Sunday 17 June 2012

Final Blog Mark

I believe my blog deserves 98%.

My blog is a reflection of how I am in person, but on the internet. I have incorporated my favourite colours through the background and write my personal additions, as if I was speaking in person. I could give my blog a dynamic view, but than my gadgets are not shown. My added gadgets give my viewers a better insight of me. For example books I have read, tweets I have tweeted, and my biography. On my blog there is also a visitor map! I keep my assignments updated and personal additions added regularly. My posts were sometimes on the lengthy side which was an extension of my writing. I had book reviews as an extension of my reading and each personal addition was an extension of my thinking. I took off two percent, because sometimes I find spelling mistakes or grammar errors on posts I had created way earlier.

Thursday 14 June 2012

Books read over the last 4 months

Here are the books I have read over the last 4 months. For every book I have read I have given them a rating out of 5 stars!

Hunger Games Series by Suzanne Collins
The Hunger Games
Catching Fire
Mocking Jay

Kissed by an Angel Series by Elizabeth Chandler
Evercrossed
Ever Lasting


Miscellaneous Books
The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

The Help by Kathryn Stockett

A Million Little Pieces by James Frey

The Cinderella Society by Kay Cassidy

Those Girls by Sara Lawrence

Final Thoughts of my Creative Writing Class



You are about to read my final thoughts on the overall experience of the grade 12 Creative Writing class.

First off, my favourite assignment was The Buried Life (TBL) project. I enjoyed thinking deep about what I wanted to accomplish throughout my life, before I died and creating a bucket list. I also enjoyed that, how we presented the project was up to us. I found it a challenging project, because creating a bucket list isn’t as easy as one would think. Another challenging part was creating 25 visuals, because I wanted to use only pictures I had personally taken. I found the time given to work on the project was the perfect amount.

My least favourite project was The Moment. I didn’t enjoy the moment, because we spent quite a long time on the project. After a while I got annoyed of re-reading my work over and over. It’s hard to correct your own work especially if it’s personal. My moment was very personally and I felt like I was reliving the moment every time I worked on it, which brought up a lot of emotion.

Friday Reading class was something I looked forward to weekly. I love reading and to have an hour to read is something I don’t have much time to do on my own! It was an added bonus to be able to check out a book from the classroom library! The classroom library allowed me to read books I have always wanted to read!

Monday written reflections was an assignment that I found easy to accomplish. I liked expressing my feelings on class tasks and projects. During my written reflections, I usually set goals for the upcoming week, which helped in the long run. I liked how we posted all our reflections on our blog. I loved receiving comments from fellow classmates on my reading reflections, because each one expressed their opinions on the same book I just blogged about!

Personally, I found the Writing Reflection Notebook (WRN) not very useful to me. We did use it at times, but I found myself spending more time on my blog. At first, I used the WRN for personal additions, but when I understood what personal additions were I posted them straight onto my blog! Also, most of our tasks that were started in our WRN were later added onto our blog. I found that I only really used my WRN for notes and marking down the books I read.


Having a blog was definitely the highlight of the class! I got really into adding personal additions, maintaining my blog, and posting assignments. Having a blog was a very good way to incorporate technology into the classroom, because kids our age use it daily. I found myself always bringing up my blog in conversations and showing my friends! I enjoyed the classes were Digital Yoda introduced ways to spruce up our blogs! Having a blog, to me was personal and something I found myself checking as much as I do with Facebook.

Having a Twitter account wasn’t something I got into, because I felt uncomfortable when I tweeted. For example, tweeting our bucket lists @theburiedlife made me feel uncomfortable, since we were to tweet them for every tweeted bucket list item. I did enjoy tweeting our reading and writing reflections though, because it expressed my thoughts in little words.

The integration of technology into the classroom was very amusing! Having a blog and twitter account was something I wouldn’t have created without this class. I use technology every day and using it in the classroom was refreshing! When I say refreshing I mean it was different from just writing everything down on papers and poster boards.

I learnt that I am someone who enjoys blogging and creating very creative pieces of work. I enjoyed the listography, blackout poetry, and TBL assignments, because it all involved art. I consider colouring, drawing, and taking pictures forms of art. I also learnt that I lose interest in books about serious events, for example a million little pieces. I just find serious books take me a while to finish.

Definitely have your students create blogs again, because I loved using blogger! Creative Writing was one of my favourite classes this term.

My advice for future students of CW is too not get behind in personal additions. I found it easy to post two a week and that was a good thing, because some students are finding it difficult to get 20 - 30 posted in the last week of school.

Thursday 7 June 2012

Dawson's Creek (#32)

So After I finished watching One Tree Hill, I wanted a new TV series to watch. So I went back in time and am watching Dawson's Creek. I have found they have extremely big vocabulary for teenage kids! Even with the big vocabulary I am enjoying the series and am on the fourth season! It takes place in the 90's where the kid's didn't have cell phone's, which is refreshing! My favourite character in the show is Pacey. He is funny and really makes the show! Dawson kinda makes me depressed and sometimes I get embarrassed watching him. Dawson is a main character, like Peyton was in One Tree Hill, and I don't like there personalities in either of the shows.

Tuesday 5 June 2012

Now What?

Now what? I have finished making a list of things to do before I die, but how will I accomplish at least one of these tasks on my list?

This summer will be the perfect time to tackle task number sixty.
  • # 60. Design my own dress (that includes sewing).
I will start off by researching information on sewing. I have done this once before, when I tried sewing a dress pattern off the internet. When I feel like I have gained enough knowledge I will draw out patterns and dress sketches.  From there, I will take a trip to fabricland to buy meters of my favorite fabric.  If I need a zipper, thread, or buttons I will pick some up too. Back at home, I will pull out my mother’s sewing machine and set it up with the correct threads, and devices set right. I will have my patterns cut out and will work on the hems. After the hems are sewn, I will sew my pattern pieces together which will leave me with my final product. Hopefully by this point, I am still happy with the outcome and the dress will be up to my standards. If it is up to my standards I will feel comfortable wearing it in public! If I wear my dress in public I will consider it checked off of my bucket list!

Some things off my list, I will need to save money to accomplish. For example own a Macbook or visit Greece with my best friend Catie. Other tasks will be much simpler and cheaper to accomplish. For example ride a tandem bicycle or kiss someone in the rain. I plan on keeping my bucket list, because someday I will like to look back on this list to make sure I accomplished most of the tasks.

25 Visuals