January 10th, 2012 Learning Log Post!

What We Did

     Finally, today was the day for our "Geography Challenge" contest! I know, it sounded really scary when we were practising, but it wasn't that bad as I thought it would be! A lot of people didn't know half of the questions so nobody felt bad about low marks which I thought was good! :) Right as we got into class and the bell rang, we got dividers and got ready to take the test. We had 9 rounds with 10 questions per round which had 90 questions in total but it was out of 100 because a set of round included naming the place and the number on a map that was provided. Every round had different types of questions such as, food, Canadian animals, rights, and e.tc. She repeated each question two times unless someone asked to repeat it again. She wasn't allowed to give hints like she did when we were practising because that's the rule. Some questions, I didn't know AT ALL, so I just left some blank which was allowed. After we finished 3 rounds, we exchanged our test sheets with the people who sat near us and marked each others. Every round was out of 10 except for one round. After the test was finished which took up the whole block, our marking partners added up the scores out of 100. We had to determine the top three people who got the highest marks in class. Jordan was first with the score of 49 I believe. One more person had to get picked because two people tied for third place!  Ms.Lees said that the test this year was the hardest one so far, so don't worry if you got a low mark because it doesn't even count for our report cards. It's just a enrichment to challenge our geography skills! 

Why We Did It

     Some of you might think it's just an enrichment and we are just doing this for the contest, but it's actually a great way to improve our geography skills. It's a great chance to know all the variety of geography types and learn about them because it'll eventually help one time in your life. The contest is held to find out the top geography experts from our school from grade 8's to 10's. I am pretty sure it's held around the region and if you do well enough, you get to take another test and compete with the other schools! It does include a lot of background knowledge because I know that I was able to relate to things that I heard on the news before to the questions which helped me a lot. You don't know how much I've learned just from the practice rounds we did in class. I was able to learn new things that I've never ever heard before. As we do the questions, we can realize our errors and correct them, which will be in our heads better! It'll help us remember and point them out through out the years. It was a great chance to learn harder geography and develop our skills.

     Geography skills is an important skill to have especially when you're an adult. When someone asks you where a certain place is, you should be able to know right away. You never know when your going to use those skills. For example, someone might ask you if Spain is along the coastline and you'll be able to reply yes quickly without even checking anything. It'll be really handy. By knowing the places, it could help you find exact locations and such.

Connections/Reflection

   It's very important to have geography skills because one of the rounds was about the news. It's always helpful to know what's going around the world so you can think about it and it'll help your social skills. You can also discuss it about it and find out how it can get solved which needs higher level thinking. As you go through higher grades, I know that teachers want students to use higher level thinking and probably will discuss a lot about the issues that are going around in the world. 

     I've learned so much from the contest because more than half of them I didn't know, and I got to improve my geography skills. I tried my hardest to use my background knowledge but it didn't work too well! I learned something new, that England is part of United Kingdom. I've always thought they were the same thing. I learned some interesting facts too! Such as, 6 people in average die from car accidents in Canada every day. I thought it would be 2 at first but I was wrong. Also, there was a question about what fruit that is yellow and sweet is grown in Thailand and some other places. I thought they grew lots of bannanas so I put down bannanas but I was wrong again. The answer was pineapple. Now, I know I shouldn't always think all yellow fruits are bannanas! I'll remember that one very well! 

     Knowing how the weather, land surface, e.t.c are like, it'll help you decide where to go and where not to go! Say you want to go to New York for vacation. You can't just go at a random time because you never know if it's going to be cold or too hot. Researching is always good because you can find out how the weather's like in different seasons. I wouldn't want to go to New York in the winter time probably because I've heard that it's VERY cold in  the winter time but I wouldn't want to go in the summer time either because I've been to New York in the summer time before and it was too stuffy and hot! Now, I would think carefully and plan when the perfect time is to go and I would decide as the spring time probably because it wouldn't be too cold or too hot! This is how you can basically use your geographical knowledge. You might think learning all of this is a waste of time but wait till you get older, you'll regret it! 

Homework

     Ms.Lees didn't assign any specific work but if you are not finished your notes, you better finish it by tomorrow. She said she will be collecting them soon for the people who haven't handed in yet and put it in the "Late Work" folder! You also should finish your novels soon if you haven't done so yet because we might work on planning out our webs tomorrow in class. 
ALSO, remember to bring warm clothing for the "Warm & Fuzzy Drive" by Friday IF you can please. :)

Tips

     - Even if you think you have done ALL your homework, go through your binder and check if your worksheets are all completed! 

     - Start thinking about the main ideas you could put in your web for our little novel web project Ms.Lees talked about. 

     - Try to sit beside someone who doesn't talk and makes you work because you want to concentrate on your work in class, not your fellow classmates! 

     - Start thinking about what courses you'd maybe like to take next year for grade 9. (Think about what you're interested in and what you're good at!)

     - If you are not sure of the "Learning Log Blog" post criteria, check out your classmates blogs or even the grade 9's since they've had more experience with them and should know how to exactly follow the criteria.

     - If you have missed todays class and can't figure out what we did today, of course check out your classmates blogs or contact your study buddies for more information if needed. 

     - If you aren't up-to-date with your work, go to flex this Thursday at 11:10!

     - If you aren't able to finish certain work, contact Ms.Lees by her e-mail. (It's on our yellow course outline sheets) 

Schedule

Monday : Olivia B

Tuesday: Alice B

Wednesday: Daniel K

Friday: Luke W

DANIEL will be doing his blog tomorrow!