This week has been quite the relaxing week for me. Lately I've been spending some time by myself to just unwind and relax, excluding social media for the most part. Laying in bed, staring at the ceiling, while a Coldplay album plays is always a nice way to unwind for a bit. I don't know what it is about Coldplay that I love so much, but their music just makes me feel like I have no worries, like my anxiety has just "gotten up and walked away". I mean, have you ever just heard that one special song and felt like nothing matters after you have listened to it? Sometimes school, or life in general can be so boring that people end up having depression. Everyday is pretty much the same for me. Simply put, life is boring right now. With my over-protective parents getting out of the house to hang out with friends is simply impossible so I constantly feel imprisoned as if I'm under house arrest. So, what I do is I tend to make the most out of life. "My life is going to get better" is often what I say to myself and I know I will accomplish my dreams! I try to be positive everyday but with my circumstances, sometimes that can be a bit challenging. All I'm trying to say is try to smile once in a while! Try your best to fit some fun into your day because you aren't a robot. I'm getting a job soon so I'm a little excited to be able to get out of the house more and that my daily life will change, so I want to get the best out of my free time to do the things I love such as drawing, listening to music, biking, and watching anime. Anyway, getting on with my blog, this week I will be sharing my reflection with you for my English class!
Inquiry Reflection . . .
In English class we have made our own reading groups and the best part is, we got to choose what we wanted to read. My group chose to read a manga called Pandora Hearts. Pandora Hearts is about a boy named Oz Vessalius, the heir to one of the duke houses, who has just turned fifteen. His life is rich and carefree, darkened only by the constant absence of his father. At his coming-of-age ceremony, however, everything changes. For no reason that he can discern, he's cast into the prison known as the "Abyss," only to be saved by a "chain" known as Alice, the Bloodstained Black Rabbit. It is unknown why he was cast into Abyss, how Alice factors into it all, and what the organization known as "Pandora" wants with him.
First off, I like how our class got to choose our own groups to work with, and I find it interesting how we are working with the other English class as well. This way, we are not limited to just the individuals in this class and we can expand on how we feel about what we're reading with others through social media, Google Hangouts, and many other resources that we are lucky to be able to use so easily. I also like pulling ideas out of the text and writing my thoughts, opinions, ideas and/or quotes from the text onto a Google doc. and sharing it with my other group members. This way we can share and combine our ideas both virtually and physically by having face-to-face conversations with eachother to talk about what we've been reading. This style of learning is very efficient, easy, and non-stressful for me so I like it very much and I hope that more students in the future will get to experience this style of learning as well.
First off, I like how our class got to choose our own groups to work with, and I find it interesting how we are working with the other English class as well. This way, we are not limited to just the individuals in this class and we can expand on how we feel about what we're reading with others through social media, Google Hangouts, and many other resources that we are lucky to be able to use so easily. I also like pulling ideas out of the text and writing my thoughts, opinions, ideas and/or quotes from the text onto a Google doc. and sharing it with my other group members. This way we can share and combine our ideas both virtually and physically by having face-to-face conversations with eachother to talk about what we've been reading. This style of learning is very efficient, easy, and non-stressful for me so I like it very much and I hope that more students in the future will get to experience this style of learning as well.
Communication and Connections . . .
Every individual has different preferences when it comes to written versus oral communication skills. I for one enjoy both. I admit that it is easier to communicate and make connections orally rather than writing it all down. However, I like communicating and making connections when I am able to write it down because I can organize my thoughts more easily and add to my thoughts and connections. I am a visual learner so writing things down is more visually pleasing for me in that I can see what I wrote and tweak things along the way. I can use my written communication skills to enhance my verbal communication skills by thoroughly understanding and practicing what I am going to communicate to my audience. Memorization is a good technique, however for me, I find that understanding the main idea of what I am going to say is much more important. It is more important to me because I can talk smoothly and I don't have to needlessly memorize lines. But it all depends on your outlook and preferences.
Conversations . . .
Last week, when I got together with my reading group, I wondered if we would have a thorough conversation about our book (Pandora Hearts). However, after we did our recording, I realised that we actually had a deep conversation about what we have read so far. It was nice to be able to discuss our feelings, thoughts, and opinions about the book in that we could learn how everyone feels about what we have read so far. Sometimes we would disagree and sometimes we would make connections but it was neat to understand different people's views. For example, one of my group members stated that they enjoyed reading this book, however I disagreed with facts to back up how I felt about the book.
The image below represents how I felt about this learning experience because I learned how to connect with others both orally, and using written words, almost as if we were connecting puzzle pieces as seen in the image below. I enjoyed doing this because we could clearly express how we feel about the book so far
face-to-face and understand eachother's feelings, thoughts, and opinions as well. Though the blue puzzle piece and the red puzzle piece are different colours, they can still piece together!
The image below represents how I felt about this learning experience because I learned how to connect with others both orally, and using written words, almost as if we were connecting puzzle pieces as seen in the image below. I enjoyed doing this because we could clearly express how we feel about the book so far
face-to-face and understand eachother's feelings, thoughts, and opinions as well. Though the blue puzzle piece and the red puzzle piece are different colours, they can still piece together!