Answering My Main Inquiry Question and Working on My Final Product, Blog Post 3

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About 2 months ago, my teacher assigned my class a Capstone project. We had a main inquiry question to answer. Since my topic was Kobe Bryant, I decided to make my main inquiry question: What was Kobe Bryant’s major accomplishment, and what impact did he have on basketball? I decided to answer this question.

I started to do research on the sub-questions that I made that would lead up to me answering my main inquiry question. I researched all of them and took notes on what I thought would help me answer my questions. After I finished my research, I started to organize it. I organized my information on a google site because I thought that it would be more organized if I were to put it on a google site.

I also started to use different types of websites like basketballreference.com, nba.com, and brianica.com. I started to take notes on my topic and put them in my google site and organize it.

Next, I started to work on my google slide, this next step was the last step before I would have to present my presentation. I got pictures and made sure that the pictures would match what I said in my script. Now I just had to make sure that I would memorize my script and make sure that it wouldn’t be more than 5 minutes or less than 3 minutes.

In conclusion, I thought that this process was fun. Despite me being nervous about having to present in front of my parents.

Talking About My Interview, Blog Post 2

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About two weeks ago, I started the first blog post of my Capstone, from now and then I began to do many things like taking notes, having my interview, and preparing for my interview like making questions to ask my interviewee.

 

Before my interview, I did many things like picking my topic and taking notes on my topic. I decided to do my topic on Kobe Bryant, my main inquiry question is, What were Kobe Bryant’s significant accomplishments, and what impact did he have on basketball? I started to make my sub-questions and started to do research to answer my sub-questions.

 

After starting my research, I started to think about who I will interview. At first, I thought that I would be able to interview one of his teammates. I emailed them and later realized that they would think that my email would be spam, I thought about it for some time, then at school, my teacher aid found this guy who wrote a book about Kobe Bryant, and she emailed him, a few minutes later, the guy said that he could let me interview him, this was when I decided to start preparing for my interview like what I would say to him when I meet him, what interview questions I would ask him, and how I would end the interview.

 

I thought that I should organize my information, so I decided to put all of my information on a Google Site. I started with the general information that people should learn about before they should learn about the more complicated things. When I finished working on the more simple facts, I started to make the more complicated things like Kobe’s career stats, his major accomplishments, his rank in the NBA, his work ethic, how he changed how other people played, and how he changed the game of basketball.

 

In conclusion, I thought that the Capstone project is very interesting but I’m also nervous to do my presentation at the end of the Capstone project because there will be many people watching me present my topic.

Southeast Region Blog Post

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About two months ago, my teacher assigned us a U.S region project. While I chose the Southeast region with my friend Evan, Cayden, and Shane. I got what I wanted and I’m sure that they got what they wanted.

 

Next, we started to figure out what our states were going to be, I thought that I would like to do Mississippi and Alabama as my two states that I would like to do information about because I thought that they were the most interesting states and they have a lot of information about it. Next, I thought that I should start working on the information. Every day, at school and at home, I would start working on the information. Later, I really thought about what I should get information about because some things are not as important to write about. My teacher later sent a document of all of the information that we would need to write about, this was when I started to write about all of the information that my teacher wanted to do. She would tell us to write about things like the general, the history, politics, geography, tourist attractions, and sport. I started researching those topics.

 

After we finished our research, we started to put all of the information in a slideshow and started organizing our information and making each slide different. We would end up having more than one slide per state. I thought that it would be more interesting if we made a map of where the southeastern states were, then our teacher told us to practice our regions to present ours. We started practicing and it ended up being less than 10 minutes. A few days later, our group decided to go first.

 

In conclusion, I thought that this project was very fun. My friends and I learned a lot. I started to really like geography after the project because I thought that geography is very fun.

Capstone Blog Post #1

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About 2 weeks ago, my teacher Ms. Edwards assigned our Capstone project that I was looking forward to at the beginning of the year. First, I wanted to do World War II because I thought that it was going to be an interesting topic.

 

I later realized that doing World War II as my Capstone topic was not going to be a good idea because I thought that it was going to be difficult finding my main inquiry question. This was when I started to struggle with finding my topic and my main inquiry question, this was when I decided to change my topic to Kobe Bryant. I realized that this was going to be easier to find my main inquiry question and my sub-questions.

 

I started to figure out what my main inquiry question was going to be and then decided to find out what my 5 sub-questions were going to be. I figured out what my main inquiry question was going to be with the help of Ms. Edwards. Then my next step was going to be working on my 5 sub-questions. I started to figure out what my first 3 sub-questions were going to be, when after the first 3, trying to find the last 2 sub-questions, I started to struggle to try to find them when I started to ask my friend Evan and he helped me get the final 2 sub-questions.

 

In conclusion, I thought that this project was going to be a very interesting one because many of my older friends said that the Capstone project was very fun and interesting.

Rube Goldberg

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About a month ago, my teacher Ms. Edwards assigned us a project. The project was called a Rube Goldberg machine A Rube Goldberg machine is a type of machine which is complex, that normally and human would not be able to do or it would take a long time to do. At first, when my teacher said that we were going to do this project, I thought that it was going to be very fun, but when my teacher said that we were not allowed to have a partner during this project. I felt very sad because I was hoping to have a partner, but I understood the reason why we were not allowed to have a partner during the project. It was because it is during Covid, and the school wasn’t safe with us going to each other’s house during the project.

 

First, I decided to make. the Rube Goldberg machine about feeding my fish. At first, I thought that the idea that I was going to do was pretty good, but after tens of tries, I realized that it was going to take hundreds of times or even thousands of tries. So I decided to change up my way of feeding my fish. I decided to use the train tracks that I used when I was little. We were also required to have at least 8 steps, and also at least 3 simple machines in our contraption.

 

I also looked at some resources that helped me to get a good idea of what I was going to do. I looked at some videos. Some videos are called Joseph’s Machines. I get really inspired because his ideas were really cool, but when I heard that my friends were doing the Rube Goldberg about feeding their pet like feeding their cats and hampster. So I decided to do my Rube Goldberg about feeding my fish.

 

At first, I thought that my idea was good and it wasn’t going to take that many tries. After I realized that my Rube Goldberg was going to take a very long time, I decided to change ideas. I decided to change the part where the car would have to hang onto a string through a very little hole, to the car would have to hang onto the string through a much bigger target. I think that this was a very interesting part of my project because I have to make any changes. My favorite part about this project was that I really like how I would have to make any changes to make it work, this shows that many things cannot be done on the first try.

 

In conclusion, I think that this project was very fun and interesting. This project is very good for our development because right now we are not allowed to work with a partner which lets us have to work independently. The 3 simple machines that I used were the inclined plane, pulley, and I also used a wedge. I got some inspiration from my sister’s Rube Goldberg machine, Joseph’s Machines, and also some inspiration from Sprices Rube Goldberg.

 

Here is the link to my Rube Goldberg video:

Debate Argument and Advocacy

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About 2-3 weeks ago, my teacher assigned an assignment about Argument and Advocacy and we started to have a debate with our book club. I was very sad when we got the topic of plastic bags because I thought that plastic bags were pretty boring and were hard to find evidence for the reasons for the claim. 

 

My teacher created 2 teams in our book club where we would start to get reasons and evidence to support our claim. Our group’s question was that if we should ban plastic bags, my friend and I, Evan, were on the side that we shouldn’t ban plastic bags because people are employed and have higher salaries. Our other reason why plastic bags should not be banned is that it is better for the environment than other types of bags like paper bags. We found lots of evidence from different websites like comparably.com.

 

The other team was trying to add a link to the debate but then they realized that if they put a link in a debate, then the debate will not work because it is a debate. When we were going to record the debate, there were also some other requirements for the debate when we were recording. The requirements were that we would have to stay still and not speak super quietly, we also didn’t want to hide our faces behind the computers that we were reading after.

 

In conclusion, this was a very fun project and debate because I really enjoyed trying to find reason and evidence, I also thought that using the counter-evidence to counter our opponent’s evidence and reasons.

Rube Goldberg Contraption Reflection

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About a week ago, my teacher assigned a very big project called a Rube Goldberg contraption. A Rube Goldberg contraption is a machine that can do simple tasks. For example, when you want to feed your fish, you can just press one button and it will go through many contraptions and will feed your fish. This was going to be one of the most important projects that we did. I was very excited to do it. But when my teacher broke the news that we were not allowed to do it with a partner, I felt sad because this was what I was waiting for the entire time. So far, we only finished the sketch for our Rube Goldberg project. I have 8 steps for my project. I decided to create a contraption for feeding my fish, so I decided to make my name, “Fish Feeder.”

 

I used many different types of materials. I used a Ping Pong ball and Ping Pong Paddle, I also used dominos, a soccer ball, an inclined plane, a toy car, and a pulley. We were supposed to have at least 8 steps for our Rube Goldberg contraption. 

 

Before we were going to start building our contraption, we have to start the sketch of our contraption. After I drew the sketch, I decided to get all of the materials for my contraption. When we were at school, we had a lesson with Mr. Casal about our Rube Goldberg project. He told us to take pictures at least 10 pictures of our Rube Goldberg, he said that the 10 pictures could be anything, but it has to be about our Rube Goldberg. I decided to take pictures of all of my materials. I also decided to take pictures of my fish and the food for my fish.

 

Since this is only my first blog post, this means that we still have to do many things before we are considered done. This means that we still have to start building our contraption, and also have to do our second blog post. After this, we also have to take many pictures and videos of our project and what happened in our contraption.

 

In conclusion, I am very excited to start building this contraption, although we cannot work with a partner this year, I am still very happy that we can still experience this feeling of building a Rube Goldberg contraption.

Sketch

Constitution Project Reflection by Teddy

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About a month ago, my teacher assigned us a project. We were allowed to pick any topic to do for our constitution project, so I decided to do Martin Luther King Jr. At first, I thought that Martin Luther King Jr. didn’t have a lot of information to learn about, but when I started to get information about him, I realized that I would be able to create a very interesting presentation. My teacher gave us a group of topics we were allowed to pick from for our presentation, she let us do the amendments. James Madison, we could even pick anything we wanted.

 

We had to find information to put in a document for the essay, then we were going to work on our script, although we were not going to change the slides automatically, the teachers wanted to have us work on the project so we know how long each one of our slides. Finally, we had to create a slideshow for our presentation, we were either allowed to have at most 6 words in our presentation, or we could have one picture on each slide. I just decided to have all of my slides have one picture.

 

Although we were not going to make an ignite out of it, we were still going to create a screencast. We were going to use the slideshow to record our presentation. We are going to share our presentation with our classmates, but we are not going to present it in person.

 

In conclusion, I think that this was a very interesting project, and I hope that we would be able to have this experience again, although the project took a very long time, the work still paid off.

 

Here is my screencast:

Screencastify Recording

 

Feature Article Reflection

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Feature Article Reflection

By Teddy

 

Introduction:

About a month ago, my teacher told us about this project that we were excited about, but then we realized that we would need to start to find a topic to write about. The other kids in my classroom already found their topic, so I realized that I would need to hurry up to catch up and find a topic.

Why Did I Choose To Write About The Topic:

The reason why I chose the tiger is that I think that tigers are very interesting and that they are almost extinct, and I wanted to learn more about them. We don’t have that many tigers in the world. In fact, we only have 3,900 tigers in the world, which is not a lot at all because there are 8 species of tigers in the world and there are only 3,900 tigers in the world? That is barely any tigers in the world, so I decided to do it on tigers.

 

Learning How To Format:

Every week, we would meet up in the Computer Lab where we would take a lesson with Mr. Casal, he would teach us about our formatting and what we could add. For example, we can add charts and graphs. We can also add “Did You Know?” keywords, sections, and captions for our pictures. At first, I thought that there was nothing that I had to change, but then I realized that there was a lot of blank space in my feature article, so then I fixed it, and it was much better!

Taking Notes:

Soon we started to take notes in a Google Document, and we started to find many resources that would help us take notes on our topic. I chose to use the resource PebbleGo which helped me to find information about tigers.

Writing Our Script and Transporting Our Writing:

We started to write our script and started to transfer all of our work to the slide show that Mr. Casal gave us during the lesson when we started to learn how to format. When we were done formatting our text, we were going to start checking, editing and revising our work by having a partner read our work and see if we had anything wrong to change.

 

Checking and Printing Out Our Google Sideshow: 

By this time, many people are checking each other work, and some of them were going to our teacher to print the Google Slideshow out in black and white so we could check it one more time if we had anything else that we didn’t notice the first time that we checked over the work that we did before. After our teacher printed out our black and white version, she asked us to have someone read our black and white version, and then we would be done. We would have to tell our teacher and then she would put our name on a post-it and she would print out our colored version of our feature article for our publishing party.

 

Our Publishing Party:

At this time, almost all of the people in our class had finished their feature article and we were ready to have a publishing party. When everyone was done, we were going to do the publishing party where we would look at each other’s work and we would give feedback for each other’s work and say what they like about their work. In conclusion, my favorite part about this project is when we were taking notes and looking at other people’s feature articles and about how we were supposed to proofread our feature article.

 

Here is my feature article:

Narrative Reflection

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The past few weeks, I was working on this narrative about a party that I had. My teacher, Ms. Edwards, gave us directions for what we should use to make our narrative writing very interesting. The reason why I wrote about this story is that this is one of my favorite childhood memories. I love playing with my friends and I love looking back at the memories that I loved. This is one of my favorite memories because my friends and I had lots of fun. I really love going to my friends’ houses for either a party or a playdate because I get to spend time with my friends so we can hang out and play together.

While working on my narrative, I learned a lot about writing and using descriptive language in my writing. I also had a lot of fun writing and helping edit my friend’s narrative. But one of my favorite parts about writing about my narrative was how I was thinking about new vocabulary words that you can use when you are writing.

The most important part when you are creating your narrative is that you have to make sure that you have no mistakes, no grammar problems, make sure that you don’t have any spelling mistakes, last but not least, you have to make sure that you don’t have punctuation issues. You also will want to check over what you have done, and also you can also ask your friend or classmates if they can read your’s over.

You will also want to add show not tell and dialogue if you don’t have any, because many people don’t have these rules, which will make your story very interesting, because you will definitely want someone to talk in your story, or else many people will find it boring.

In conclusion, I learned a lot when I was writing my narrative. I had a lot of fun reading my friends and my narrative to see if we had any mistakes. I had a lot of fun playing and working with my friends, and that is why this is probably one of my favorite writing projects I ever worked on with my friends.

 

Here Is My Narrative Writing