Technology #2

Over the past week, we have learned about atoms. We spent a lot of time trying to understand how tiny atoms really are. There are more atoms in one grain of sand than there are grains of sand on the beach. Another comparison was if we made a grapefruit the size of the Earth, each atom would be the size of a blueberry. Then, if you enlarged the blueberry to the size of a football stadium, the nucleus would be the size of a MARBLE. This was crazy, if you think about how big the world is, and how small the blueberry is.

Safety Rules In Technology #1

This week, we started second quarter. Almost nothing is different except our quarterly. I am now in Technology. Today we learned about all of the rules. There was only one rule that might be a problem. I have to have my hair up at all times. AND, if I forget my hairtie, I have to borrow a rubber one that knots and gets stuck in my hair. But other than that, I am looking forward to my quarter in Technology.

Capstone 3 – Site Visit

This weekend, I went to New York City, and I visited a Dream Therapist. His name is Ross Levin. I went to his office and he showed me how he works with his patients and what his job is all about. I went with my mom, and we learned a lot of new information (Including that my dad might have a sleep disorder). I learned about common nightmares and problems Dream Therapists face. I learned that when people are at therapists they threaten to hurt themselves. I had been having a lot of trouble finding a site visit, so I was very thankful when Dr. Levin wrote back. He gave me so many facts that will be very helpful for my final project!

Graphic Novels

As a new unit in writing and reading, a teacher named Mr. DeBerry has been coming in and teaching us about graphic novels. At first, we were just reading graphic novels but eventually, we began to write our own. As we were reading the graphic novels, we made noticings about how each page and chapter was structured.

The reading was very different compared to reading other genres of books. I like reading graphic novels so I was very excited to start this unit. The reading went by much faster and you had to pay very close attention to every page. At times I got very confused about who was who because the names were rarely mentioned in graphic novels. The story had many details you needed to find in the pictures. I learned so much from reading graphic novels and all of this knowledge helped me write my own graphic novel.

Writing a graphic novel is also very different from writing a novel. I thought it would be a lot easier than it was. You have to plan out your story and then do a draft. Then you have to draw each picture carefully with a lot of detail. Then you have to color everything in. I am not very good at drawing so this took a long time. I am sure I will try again to make an even better graphic novel!

If you cannot see the slideshow, click here:

http://blogs.scarsdaleschools.org/cboyer?s=graphic+novels

Capstone 2 – My Interview

On Monday I had my interview for Capstone. I did it with a doctor/professor from the Universary of Montreal. His name is Antonio Zadra. He studies dreams, sleep, REM sleep, NREM sleep, parasomnias, sleep disorders and lucid dreaming. I was very happy to have the interview because it took me a long time to find an interview and I had begun to get worried about it. I had emailed a few other people but they either didn’t reply or couldn’t do it.

When I emailed Dr. Zadra he said yes almost right away, and we decided on a time and date. We did our interview over Skype. My best friend, Audrey, helped me set it up. We talked for about 20 minutes and he answered a bunch of my questions. I am very happy that my interview went so well and I can’t wait for my site visit.

El Resturante

Today at school we went to a Peruvian restaurant as a field trip with our Spanish teacher. While we were there we learned and practiced speaking Spanish. We had to talk mostly in Spanish and answer some questions on a worksheet. The food was all very good. Some of the dishes we had were lomo saltado, pollo saltado, pescado and arroz. We also tried a drink called chicha morada. I didn’t really like it. I sat at a table with my mom, Samantha, and Rehma. We had so much fun and I hope my family and I go back there sometime.

Lomo Saltado – Yelp

Choosing a Topic for Capstone

This week we began to talk about our capstone topics. Capstone is a big project you do in fifth grade about an interest you have. Most of us had already been thinking about our topics for a long time. I wanted to do Broadway casting. The problem was, two people cannot do the same thing and one of my best friends, Audrey, wanted to do it. I thought more about topics and what I was curious about.

After a lot of thinking I thought of something I had always wondered about; Dreams. Things like “How do dreams connect to your brain?” and “Why do you have dreams?”. Once my class all had their topics we began to come up with inquiry questions. We put post-its with questions on posters and graded our questions. Then today we helped each other improve our inquiry questions and started to write subquestions. My inquiry question will be:

“Why do humans have dreams and how do dreams connect to their brains and lives?”

My subquestions will be:

“Do your dreams have anything to do with what is going on in your life?”

“If you have a certain personality trait, will your dreams have anything to do with that personality trait?”

“Why do you only have dreams sometimes?”

“Does having a dream have anything to do with how deep you are sleeping?”

I have had so much fun with my capstone project so far, and I can’t wait to do more!

So B. It

In school my book club has been reading a book called So B. It by Sarah Weeks. It is about a girl named Heidi. Heidi’s mother has a mental disability so her neighbor, Bernie takes care of them.

One challenge Heidi faces is her mother’s disability. This is a challenge because Heidi’s childhood was affected by her mother’s disability. Bernie has agoraphobia. That means she is afraid to leave her house. Bernie and Heidi’s mother can’t drive Heidi to school so Heidi had to be homeschool. This meant she didn’t meet any kids her age. Heidi had to grow up too fast! She had to act grown up because if Heidi was upset, Heidi’s mother would throw a tantrum. When Heidi’s mother had tantrums she would hurt herself.

This affects how Heidi interacts with the world when Heidi began to lie. She wanted a different life so when people asked about her life she would lie. Once she sat with a woman named Alice on a bus. Alice asked about Heidi’s family. She told Alice she had a mother, a neighbor named Bernie and a grandma. Heidi then began to lie that her fake grandma knew Shirley Temple. She said Shirley Temple would come over and bake at their house. Heidi’s lie grew bigger and bigger until she had a completely different life.

Heidi barely knows anything about her mother so she makes list about her mother in her free time. She made a list of all the words her mother knows. Heidi also made a list of everything she knows about her mother. She knows almost nothing about her mother though. Heidi also made a list of questions she had about her mother. Heidi’s whole life revolves around her mother and her mother’s disability. I can’t imagine what Heidi is going through, and I think she is more patient then I would ever be.

Stop Motion Animation Pt. 3

At school Audrey, Samantha, Rehma and I have been working very hard on our stop motion project. Today we finally finished!! We finished first in the class. I think we finished first because when one of us got off track everybody else would yell at them until they calmed down. (We were VERY loud) We finished filming unusually quickly too. Overall we worked well together.

In our movie there is a boy and his friends send him a letter. The letter explains everything about the journey over to America. While the letter is being read out loud panel images slide in and show what the letter is saying. Our video is short but educational. I am very proud of it. Here it is: