1. Reflect on the first four lessons of the unit and on your classmates’ presentations.

In the first few lessons of the unit, we learned mainly about the 4 concepts: identity, stereotypes, prejudice, and racism. I really liked learning about issues that impact the real world right now. It was interesting to shift away from the textbook for a while and do more interactive work. During the presentations, I really enjoyed hearing everyone’s stories. I did not think that some people experienced prejudice in those ways, and it was very eye-opening. As for my own presentation, I learned a lot more about myself through it. I got to really understand the incident and evaluate it more. However, it was pretty uncomfortable to share about such personal topics in front of the class.

2. What did you learn about identity, stereotypes, prejudice, and racism?

I learned that identity is all about what you think of yourself as. People can identify you as something, but identity is something that only you can decide. I like to this of it as identity with the “I” as in you. I learned more about the difference between stereotypes and prejudice. I learned that stereotypes is sort of like classifying someone as something, rather than prejudice is acting upon it. Lastly, I learned that racism is the major influence of prejudice and stereotypes. Also, that race is a term that society has created, and isn’t real.

3. In what ways did your ideas change from the initial lesson when we created word webs on the white boards?

My ideas changed from the first lesson because I learned the actual definitions of the word, and more real examples of each word coming into play in real life.

4. How does race shape the way we see ourselves and others?

Race shapes the way we see ourselves and others because it makes us more aware of everyone’s differences. Our brains categorize people into groups, and when this is done, the differences become more real. If we look different than others in a society, we see ourselves as that. Different. While if others don’t look the same as a group of people too, they will seem more unknown, and with unknown sometimes comes fear. The race and color of someone can change how afraid we are of actually meeting them.

5. To what extent do our ideas about race influence the choices we make?

It usually varies to what extent ideas about race influence the choices we make. Sometimes, it could be making a small decision that isn’t affected by the ideas of race as much. Or it could be another decision that is clouded up by ideas of race. For example, if you don’t want to get in a taxi just because someone is a different color than you, ideas of race would have influenced us in a small way. I think living in Hong Kong, ideas about race don’t exactly influence our choices too much. We are all mostly familiar with different races of people, so we don’t let it influence us. However, for some people who aren’t exposed to other races may be more afraid, and let their assumptions take over completely.

How do you feel you did on the Government Unit? Remember this includes the PSA as well as the tests. 

I feel that I did pretty well overall on the Government Unit. I definitely grasped the concepts of how the US government works, the amendments, and debates about them. During the PSA, I went in detail learning about the gun control laws in the US, and later learned how it connected with the 2nd amendment. I especially enjoyed learning about the court cases and real life scenarios. I also liked the fact that we are learning about something that is in effect right now, not what has happened a while ago.

What would you do differently next time?

Next time, I would spend more time learning about the amendments and the debates that people have over them. I would study more cases that relate to what we did on the chapter 10 summative.

What study strategies worked best for you? 

The study strategies that worked best for me were reading the chapter earlier while taking notes, then create flashcards, then make sample questions for the test.

What strategies didn’t work?

The strategies that definitely didn’t work for me were cramming it all in two days. I did fine on the assesment, however, when I started studying for the big test, I realized I didn’t remember certain parts.

Next time there is a test, how will you prepare? 

Next time there is a test, I’ll remember to use the 5-day study plan and learn ahead of time. This way, I’ll have plenty of time to review the information to remember.

Links:

Textbook

School House Rock Preamble

Amendments Game

October 8, 2014: Occupy Central

Occupy Central 

For the past week, hundreds of thousands of protesters gathered in various places in Hong Kong such as Central and Mongkok to protest against the government about democracy. The protesters want to have free democracy, and also want C.Y.Leung to resign from his position. It started out as a student protest and became a very large protest that has been broadcasted world wide. The protesters have mostly made it a peaceful protest, but anti-protesters have been violent. This violence was mostly in Mongkok. The police have threatened to use force if the people start occupying govenment buildings. The police have also used tear gas and pepper spray on the protesters, which they deflect with umbrellas. This is why the movement is also called the umbrella revolution. The national symbol for this movement is a yellow ribbon in a loop. It appears that the protest leader’s names are Alex Chow, Joshua Wong, and Benny Tai. A major event that followed the protests is the application “Firechat”. This is a large social networking app that runs even when the internet is blocked. 

I am very happy for the protesters of Hong Kong that they are finally taking a stand against China to get free democracy. Even in some local HK schools, they are being taught that communism is good, when HK is supposed to be a democratic region.  I don’t blame the protesters for feeling controlled by China. I do however, think that it is a bit overboard to be bringing the economy on Hong Kong down so much. With the roads blocked, most people can’t get to work if they live in the city. Also, I sincerely hope that both the police and protesters do not get too intense. This is because this could easily trigger another Tiananmen Square incident. The new app that is becoming very popular is Firechat. This is an app that many protesters are using because they can communicate directly to other’s phones with no internet. This will be bad news in China because there is no way for them to block this app. Though other apps such as Instagram and Facebook can be blocked, Chinese people can easily get information from other people using Firechat. 

I am still confused about why the Hong Kong people are still protesting. I thought that they would have to go back to work and school once the week holiday ended. I thought that it must require a lot of dedication to stay out there. I want to learn more about how the economy has been effected by the Occupy Central movement. 

La Times:

http://www.latimes.com/world/asia/la-fg-hong-kong-leaders-20141006-story.html#page=

South China Morning Post:

http://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/1611212/live-hong-kong-protests-enter-tenth-day-dialogue-talks-drag?comment-sort=

The Atlantic:

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/10/firechat-the-hong-kong-protest-tool-aims-to-connect-the-next-billion/381113/

CNN:

http://edition.cnn.com/2014/10/06/world/asia/china-hong-kong-protests/index.html

The Washington Post:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/10/06/the-umbrella-revolution-wont-give-hong-kong-democracy-protesters-should-stop-calling-for-it/

The Japan Times:

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2014/10/05/asia-pacific/politics-diplomacy-asia-pacific/hit-to-hong-kongs-economy-spurs-opposition-to-occupy-central-protests/#.VDTEuisY158

1. Summarize your learning – refer to your KTW chart

I learned from this unit a lot about the geography and culture in North America. I learned about the different vegetation zones; for example, in Northern Canada the vegetation is tundra (a cold desert). Also, in the Great Plains cultural region, there is a temperate grassland climate. Another aspect that I learned in this unit was about the native’s culture. I learned about the Qagyuhl people in the Northwest coast and how they carved totem poles out of elm wood trees.

2. Share and explain at least one of your answers from the survey you did.

For the most enjoyable part of of this unit, I wrote the dance. This is because we got a lot of free choice in how we got to move forward with it. Instead of having to do something, we got to choose to do whatever we wanted. I also liked reading the creation stories. This gave us a deep insight into the actual culture of the natives living in each cultural region. Overall, this was definitely the best part of the unit for me.

3. What level of badge did Pierce award you? How does this accurately describe your achievement level?

Mr. Pierce awarded me with the Iroquois League badge. I do think that this is an accurate representation of my learning because I have learned a lot in this unit and enjoyed it a lot. Also, my work habits were all consistants, which made sense that I was ranked gold.

4. Identify one learning strategy that DIDN’T work last unit, and one that did

One learning strategy that did not work this past unit was writing down all of our notes on the piece of paper. Personally, I like to do the notebook packet to prepare for assesments. One strategy that did work was the mapping lab packet. I thought that this really helped solidify the climate and vegetation zones in each cultural region.

5. Set a specific learning goal for Unit 2: Challenges of a Growing Population

My learning goal for Unit 2 is to get a meeting expectations on the assesment and exceeding on the transfer portion. I also want to improve my ways of studying to make them more effective.

http://student.teachtci.com/shared/sections/8647?nav_info=text&program_id=117

^^^^ I especially like this picture because I can clearly see how the natives migrated from Siberia to the Americas. Also, I can see the glaciers and land during the ice age.