Misty Copland was the only black girl in her class. Before she started ballet, they had a image. When you imagined a ballet dancer, you imagine someone pale and frail. Now, we have someone muscular and with dark skin. It changes the image of ballet dancers around the world. Even though she was 13 when she started, and you usually have to start much younger to have enough practice to be successful, she still was. I especially liked this quote;  Continue reading →

The first person that I interviewed was my grandfather. He actually immigrated from the Soviet Union in 1978. He also has a very strong opinion about communism and politics, so I thought it would be interesting. It was. But what should I do for my questions? I didn’t want to say my sub questions word for word! So, I sat down with Mrs. Edwards. We thought, thought, and thought some more. We looked at my sub questions. “What questions should I do to help me answer these” I had thought. So we thought, and thought, and thought some more. Here are my sub questions:

1.  What comes to mind when I say the word “Communism”?
2. When and where you born and raised?
3. When did you become aware of the politics of your country?
4. What was your opinion then? What about now?
5. As you grew up, did your parents ever speak to you about the Soviet Union before WWII?
6. Was the experience the same in Kiev as other major cities in the Soviet Union at the time?
7. What did you study in college? What influenced your decision to study it?
8. If you could describe your life as a Soviet citizen in one word, what would it be and why?
9. How did being a Soviet Union citizen hinder your activities and daily life?
10. What big world events do you remember happening while you growing up?
11. Looking back, were you aware of the Soviet’s use of propaganda at that time?
12. What made you decide to move to America?
13. Was life in America what you imagined it to be?
14. How does life in America compare to life in the Soviet Union?
15. Did you ever say or do anything to express how you felt about the Soviet Union while you were living there?
16. If you could give advice to your 25 year old self, what would you say?
17. Did you ever consider moving to Moscow? Why or why not?

My grandfather had a lot of intelligent answers. I had more than 10 questions because some of mine could be answered in a sentence. Before my interview, my mom helped me write a timeline of my grandfather’s life. It was so I could have a little background information. When he started talking about college, I could picture when that was, and it made it easier. I hd prepared a whole binder with blank sheets of paper and a clean notebook (well, I had to rip a couple of pages out, but that’s not the point). It turns out I didn’t need them, for my computer didn’t run out of battery or anything. I think my interview was a success, and I am excited to go on my site visit. Where? I’m not telling. Let me leave on that note of suspense!

After reading the Power of Quiet, I thought a little bit. Then I thought some more. Then I thought a little more. Then, I asked my friends. “Am I an introvert or a extrovert?” I said. As soon I said my first interrogation question, my friends replied. “You’re definitely a ambivert.” I thought for a second and agreed. After reading my next question, I asked Interrogation Question #2. “But examples do I have?” Well, I like sitting with a friend and reading quietly. I do it during snack and indoor recess sometimes. But I’m also loud. So, I wrote it down. I learned a lot about introverts and extroverts!

Today, Grace Lin visited Heathcote. She was supposed to come on the 14, but she had to post-pone. She was visiting the president! Mrs. Lin first talked about the different types of books she’s written. She told us that she writes picture books, early reading  books, and novels.  She also informed us that a new novel of hers is coming out this October! It’s called “When the Sea Turned to Silver” Mrs. Lin said that she is currently working on a new novel. She told us that her idea might change, so hold us to her word. So you never read this…………  It is about a girl who’s parents run a chinese food restaurant, and they decide that they wanted to make their own fortune cookies. This girl makes the fortunes, and they start coming true. Now, on three, we’re going to erase that from our minds…. One…… Two…….. *build up suspense* THREE!!!!!!!!!!!!! Wait, what were we talking about? Anyway, she taught us how to draw a tiger and about it’s special stripes. It was very exciting to meet a big-time author!

After finishing our catapult, we were wondering how we were going to launch it from a high place. I had no ledge or little crevice in the wall big enough to fit our catapult. So we decided as a group to tape a slab of wood to the wall, and have it sit on top of that. Let me just tell you, that was much harder than expected. Audrey had to leave right when we established that, so there was just Julia and Julia left. With one person holding, and the other one taping, we had a pretty good process. But it took a lot of tape. It looked messy, but that wasn’t the problem. When we tested it with the catapult (which had two full soda cans and a metal fork), and it sagged down. So, after putting our heads together, we took a piece of string and taped one end to the wood. The other end we taped to the wall, and stretched it tight like a guitar string. It seemed to work well. After we repeated that on the other side, we peeled of the excess tape. Julia’s mom arrived and it was time for her to leave, so we took a quick picture of our catapult holder to submit to Mrs. Edwards. The next morning when I had woken up and checked on it, I found the catapult on the cushion we had put beneath it to stand on. The slab of wood was hanging from a single piece of tape. We probably shouldn’t have left the catapult on the stand overnight! Back to the drawing board!

We built our catapult today. At first, my group thought that we should have something similar to a see-saw. We were thinking about having a shoe hit our see-saw/catapult. There was a lot of flaws in that plan. So, we scrounged the internet for a simple catapult. We found one that was made out of two soda cans, rubber bands, and a fork. Click here to watch the video…. We decided to build it. Audrey, Julia, and I had watched the video a million times, so we got right to work. Not the best idea. We emptied the coke cans we were using. As we were building, Audrey suddenly said that we weren’t supposed to empty the cans. We were reluctant to believe her, mostly because we didn’t want to start over, but unfortunately, Audrey was right. We got more cans, and then another problem surfaced. We couldn’t find any rubber bands! We scrounged my house and found a few. We were very proud how well our catapult worked.

Rescuers found “help” spelled out in palm fronds on a deserted island. Three men had spelled it out in hope to be rescued after three days of being stranded. Their boat had been destroyed by a wave.

I find it unnerving, that if these three men hadn’t been wearing life jackets on, they probably wouldn’t be here to this day. They swam form their sinking ship to a deserted island. These two of these three men were waving their life jackets around next to the place they spelled out “help”. What struck me as odd is that it stated in the article, “Fortunately for them, they were all wearing life jackets and were able to swim to the deserted island.” It was almost stating that most people don’t wear life jackets on a boat, and these men were just lucky that they happened to be wearing them.