Farhad’s School Education Blog

This term in English I have learned and covered various usage of English from books to poems to essays and much more where I have had some strengths or weaknesses in. In this class I have learned about ESLRs the most as my knowledge about them dramatically grew and was more advanced in it as I started the term without having a clue what the ESLRs were. Personally, there have been two ESLRs I have been most active with, which are Involved Citizen and Academic Achiever. One personal growth I realized I had was Drama where I gained knowledge of it quite significantly; honestly I learned about most aspects of drama in just one quarter. To sum it up, this term has been a successful term especially with only the ESLRs and Drama.

Involved citizen was one of my skills to get me through English and also other subjects. To me involved citizen means having the responsibility to care and respect people of same and also different backgrounds. I was an involved citizen for instance, when I had drama for explanatory and I didn’t criticize someone in a bad mannerly way since we were all beginners in this subject including myself. In direct definition of ESLRs this means I “demonstrated awareness and respect for the rights of others.” Another example is when I had an English discussion about Anne Frank or The Tempest; I didn’t make fun of or interrupted any of my classmates who all came from different backgrounds. Even though I didn’t fully agree with what they were trying to say I still respected their point. In direct terms of ESLRs, this means I “Interacted respectfully with people of diverse cultures” Furthermore, another aspect that I used of Involved Citizen was when I “Demonstrated care and concern for my environment.” I achieved this by not being mad or arguing with my group members when they didn’t do what they were supposed to do in Scavenger Hunt project as I understood their mistakes. Overall Involved Citizen is what I accomplished for needing for me to behave and respect everyone in this term.

Academic Achiever was another ESLR I was really effective in. One important aspect of this ESLR was that I achieved being able to work independently and collaboratively, for instance when I did the Poem Unit, first in the beginning of class I participated in this poem activity with the whole class and finally I wrote poems by myself without chatting with my class peers. In Academic Achiever, this is known as “ demonstrate the ability to work both independently and collaboratively” I also managed to “access information from a variety of sources.” I did this quote for instance when I had to do research on a poet and summarize the life of that person, and even though Mr. Raisdana gave us a site to go to go for the research, I went to other sites to go more in depth for the poet’s life which was Angelou. The other Academic Achiever term I handled was “demonstrate technological literacy and the use of technology as a tool for the efficient and creative completion of a project” I achieved this quote by being able to finish the Teen Life project that was a movie about terrorism with my team members from other nations by using wikispace.com. In general I was also able to be efficiently an Academic Achiever.

One personal growth I realized I got was Drama, which was a mandatory subject as an Explanatory. This fascinating and fun subject helped me get my extroverted side out and not be the shy kid anymore with doing all the activities to stand out and not be introverted anymore. Since I like watching movies of all types, I might admire being an actor one day since Mr. Raisdana who had an intellectual idea of teaching us the skills to what an actor has to have and practice to have great sucess. So because of this I will try out in the next play next year staring 9th grade. Actually, Mr. Raisdana also taught us how a script is written with all the suspense and climax for example. As a whole, Drama was one of my favorite classes this year and I learned the whole concept of Drama that I had the benefit for the future and enjoyed it enormously.

Starting off the year I thought English was going to be this dull subject nevertheless I actually enjoyed it especially with the Poem and The Tempest course. This English class was a remarkable experience that I’ll never forget it as we learned a lot of characteristics of English and I think it will help us outstandingly next year starting high school being a fresh man. Generally I was filled with pride to be apart of this incredible 8th grade English class with Mr. Raisdana and my classmates as everything came out being a success for everyone even though my class had some up and downs.

          The third quarter has been by far the best and most thriving for me as we did a variety of different activities and projects that really involved the ESLRs not only within our community but also with three other schools around the world that’ll I talk about later in more detail. The reason that I believed that this was the best quarter is because we got to think outside the box as we did activities both technologically, physically, emotionally we had never done before. We learned everything in such an enjoyable way that really helped us gain loads of knowledge both independently and collaboratively. Below I’ll describe each event from January to March as proficiently as I can with my strengths and weaknesses. The events are the book we read over the holidays, The Wave, Poetry unit including the construction of the book and more, Teen Life Project, the movie we made as a class with pictures and video, and finally discussions we chatted about in class that helped you understand where you are at or things you need to improve on. Overall I think we did a lot of activities and projects in a short amount of time without even realizing it, and it truly amazes me how hard I worked in English class.

         I had the option if I wanted to read The Wave over the Christmas holiday because Mr. Raisdana was not able to it with us during school. I really enjoyed reading this book even though I was having a nice cold winter holiday in Iran, and to be honest, it is one of the best books I read in my life as it is truly one of my favorite and motivating books unlike Anne. Honestly after reading Anne Frank, my interests of books were totally vanished until when I was assigned to read The Wave. I wish we could have done some activities or projects regarding to this book. I think was more of a Self-Directed learner because I “Accepted responsibility for my own learning” which means even though we didn’t have to read the book, I did and finished my task of finishing the book completely. I could although have been a better Self-Directed learner by posting my thoughts about The Wave on my blog. I would grade myself 9 out of 10 for doing this part of 3^rd quarter. To put it briefly I read The Wave and I think it was really helpful in terms of education.

          Poetry Unit was just incredible as we explored the secrets and culture of Poetry. How can we forget this unit as it truly showed us the skills we actually had and yet didn’t realize. Without a doubt I believe everyone thinks that the Poetry is and will be the best unit we’ve done over the term. Through this unit we have written poem after poem with being well edited and finalized for our books for the Poetry Night which I miserably failed to go to. In the course of this unit we have learned writing poems of diversity, and learning poetry terms and actually using them for our poems. We also learned how to recite poems in front of audience with emotions and the pace it’s supposed that depends on the theme of the poem. Fun activities included a game sort of where we had to write a poem on a random picture in the one of the senses it’s supposed to be written in and heaps of other group activities that involved me with the ESLRs: Involved Citizen and Effective Communicator as I interacted respectfully with group members and showed my skills of collaboration as I shared helpful ideas right through the discussions we had. While making my book I was impressed with my grade, but I thought I could have done better because I was missing three poems which took off 10% of my grade. To improve next time I can be an Academic Achiever as I adjust my work to higher standards, meaning next time I should keep track of my poems, be organized, and finish a project completely to get the grade you really strive for. As I did my analysis on the poet I chose which was Angelou. I was a critical thinker as I “gathered, analyzed, and processed from a variety of sources” which means I took information about this poet using four kinds of websites of information of her background and then analyzing it in my own words. I could have gotten a better grade but I had missing a few poems in my book so next time I could be more of a Critical thinker by being more organized. I would rank myself a 8 out of 10 for this Poetry Unit. In conclusion I enjoyed this part of quarter three even though it involved these all this hard work nevertheless it was worth it as I experienced poetry in my own style.

          We have participated in the Teen Life Project which consists of four schools from around the world. They are in Colombia, U.S.A., and Canada and we communicated with these teenagers using a wiki as we are divided in about 20 groups of at least 6 people and have our own page to put our information. The purpose is to see how teenagers think about the global issues surrounding us and how we can help to solve these problems. So in my school we are supposed to write a poem that sends out a message and also a picture you made representing your topic and mine was Terrorism. It was hard communicating with our group members so I decided to get their emails and the Colombians were the only ones interested in talking to me as I chatted with them in MSN. Now the other members are supposed to put everything in some sort of project perhaps a movie in our group. I was definitely an Effective Communicator because I “Used technology as a tool for communication” and “collaborated with others in appropriate learning situations to achieve group goals.”  This defines that I used the internet to communicate with my group peers for effective strategy to complete this Teen Life Project. Next time I can do better if I emailed the Americans and Canadians to help out in the project. If I was to be graded for this section, I would give myself a 8 out of 10. Overall I wouldn’t say this was the best project due to lack of communication with different time zones but at least I got to know some new people from different cultures and this is how business is nowadays so it’s worth it to do this project even though I think that 10 graders because they would be have better knowledge of communication with being mature and responsible and would be more suited for this than us.

          At first I thought 3^rd quarter was going to be torture. Truthfully seeing that I was never into poetry, I was wrong as I realized I write poetry fairly well but I wouldn’t consider myself being a poet yet. Finally I was filled with pride to be apart of this great 8^th grade English class with Mr. Raisdana and also with my peers since everything came out being a success for everyone. A truly unforgettable experience!

In modern generation if you consider me as a 14 year old female from the west or else where that is popular and known for her friendliness I would try to get as much attention to help advance my high status. That would mean one way of getting guys to like me is by wearing the newest fashion and for instance I would wear short skirts or shorts to actually show off my attractiveness. Since there is this so called “media” surrounding our environment I could think of being anorexic at some point to look like some celebrity, putting a lot of make up on, trying to get the best boyfriend of everyone else, do sports to normally being the reason of being popular and showing off my athletic skills, and chatting online with boys. However on the other hand not all girls are like these due to religion, low self-esteem, being shy, culture, and ext. So if you imagine me as a 14 year old religious girl I would do the complete opposite and have a point that all men and women are equal, never try to be the most attractive, and not looking for a boyfriend until you get married after school or college.           

Class has been the way of people being divided of inequality from the day the humankind was created here on earth. If I was an American adult who was a lower class person, not educated too well, and looking to make money for my poor family, I would obviously have no chose but to get forced into the army to have a good salary and go fight the war in the east not knowing if I’ll ever come back and make profit use my dedication and money I worked for. I could also be an uneducated Indonesian who’s thinking to come to Singapore to make good money for my kids and next thing I know I’m a maid with a monthly fee of only 50 Singaporean dollars.

Race is the most important in culture as it simply shows a person of his or her difference towards another person. If I was an English boy who plays war games of whites fighting terrorists all the time and hasn’t had the chance to understand a Middle-Eastern culture, I would go around and call all the so called Middle-Easterns “terrorists” or maybe make fun of their skin color or religion. On the other hand if I was a poor Iraqi who’s not happy with his family members dying in the war of being purely innocent and getting mistaken that they militants. Then I would think that westerners are trying to ruin my life and fight us for no reason, and destroying my home country though the army is trying to help the Iraqis fight the terrorist groups. Nevertheless since the west has accidentally killed this boy’s dad in front his face, he would probably grow up becoming a terrorist himself perhaps and try to get his revenge. Overall this is why I think wars sometimes just don’t seem to end or get started and the reason for this is mostly misunderstanding towards people of different race

I chose Maya Angelou out of the top 20 because honestly I wanted to choose one of the top 3 to see what a good poet’s personality is like, how they enjoy writing poems and what they go through their lifetime. Another reason I chose her is because she is different from everyone and one obvious notice is that she’s African-American and she had one tragic hard childhood to handle.

Angelou’s Biography:
Maya Angelou was in St. Louis, Missouri, on April 4, 1928 and there she grew up in St. Louis and Stamps, Arkansas. She not only was a poet but also an author, historian, songwriter, playwright, dancer, stage and screen producer, director, performer, singer, and civil rights activist. Maya is truly one great multi-tasker. She is famous for her autobiographical books which some were nominated for the National Book Award.

Angelou’s Background:
When she was three years old, her parents divorced and she and her 4-year old brother, Bailey, were sent alone, by train, to live with their grandmother in Stamps, Arkansas. There, she started being a good dancer after taking a variety of dance classes. At age 8 she confessed that her mom’s boyfriend had sexually abused her and then her uncles murdered the man. She got scared of this result and become mute because she originally stated before that “the power of [her] words led to someone’s death.” After years of struggles she begins speaking again at the age of 13. Afterwards, in 1940, she spent the summer with her father in Los Angeles and was attacked by her father’s girlfriend. This caused her to run away and live in a junkyard and there she lived with homeless children. She finally called her mother and was sent a bus ticket to come back to live with her mom. When she was 16 she got pregnant and had a son that later became a poet. To make money for the son she became a singer at a nightclub. After that in 1952 she married a Greek sailor named Angelos.  She now is alive at the age of 78 and is one of the most recognizable woman in the world as she has been interviewed in recent years in Larry King Live and Oprah Show.

One of her poems: 
Alone  
by Maya Angelou 
Lying, thinking
Last night
How to find my soul a home
Where water is not thirsty
And bread loaf is not stone
I came up with one thing
And I don’t believe I’m wrong
That nobody,
But nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

There are some millionaires
With money they can’t use
Their wives run round like banshees
Their children sing the blues
They’ve got expensive doctors
To cure their hearts of stone.
But nobody
No, nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Now if you listen closely
I’ll tell you what I know
Storm clouds are gathering
The wind is gonna blow
The race of man is suffering
And I can hear the moan,
‘Cause nobody,
But nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.
 

Analysis:
I enjoy her poem as it sent a great message out to the world which I think is stand out for yourself no matter what and even if you’re alone you’ll make it of what you want to be. This poem actually describes her life as she was alone with out a mom or dad for so long yet she is so well-known now after all she went through in her childhood. She included a lot of figurative language that made it more poetic despite that this poem was clear and easy to understand. Something I realized was that she repeated a lot of word at times.

A question I would ask Maya is that: Does she always describe herself in her poems as she did in this one with saying how she was with nobody and alone and yet made it at such a high level? Another question I would ask her is: How did she manage in such dramatic life time to be a poet, author, historian, songwriter, playwright, dancer, stage and screen producer, director, performer, singer, and civil rights activist at the same time?

Maya Angelou used most of the figurative language I know of to write this poem. She used rhymes of a simple AB,AB pattern like when she said in the 3rd stanza with one of her end rimes was: “With money they can’t use” (and continued with) “Their children sing the blues” She also used personification when she said in the first stanza: “Where water is not thirsty” She wrote repetition too when she kept saying “alone” and “nobody” in her poem. Finally it also had similes when she said “There are some millionaires” (next line) “With money they can’t use” (next line) “Their wives run round like banshees” because here she was comparing wives of millionaires to banshees. And finally she used alliteration when she said “alone all alone.”

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A Sunni Muslim group has claimed responsibility for bombing a bus carrying Revolutionary Guards in Iran, killing at least 11 people. This was rare because normally there is not a lot of attacks in Iran and this was one of the worst in years. This attack was hit in the majority Sunni city of Zahedan, the capital of Sistan-Baluchestan province, in the mostly Shia country. All the revolutionary guards were shia how ever. This city has had a lot of problems with violent Sunni terrorists like once a number of Iranian soldiers have been attack with surprise or kidnapped there in the past. This had happened on Wednesday, February 14, 2007 which is the Iranian Revolutionary Day and a day after, Iranian Intelligence have found the reasonability of this attack. They are Jundallah or A.K.A Army of God. This group has done violent attacks in Iran before and today they are described as a group of bandits. Jundallah are alleged of increasing cross-border attacks from
Pakistan and have from influence from the Pakistanis. The Mayor of Zahedan has said that the issue to be taken up with Pakistan. He also added that bandit groups in Sistan-Baluchestan had links with British and American intelligence agencies before and now like Jundallah for weaponry and bombs. How ever the Americans denied the charges.

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About Me
My name is Farhad and I’m a fourteen year old Iranian that has lived in Kuala Lumpur, and elsewhere in Malaysia for no more than 11 years. To give you a sense my personality, my hobbies include listening to music, playing sports especially soccer and track and field activities, and traveling to other countries. I have been in international schools my whole life and I believe through my years I have learned that it’s an advantage to be with people of different diversity, background, culture, and so on. The reason behind this is because the more I interact with them, the more I learn about cultures and gain more respect for them and getting to have better relations with international communities is beneficial when needed in the future.

About Malaysia’s Physical Environment and Technology
Malaysia is a developing country and I have been here for 11 years and I can say that the growth of its environment and technology has increased with a steadily fast pace that truly amazes me and has lead to more foreigners coming to visit and stay here. Malaysia is a small tropical region that is located in South East Asia. Here the community provides good services, like police and fire departments but they don’t come at right the time sometimes from my past as I experienced. Having said that, there are more positives about the services such as for example police guards are found everywhere at malls, parks, near housing sections, so I would agree that it’s a safe country here. Technology here is advanced to its fullest and here you can find any piece of technology device such as laptop, Ipod, cameras and so on. Everyone thinks Malaysia has an inadequate environment but that’s not true once you visit it here. This is because here there are good transportations, huge buildings, malls, parks and so on. Some facts include that Malaysia has the biggest bird park, 2nd biggest airport, and tallest twin towers known as KLCC in the world. Overall Malaysia is a satisfying country to live in.

My School
I go to an international school that I believe is one of the best schools in Malaysia because of its education and activities it provides. Here we have about a thousand students from kindergarten to 12th grade. In my school we have mostly have American teachers and also foreigners that teach new languages such as Spanish, French, and Mandarin. The school has a lot of after school curricular activities from taekwondo to cheerleading to sports to art and so on. We do have tournaments for sports which includes going to other neighboring countries to play games. Our school also provides parties at nights for Halloween, Valentines dance, and for other occasions too monthly. Our school is ran well with a typical American system.

Issues
The issues I most interested in are racism, puberty, and peace. To commence the choice of my issues will be first puberty because at this stage of life you change emotional wise, physical wise, maturity wise and so on, and I believe this has affected my life immeasurably and for the future. The next one is peace or as people know it as war. Wars begin because of bad relations of countries, rebels, or so called terrorists and if we had better understanding of each other within cultures, or religion, our world would have been a better place. I’m not saying that this should necessarily happen but imagine the world with everyone being a part of 1 nation, 1 religion, and 1 race and without a doubt the earth would be a much safer place than now. And finally the last which is racism and this starts of at teenage years I believe as I experienced. This begins with teenagers criticizing other people racially. What I mean is that they might call someone  “black” if you come from an African diversity but the person doesn’t give up and shows his power by criticizing him or her back whether he’s European, American, South American or Asian. As I mentioned racism gets started anywhere or anytime which leads to one the most important truly many reasons why more gangs form and wars start. I don’t relate to racism or peace too much in my life because I’m in an

1. Where did the Aztecs originally live? What prompted them to relocate? Where did they end up and why? Chose an artifact, which you feel best, represents this event. Support your choice

The Aztecs originally lived in Atzlan which someplace in North West Mexico in fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. They ended up in a swampy island in the middle of Lake Texcoco because Tenoch had a vision and Huitzilopochtli told him to lead his people there and the city was then called Tenochtitlan. Tenoch envisioned that he was told to look for an eagle being rested on a cactus that was growing from a rock or cave encircled by water. The artifact that I chose is a fearsome knife with a razor-sharp blade and its handle is turquoise mosaic. I feel best that this represents the Aztecs because they used this specific knife to conduct human sacrifices next to the god house of Huitzilopochtil. The interesting fact I found about this the gods name is that it means hummingbird wizard and the sacrifices so that he could be able to triumph over the god of darkness. I also think this is the best chose for an artifact I found because this represents what the Aztecs worthily and courageously did these religious sacrifices for their Aztec god.

Step 2:
The Aztecs ended up in the middle of a lake and built their new capital Tenochtitlan. What were the pros and cons of settling in the middle of a lake? Describe the lay of the land and choose an image for your exhibit.

The pros of the Aztecs ending up in the middle of a lake and built their capital are:
∑ They were able to make irrigation to make crops all year.
∑ They had the capability to make floating gardens easily
∑ People moved about between their chinampas was made easy for people.
The cons are:
∑ The island was a marshy, snake infested land
∑ The island for normal people was made by piling up plants and sticky black mud from the lake.

Step 3:
Which gods were worshiped? The pyramids were built for what purpose?
Aztec only had knowledge of the forces of nature and worshiped them as gods. The most important god was Huitzilopochtli, the god of sun and he was also used as their god of war. The other gods include Tezcatlipoca who is the god of the Great Bear constellation and of the night sky, Quetzalcoatl was the god of morning and the evening star, Tlaloc was the Aztec rain god and his his name means He Who Makes Things Sprout, Chalchuitlicu, had been a water goddess and was known as the fourth Sun. The pyramid at Aztec Empire were built for purposes such as sacrifice rituals for their gods that they worshiped and were normally done at the top of the pyramid.
Step 4:
Who are the different members of Aztec society? What are their roles? Choose an artifact that represents the social order of Aztec society.

Slaves, commoners, and nobility are the different members of the Aztec society.

SLAVES
∑ Children of poor families could be sold.
∑ Freedom could be bought by slaves.
∑ They gained freedom by running away from their master, and make it to the royal palace without being caught.

COMMONERS
∑ This was the largest social group, “macehualtin” in Aztes.
∑ They were involved in agriculture and trades.
∑ They were farmers working in families, and keeping their harvest.
∑ Their actual land was owned by all the people of the neighborhood, also known as calpulli. These commoners owned their area of land for their life but lowest group of commoners weren’t allowed to own land.
∑ These people were allowed to use land, but not own it.
∑ Far distance traders would frequently be used to serve the government as ambassadors.
∑ Famous artisans, physicians, and teachers were also shown a lot of respect.

NOBLES
∑ Nobles had birth, priests, and people who earned a high rank.
∑ The pipiltin was a small number of families who were the few uppermost in the Aztec social life. They had the highest position of the government, army, and the priesthood.
∑ The nobles chose one person to be their crucial leader and was called the tlatoani. This leader would be highly respected and would rule until he died.
∑ Most of the respect was given to warriors, priests, and the nobles.
∑ Warrior class was highly appreciated.
∑ Warriors would normally volunteer themselves for the most important sacrifices.
The artifact that I chose that would represents the social order of Aztec society

Step 5:
The Aztecs have a spoken language. What was it called? Did they use any other forms of communication? Include an example of either written or visual language of the Aztecs.

The spoken language that the Aztecs used was called Nahuatl and this unique language comes from a large group of Indian languages. They used variation of a larger language group called Uto-Aztecan to communicate in other forms and also in some areas of Mexico they still have native cultures which are variations of Nahuatl that are are spoken.

One Aztecan used visual pictures, and the other used letters called glyphs. They used visual pictures sometimes and make it very complex so that it would tell a whole story and they would also use pictographs to symbolize ideas or symbolize the sound of a syllable. Glyphs were used to indicate phonetic sound and color was the key of glyphs since some of their glyphs were very similar and with lacking color, it would be tough to tell what a glyph meant and a mistakes could be made due to colors.
Step 6:
How did the Aztecs grow food and what was their main crop? Did they trade and with whom? Did they have a currency (money)? Find an image for your exhibit about making a living Aztec style.

They Aztecs grew corn, chili peppers, squash, tomatoes, beans, and other kinds of food and their main crop was corn, which was known as maize in their culture. The Aztecs traded with city neighbors all the time because a lot of cities had their own unique crops which others didn’t have. The Aztecs didn’t have currency so they traded goods instead of paying money to buy other products.

Step 7:
Discuss the Impact of Spanish Contact 1519 from both the Aztec point of view and the Spanish point of view. Find an image depicting this event.

Step 8:
Discuss La Malinche or Dona Marina. Debate her positive/negative impact on Mexico past and present. What does the term Mestizo refer to? What influences remain today from Aztec culture of the past?

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Courage to me is something that you need to have in order to have a stable life and that includes great achievements that help you throughout your self-esteem and timeline and if you don’t have good courageousness in your brain, heart, or soil then you won’t succeed well in life. Famous people like Armstrong are a great example of why they are courage and how it has helped them in life which the answer is winning Tour de France not only 1 but 7 times! People sometimes think that courage means being strong and fighting, that’s true but there’s a whole lot more ways of being courage and to me it not only means to be brave but also the capability to face, danger, difficulty, or pain with overcoming the fear. I would say being courage whether it’s mental, physical, or emotional you somehow manage to overcome it in life. Believe it or not once I was scared to climb the wall at our school in 5th grade so I gave up on the first attempt because I had never done anything like it, but I came the next time and was determined to do it and I did it by climbing the first big wall at school. Now that I overcame this difficultly it has helped me to be a fine climber and I never imagined I was this good at it. So this an example of courage because first it shows my fear, then I overcame it and now the outcome of it has helped to be a better climber.

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Click this to know have knowledge of Argentina’s involvement in World War 2 and Pursuit of Nazi collaborators.