In my titration lab, I was able to demonstrate the communication core competency, specifically the collaboration portion. The lab required plenty of communication between my partner and me to ensure we could reach our end goal successfully. We divided up a few small responsibilities to do individually after reading over the procedure, and did the rest side by side to ensure the lab was conducted to the best of our abilities. Having a partner allowed me to feel more confident in my work because there was someone else also focusing on the same task at hand. Collaborating was an important part of this lab because if there had been poor communication between my partner and me, there are many things that could have gone wrong. I can take on roles and responsibilities in a group; I do my share.
I demonstrated the Thinking Core Competency in my exponents project about stopping the spread of harmful bacteria in Math 9. In this project, I showed that I can connect mathematical concepts to each other and to other areas and personal interests. I researched how quickly bacteria multiply and created a formula to show how much it would multiply in a certain amount of time, I then explained this in words, provided ways to prevent the spread of bacteria, and explained why it’s harmful. This short presentation showed my growth in this course as I learned a lot and helped educate others. I also demonstrated that I can develop a body of creative work over time. I created a short but engaging presentation that had many visuals and helpful information about bacteria on display for others to read and learn from. This was the first presentation I have made in math class and I have grown in this core competency immensely, I showed my thinking skills by creating a body of creative work and researching and connecting topics in math and science.
Personal/Social Core Competency + French 9 Example
Completing this family tree presentation in French 9 allowed me to show my growth in my Personal/Social Core Competency and French 9 Curricular Competency. I can understand that my identity is made of many interconnected elements and part of that is my family, doing this project allowed me to look at my family tree and see who helped shape who I am today. I got to share about a few of my family members with my classmates while speaking French which demonstrates my growth in this curricular competency as well. I can exchange ideas and information using complete sentences, both orally and in writing which I showed in this presentation. I have written in French before but I have not spoken it publicly but I did which showed my growth. This project allowed me to learn about my family, share what I learned with my class, and improve my French speaking/writing skills. I am so proud of how much I learned in the French 9 course and how much I improved throughout the months.
Completing my picture analyzing project demonstrated how much growth I have had in my Communication Core Competency and English 9 Curricular Competency. The main goal of this project was to focus on analyzing and understanding the plot structure of a book, we were tasked with choosing a children’s storybook to read. I have not had the chance to do a project like this in English where we all worked on one poster along with a few paragraphs together, I’ve only done it alone. To allow us to reach our full potential we communicated our strengths to each other and split up the tasks equally which allowed us to support one another and complete the task efficiently. I grew in my collaboration skills since in discussions and conversations, I helped to build and extend understanding by taking notes about the task at hand and sharing it with my group to make sure we all understood what was required for this project. Taking notes allowed me and my group to stay organized and successful. I was able to apply appropriate strategies to comprehend written, oral, and visual texts, guide inquiry, and extend thinking. We took notes, asked questions, and analyzed our story to further comprehend the images. For this project, I demonstrated my communication skills by understanding and sharing information about a topic of interest in a clear, organized way.
For the project above we had to focus on analyzing images and understanding the plot structure of a book, our task was to find a children’s storybook, figure out the plot structure, and “read” the images. Before we started this project I was unaware of all the details that go into children’s storybooks/graphic novels, the pictures are illustrated in ways that can give them a deeper meaning such as pointy shapes to illustrate fear and the colour blue to illustrate sadness. In graphic novels, the spacing between pictures can show how much time has passed and the image’s border can portray the mood of that scene. With all of this new knowledge, pictures show me so much more. The quote, “A picture is worth a thousand words,” was proven to me during this project because small details could have multiple-sentence explanations to deepen the plot.
Core Competency Reflection
An example of where I built upon someone else’s ideas is when we were planning out our short graphic novel and my group members were talking about the shape of the border and I suggested using colour to further display the mood of the scene.
An example of something I have spent a lot of time learning about is how simple shapes can appear as detailed images without adding any of the details. Colour and size can imply many things such as emotion, age, importance to the story, and more.
What did you learn about determining a character’s physical appearance? Explain how you figured out what your Avatar would look like.
I had to read through the book to figure out if any lines talked about their appearances. Some parts of their appearance weren’t described so I had to make an informed guess as to what they looked like. This included rereading certain sections where they might have called them a word that referenced their looks. An example of this is in Act 3, scene 2, when Lysander says, “Away, you Ethiope!” to Hermia. The line is insulting but I could find the definition of the word and understand Hermia’s appearance more.
What did you learn about determining the setting of a story? How did you apply this to choosing the images in your movie?
I learned that you have to fully read and understand the text to figure out where the story is taking place. The setting wasn’t mentioned that many times so I had to read the lines to figure out where they might be when they are talking. The mood of the scene also influenced the choice of the images for our movie.
Explain what the word mood means in literature and movies. What mood did you decide on for your movie? Why did you pick the song that you picked?
Mood refers to the emotional atmosphere that the writer has created with the lines, for example, if the lines in the scene talk about a bright sunny day it creates a mood of happiness and joy. The mood we decided on was a little bit sad with little hints of joy, the song isn’t so upbeat that you feel overjoyed and it’s also not heartbreaking. It is right in the middle which allows you to link the song to the movie perfectly.
This story was heartbreaking yet heartwarming at the same time, each character had their own story, all intricate and unique.
Core Competency Reflection
An example of where I built upon someone else’s ideas is in our conclusion paragraph. We originally decided that one group member would write it and that would be it, after reading what they had written I decided that we could write something better. We merged our ideas while using the original paragraph to create something that better summed up the movie.
In discussions and conversations, I help to build and extend understanding by sharing my point of view with the group to see if we have a mutual understanding. If we didn’t all share the same ideas about what’s happening, I would take the time to support my thoughts with evidence to hopefully allow the group to have the same understanding I do.
Some skills I have developed to make my creative activities better are communication and research. Examples of this are instead of sectioning off the project and not communicating with the group, we would talk to each other about ideas we had and what we thought about each other’s work. This allowed us to have a more creative and interesting project. An example of research was taking the time to reread certain sections of the book to make sure we all knew what we were writing about and explaining in our project.
Protecting Your Online Identity and Reputation (for Teens) – Nemours KidsHealth. https://kidshealth.org/en/teens/online-id.html. Accessed 26 Sept. 2023.
Security, Canadian Centre for Cyber. “Digital Footprint (ITSAP.00.133).” Canadian Centre for Cyber Security, 12 Jan. 2022, https://www.cyber.gc.ca/en/guidance/digital-footprint-itsap00133.
“What Is a Digital Footprint? | Edge Learning Center.” Edge, https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/edge/learning-center/digital-footprint. Accessed 18 Sept. 2023.
Reference 2
Protecting Your Online Identity and Reputation (for Teens) – Nemours KidsHealth. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://kidshealth.org/en/teens/online-id.html.
Digital footprint (ITSAP.00.133) – Canadian Centre for Cyber Security. (2022, January). Retrieved from https://www.cyber.gc.ca/en/guidance/digital-footprint-itsap00133.
M. (2023, July 18). What Is a Digital Footprint? | Edge Learning Center. Retrieved from https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/edge/learning-center/digital-footprint.
Person/Social Competency Reflection
Some of my preferred strategies for maintaining a healthy, balanced online presence include being aware of what my friends and family post about me, having a private profile on popular apps that only my friends and family can follow, and checking my digital footprint occasionally. I also make sure I’m not spending all my time online because that is unhealthy. Some of the ways I work to build and maintain online relationships are checking on friends I haven’t spoken to in a while, possibly making plans with them, and supporting what my friends post online. For example, telling them they look great or what they did was amazing. My online support network is helpful to me because it allows me to work on assignments and get support if needed at home, it is also helpful to me because I can see any upcoming tests or assignments that are due. This allows me to stay on top of my work and stay organized. The online support network is particularly helpful because I can access everything I need at home to complete my work, also, websites that are needed are easily accessible.
The Ball Launcher challenge allowed me to test, experiment and use my critical thinking. I had to create 6 prototypes, 3 for the launcher and 3 for the receiver. Then I had to research and figure out which designs worked well. Building the catapult and doing the lab write-up allowed me to go through all the steps of the scientific method process. A problem that occurred was the tape coming undone in multiple places, I had to solve the problem and think of better solutions I could use to improve my launcher. Our hypothesis was supported and the launcher worked well.
Core Competency Self Assessment and Creative Thinking
I am most proud of my ball launcher lab, building our launcher went well and we didn’t have to adjust anything from our first prototype drawing. Our launcher worked better than I had expected, the ball went the farthest out of all the other launchers in our class. I used critical thinking to figure out a way to best solve our problems such as thinking of different ways we could attach our elastic band to prevent it from coming undone. While completing the labs I could easily tell which part of the Scientific Method we were on which allowed me to better understand each step in depth. Each lab went through every step which helped me understand it more because we were performing the step then and there. I demonstrated that I can create new things when I designed 6 prototypes and successfully built both the ball launcher and receiver for our ball launcher lab. I demonstrated that I can build on the ideas of others when I talked with my group to analyze our ideas and figure out what would work best. When trying new things, I expect setbacks and failure and use them to develop my ideas. An example of this from the Scientific Method labs would be experimenting with our receiver to see what would allow it to most effectively catch the ball. We went through many designs altering them slightly each time.
