Favorite Memories

Does it count to have a whole year as a favorite memory in high school? My freshman year was the greatest, in a school called Idaho Leadership Academy I learned more that year then I ever have before or after in my life thus far. But if I have to narrow it down to one memory I would probably say the Winter Ball. The Winter Ball was an annual family event held every year by the school. This was an actual ball, not a weird sort of Prom. They had a live band and a hired instructor to give a quick lesson on a few ballroom dances (although the school offered a class and most of the students knew how already)
I had gone a couple times in the past years my siblings had attended the school but this year was my first time as an actual student which made it very special to me. Also, my cousin, Richy, was visiting at the time and I was able to convince him to go. He was surprisingly a good dancer, especially for just learning. It was in early January so the snow outside gave it a special atmosphere. The building it was held at is sort of small but gorgeous, the same place was used for weddings many times. I don't know how many people I danced with, but it was more than expected...I know this all sounds kind of corny, but it was a night I probably wont forget, the school closed down that summer, so that was my last chance for a Winter Ball and it was beautiful.
 

Senior Project

My senior project was a board game designed for music students in grades 4th-6th. Basically, it is just trivia questions, but I also wanted to make sure they learned or at least understood what should be required from them at that age. The questions involved history, compositions, famous composers, theory, and culture. The experience of working on it wasn't so bad. It took me a long time to really get it going but once I did it really came together quickly and nicely. It turned out much better than I expected from the beginning. I was able to find miniature instruments as game pieces and my sister had a computer program that helped the actual board look nice and a lot more professional. I was even able to find a box that it all fit in perfectly. In short, I am proud of the work put into my senior project but also a bit relieved that it is done with.

Round the World

Attached is a picture of some of the things my family has collected from around the world. The camel and the statue of a man holding a sheep across his shoulders are from Israel, the camel actually belongs to me. The abacus is from Russia and the brown thing behind that contains six hand carved coasters from Africa. Mainly, the camel is my favorite because my dad brought that home to me when I was about five years old and right now I am saving to visit Israel with my dad this summer.

Spring Break

Well, my spring break was very long, yet when I came to school it seemed like it had only been a weekend, probably because I didn't have time to relax. Seen as this is my first year at this school I did not already have my project planed therefore, I had less time to work on it. After I finally figured out what I was going to do and who I would ask my mentor to be it was nearly the second semester. So to get back to the point, this spring break was pretty much spent on my project. Of coarse I also had to work on my portfolio, senior research paper, normal homework, and study for the ACT...which is Saturday the 9th...Despite all of the effort I put into it however, I wasn't able to get near as much done as I was planning on, so, as you may imagine, my spring break was actually quite stressful. Thankfully, I was able to end it with a haircut. I think this picture is a pretty good summary of my spring break.

Music Theory Assignment

Okay, so, is it possible to have a melo and hektic week? I know a lot of stuff happened this week because I was really busy but when it comes down to it I can't really pin-point any highlights. Well, seen as I have to talk about something...I had been looking forward to a certain assignment in Music Theory this year, creating a song, and it was this week that we actually did it. As excited as I was however, it was very frustarteing. This first day I had no idea how to work the Garage Band program, mainly because my Mac did not have sound, for no reason at all, thefore I wasn't able to work on it. Thankfully, the second day I got the hang of Garage Band and was able to get a lot done (with sound) The next day (Tuesday, it started Friday) my Mac decided to take ten minutes to load everything I clicked. So on Wednesday, the day it needs sent in I quickley finished it, until it came time to send it...This time the Mac decided to freez while it tried to load my e-mail, right at the end of class. I finally got it sent from home useing a jump drive, but, all this was simply to say, it was frustrateing. The song in its self was fun though, at least thats a plus.

Changes

This week held lots of big changes for me. My brother, sister in law, and 3 month old niece have been living with my parents and I since we moved to here in the summer. 2 weeks ago they found an appartment they liked and this week they moved out. I'm really going to miss my niece, she is so wonderful to have in the family, but it's good that they were able to get their own place. It is going to be different with just me and my parents now days, but I suppose thats life. I just hope that I never need to see a day when my sissters, brother, and parents all live to far away to see eachother. Change can be good but it's also tough at points.

Debating School-continued

The last two weeks of my life have pertained to my last discussion in an unusual way. I have been a student of a charter school. But even here the way of teaching has been very much the same as all other schools. In my observation from being here the only thing significant about it is that more classes involving the arts are available, it is rather low-key on the political issues as well. Like every school, it says the pledge every morning, but other than that and a speaker on Martin Luther King Jr. Day you hardly hear of anything political. One thing different, however, is History Day, this does allow students to really research and think about significant topics in history, and the 'project' that goes with it enables them to be active or see more of what it was about.
This is my first year participating in History Day but I really like this years topic, Debate. This particular theme helps students understand some of the issues that have happened, and could still be happening, today. It forces them to analyze both sides of what happened and come up with there own conclusion of who was in the right. When students start to think for themselves in issues of the world that will help in shaping the government (as I started to mention in the last post)
This one event, in select schools, does not change the whole of public school flaws, however. The majority of America still does not understand some of the core events of how and why the world works the way it does. Yet, they still try to make their own opinions and vote for whomever they believe is right for helping America survive. I believe that if the public schools started finding systems that applied to all students, America would see a difference in our way of thinking about the world.

Dabating School

I plan on going into polotics when I head for collage so I will discuss one of my views on something I believe is a problem. One of my biggest opinions is about the public school system. I understand that there are students that learn the way public schools teach, but the majority of the people generally forget most of what they 'should' know by the age of 30. Making students memorize certain things each year so they can pass the test at the end is not the only option to education.
One of the strongest ways for people to learn is to think deeper about what they are learning, not just being forced to write a three page paper on some guy that wrote a famous book; instead, they could read the book that he wrote and possibly have a class discussion about the events in it and possibly why he wrote it. This is just one example, another way students learn is to be active. Schools could be made to focus on active activities that help the student understand exactly what they are learning, maybe they could do a skit with Martin Luther King Jr.'s speech in it.
Personally, I think it would be better if America could find a way to create public schools of different varity. There is, of corse, charter and private schools, but these are not always available to familie's. I believe it would be benefitial to creat public schools with a new technique to teaching for the students that simply have a different way of learning.