out. for example, here in malaysia, if you buy a box of crackers, they are all individually wrapped, which is kind of useful, but definetly not nessecary. If they just limited stuff like that, a lot of things would be saved.

If there’s anything else that you want to know, ask me. I’ll get to know you better hopefully.