It went okay because most things went as planned. I actually do not know if it sounds like Dvorak’s New World Symphony. It has 3 tracks. The first worked well. I followed the conversation style.
Here is my song on soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/heathcotemusic/kenneth-5b
I had a great experience on Garageband because it was fun, challenging, and interesting. I can also access garageband at home.
Today Jackie Bastardi from Curious on Hudson came in and told us about being a mechanical engineer. She said engineering is a lot of fun. There are lots of projects you can do. Once, there was a 3D designing competition, and the winner gets their model design 3D printed. She also told us a lot about stories of her career. The “Gallopin’ Gertie” was also mentioned throughout the talk. It was about a bridge that collapsed because of the winds. In the end, we all made kazoos. It had popsicle sticks, straws, and paper. The paper vibrates to make the sound. I had a fun experience.
I spent four days at Vermont to go skiing at Killington/Pico mountain. My family stayed at a hotel called BestWestern star rated 3 and a half. It took about four hours to get to BestWestern, stopping for lunch on the way.
My family had to unload before settling in the hotel, since we could not leave all the luggage in the car. The room was made up of a living room, closets, a bathroom, a kitchen, and a bedroom. The bedroom was made up of two queen beds and a TV. The bathroom had a toilet, a sink, and a tub and shower. The living room had a TV, coffee table, and sofa bed. The kitchen had a stove and oven, a fridge and freezer, and a sink and microwave.
The skiing place had many parts. There was lodges, chairlifts, trails, and gondolas. In the morning, there is a lot of people, but the afternoon has not that many. Also, some trails had ice, which can make me fall down. But otherwise the ski trip was fun.
On the way back, my family stopped for dinner in Albany. I got home around 11:00 pm, which is pretty late. But I will not forget the trip.
I really like chocolate. Chocolate is a type of candy that is made from cocoa beans, powdered milk, sugar, and cocoa butter. There are many types of chocolate, such as caramel chocolate, milk chocolate, peanut chocolate, dark chocolate, bitter chocolate, which is unsweetened, and hot chocolate drinks. Chocolate comes in all shapes and sizes, from big blocks to chocolate chips used in cookies. I like most of them.
First, where did chocolate come from? It came from long ago where cocoa trees grew. Farmers mimiced the ways monkeys ate the cocoa pulps. Later, when Europeans came, they brought it back. It was served as a drink and only the rich could afford it. Then even later, a man named Milton Hershey sold lots of chocolate and was one of the most famous. His plant made and sold a lot of products. He sold Hershey’s bars and kisses.
Chocolate has many ingredients. Of course, there is chocolate liquor and sugar. There is sometimes milk and cocoa butter. The remains squeezed out of chocolate is bitter chocolate. To shape chocolate, you must melt it then shape it using molds the way you want it, such as circle or rectangle. But it is referred as sweet flavor.
I like chocolate because it is sweet and energizes me. The taste also is great, making it a candy I really enjoy, as I like chocolate ice cream and cakes.
As you can see, I love chocolate, but not all the time. chocolate is sweet, but it is one candy I really like.
I finished reading “the higher power of lucky”. Now our book club called “The book Wizards” now needs to find another book. Next on the list is “Wonder” by R.J. Palacio, but our class only has 2 copies and there is 4 people in the group (me, Harley, Elliott, and Jack M). Lucky us, the school has exactly 2 copies of Wonder.
On 12/14/16, The expert was Ronald’s dad (Junbo). Junbo is a chemical engineer. He does a lot of experiments, and he said only 10% of them succeed. He comes up with solutions how to reduce the waste on Earth. On battleships, they produce a ton of waste each day. But how do you get rid of it if you do not dump it in the ocean?
This comes with super critical fluids. A fluid is super critical when high temperature and pressure go past the critical point, the liquid is super critical. Junbo can be exposed to radiation sometimes. The lab is highly in security for safety reasons. He said some experiments took 24-48 hours. The experiment is to fire a highly voltaged electricity on a seal with water. A laser measures the reaction, and then passes it to a computer. Safety is really important, the computer is activated by the badge the workers wear. Between the computer room and the testing room is 3 thick walls with locked doors on each one.
Junbo is a experimenting chemical engineer that gave us an intro to super critical fluids. This can reduce trash in the ocean and protect our envoironment. We had a good time with Junbo learning about chemicl engineering.
This time the expert was Rush’s dad, who was visiting on 12/12/16 and talking about the supreme court. He talked about the justices of the court. Rush’s dad is an attorny (lawyer). There are 8 justices in the supreme court. He talked a bit about his and Rush’s connection. He also mentioned that there was a basketball court right above the court. There was no playing allowed when the court was in session. He tried to play whenever he could back then. Rush’s dad passes books about the justices of the court we could read. Then I had realized I was late for LRC and that was the end for me…… He also gave us things of the Constitution.
I am learning that stop motion is similar to running photos at a constant speed. It takes a long time to shoot and edit to make a professional stop motion animation. I have learned that Legos are a form of a stop motion, and there are other types of stop motion you can make. To make a good stop motion, you should not shake the camera so it would look like an earthquake in the animation. Each second in an animation has about twelve frames. You may not notice anything in the background, to make the animation look cooler like a professional one.
On 12/5/16, we started our first official meeting for our social issues book clubs. My partners are Jack M, Elliott, and Harley. Our book we are reading is “the higher power of lucky”(no capitals) by Susan Patron. We already read two chapters in the book. Most social issues books are fiction. There are themes. We are awarded for how our tables are cleaned. We are required to jot about the books we are reading.We jot on our books, we are supposed to jot every five pages. Each person has a choice to jot on a post-it, or jot on their reading notebook. In our group, we read two chapters and at home three chapters. On the post-its, we put on the page number.
I do not know what to call my four day thanksgiving break. There were lots of things going on. First, on Thanksgiving, our house was hosting a Thanksgiving party. We had a lot of guests coming, so my dad made us help set up the event when we were having an electronics break. This four day weekend was at least some good news. The party guests started to arrive at 3:00 or later. All the guests brought dishes of their own, but my mom made the turkey. I enjoyed it because there was a bunch of things to do, but not for me. It was boisterous. When we had dinner at about 6:00 pm, the food was so good, I want to eat that much again. It was really fun at the end during the night because I had 3 scoops of ice cream for desert. My mom said: “You’re having your third?” I replied, “Yeah.” I went to bed pretty late.
On Black Friday, my brothers left without me to Kalahari resort in Pennsylvania for one night with some friends. Before that, someone asked me:”Will you miss them at all?” I said:”I’m not sure.” My brothers left at about 10:30 am. It was quite enjoyable experience without them that day. In the afternoon, I went to the Westchester mall in White Plains. My parents looked around many different shops. I went to the Apple Store and played this game called Mekorama. I only stayed there for 10 minutes, though. Have you been to the mall before? I have many times. I also had a movie night party at 8:00. The excitement was not over yet. On Saturday night, I went to a party a friend’s house. It was an exhausting holiday.
I had a big experience with many things. I lived 2 days without my brothers, and had a series of parties. It was the best holiday so far.