Reflecting on My First Year

My Grade 9 Year 

During my first year here at Centennial Secondary, I have already expanded my knowledge in various areas and experiences, studied the past, understood how it ties into today’s society, how to predict things like weather and what will go well whereas what won’t in a stock market, and learnt about law. I’ve had a lot of good times and fun yet informative work activities to do such as anything related to PHE (Physical Health Education), presentations in business, and anything in math besides ADL. I enjoyed conversations during lunchtime with some of the students in the same class as me, with Dario (one of the janitors), and some of my teachers like Mr. Cook or Ms. Do about our work, what we’ll do later, and diving deeper into topics we covered or that we will cover later. 

I learnt things about religion, phycology, and about Shakespear’s life from Mr. Cook, some history of Canada, the slave triangle trade, colonization of Canada, Charles I, Charles II, the Bloody Court, the France civil war with Louis XVI, the Bill of Rights, the Habious Corpus, the existence of the Grand Remonstrance, trading with the first nations, and sweatshops during the Industrial Revolution vs now and opinions on them from Mr. Wilkinson, a deeper understanding of cell parts, cell reproduction (mitosis and meiosis), understood a ton more of chemistry than I ever did in middle school, and learnt about physics such as kinetic, potential, electric, and static electricity from Ms. Joo. 

I overcame my time management challenges of not getting to school in time, not getting some of my homework done on time, and technically not getting to sleep in time too. No matter the time I woke up, I always distracted myself or spent too much time doing something that I got late for school; it could have been that I decided to start playing games even though I wasn’t fully ready to leave, or that I slept in, or that I decided to work out instead of packing my backpack, all which would make me late for school no matter if I woke up at 6:30 or 7:30, but I always arrived at the same time which was around 5 past the time I was supposed to be there. I was a very slow writer, too much of a perfectionist, and tried to be too accurate when writing information that I went off topic or wrote down true things but still, they were things that weren’t mentioned in the material given to me by my teacher(s). The “technically not getting to sleep in time” is justifiable because I had sleep deprivation at the time, even when writing this I still have sleep deprivation (writing this at 12:17am). Hopefully my sleep deprivation will go away soon, I compensate by exercising and following “you are what you eat.” 

This year, I reached my second goal of researching the prerequisites and requirements to obtain the skillsets and wisdom to follow the path of an astronomer and a medical scientist. I reached my third goal of developing myself in a positive manner, avoided things that could reduce my mental growth and/or physical health. I developed positive habits like the 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens: Be Proactive, Begin with the End in Mind, Put First things First (prioritize), Think Win Win (think of a conclusion where both sides win), Seek First to Understand than to be Understood (listen to something first before giving your absolute, full, or final response), Synergize (work with others to produce a greater result than separate efforts), Sharpen the Saw (take time to self for free time, relaxation, and looking after one’s health). I have developed traits such as respect, honesty, courtesy, modesty, integrity, never set people’s abilities on different standards like someone misogynistic or sexist, and tried my best never to give up on someone or something once giving my attention, time, help, and efforts. 

This year, I realized I learn best by small explanations or visuals if there’s a formula to be learned, and repetition of using new knowledge to retain it and make full sense of it. 

When having difficulty with something, I turn to my mother if its for grammar or science, my dad if its for religion, math, or history, and both if its for business. I turn to Mr. Cook if its for psychology or poetic devices, I turn to my extracurricular math teachers, Ms. Do, and Ms. Lam for math, and I turn to my uncle (mom’s brother) or Ms. Olchway if its tech. 

Favourite Website 

I don’t have a favorite website for educational purposes but I can say https://www.google.ca would be my favorite because its where I access all information, articles, games, pictures, videos, and examples on various assignments. 

Favourite Video 

For videos as well, I don’t have a favorite. I chose this one because I like math and without it, I wouldn’t know how to solve math questions ahead of my grade. I don’t care if I’ll do it later on and have time, its math so I’m eager to learn it. 

Favourite Picture 

I chose this picture to be my favourite (totally didn’t make this picture right when I saw this assignment in teams) because its a reflection of all the PowerPoints I made which I am proud of since I put effort into them, but also because it gives me a trip-down-memory-lane of some of the things I’ve covered throughout the school year everytime I look at them. 

Just by looking at them, I remember what I did in those PowerPoints and for what class. 

English 8 & 9: Poem definition, I did that in grade 8 but added more in grade 9, the poem definition was just a small assignment to put down five poetic devices we learned so far at that time, I added more than I was supposed to that it went into the twenties, I added more in grade 9 to put it into the thirties. A Wrinkle in Time is a book and a movie. I did a PowerPoint in a video format reflecting on the storyline and characters in the book version even though I really wanted to do the movie, it was against the instructions (so it wasn’t as cool). 

Business 9: The 1980 Recession was due to tight money related policies to fight mounting inflation, ending in interest rates dropping but unemployment rates hitting 24% then dropping to 17% by the end of the year. It was also due to the Iranian revolution energy crisis which caused a disruption to the global oil supply. The economy was building up to the recession since the 1960s and is quite surprising that it took two decades for things to start going downhill. Business, politics, and history are not my interests so I’m happy I did this in a group. The business flowchart is just the process of what happens once an online order is placed, it was a very small project but required a ton of research. 

Science 9: The background looks like an amazing work of art, and even though it only took me three consecutive hours to make those ten detailed and informative slides, it took three consecutive hours. 

Favourite Quote 

“Everything has a formula. Knowledge are building blocks to construct items in which you discover new formulas.” -Irfan Sonawala 

This is the most true quote I could find relating to education. I chose this quote out of all the quotes there are because of favoritism towards the fact that my father made it on the spot when I asked him for a quote, and when it comes to education I have no quotes in mind. 

Work Cited

“3d Render, Abstract Minimal Background, Glowing Lines, Triangle…” IStock, 26 Sept. 2018, https://www.istockphoto.com/photo/3d-render-abstract-minimal-background-glowing-lines-triangle-shape-pink-blue-neon-gm1043738820-279383067.

“5 Hidden Gem Places to Visit in Kyushu.” Japan Today, 22 Aug. 2020, https://japantoday.com/category/features/travel/5-hidden-gem-places-to-visit-in-kyushu.

A Wrinkle in Time. Directed by Ava DuVernay, Legend3D, Walt Disney Pictures, Whitaker Entertainment I, 2018. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1620680.

“Recession Will Likely Be Longest in Postwar Era.” NBC News, 8 Mar. 2009, https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna29582828.

“Particle Drapery Luxury Gold Background 3d Stock Illustration 1417319138.” Shutterstock, https://www.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/particle-drapery-luxury-gold-background-3d-1417319138. Accessed 18 May 2023.