Answered Questions- Science Fair Reflection

After all the hard work of bringing in materials and making our poster board, we finally presented it on the day of the science fair!  I would like to reflect and share how my group's project went.  Our project was the reaction between coke and mentos.  Our independent variable was the coke.  Our dependant were the different flavors of mentos.  Our constants were the meter sticks, the coke and the mentos.
The only thing that I knew about my topic before we started researching was what actually happened in the experiment.  These are the things that I wanted to find out-

• What caused the reaction?
• What ingredients are in mentos that cause the explosion?
• How high can the explosions really go?

Throughout the resarch process, I learned so many cool things about our project.  For example, suprisingly enough, the reaction is actually a physical reaction, not a chemical.  Also, to answer one of my earlier questions, it is not an ingredient in mentos, it is actually the tiny pores in the mentos that make the carbon dioxide go in them and make the coke flow more easily out of the bottle.  So, during my research all of my questions were answered.  A new question I have the I did not research is if the type of soda/fizzy drink affects the explosion.  My plan for my future science expirement is to work alone.  I think that I will work alone because I might be less distracted and more focused on only my project.  One of my favorite parts of this expiriment, not counting the fair, was probably preparing the board and doing the actual expirement.  I feel like one of my core value strengths are being innovative and being innovatine while making this posterboard was really important.  Doing the actual experiment was actually really cool too, because we where able to see that coke and mentos could really go up 3 meters!  One of the more frusturating things in my group was disagreeing about certain things.  We had problems sometimes with having an odd number of people because it sometimes felt like there was an odd one out.  If I could change anything, I might have changed the script lines, because sometimes in certain presentations, there was someone who had less lines than others.  During the science fair, I tried to project my voice as much as possible, because I know that that is one of the things I struggle with. I know that our collaboration was as big a challenge as anything else because there was an odd number of us, and we had to evenly divide and conquer.  We also ran into quite a few disagreements as a group, but were aable to overcome them by calmly talking them out.  In the end, I was kind of half satisfied, half not satisfire with my topic.  I liked it because it was intersting and there was a lot to learn about, but I disliked it because there were a lot of different groups doing it, so it was not really origional.  When we were about to present, I felt kind of nervous, but then I realized that I knew all the information.   I liked the QR code system because it was really organized and it was not handwritten, although there were some irrevivent comments, not really focusing on the project as much.
Overall, this was a great experience and I am so excited for next year!

My Science Fair group- Claudia (Right) Rosanne (Middle) Me (Left)

City of Ember- Deep Question of Choice

Why do you think more people in Ember did not act like Lina and Doon did?

I think that people did not act like Lina and Doon because they were still asleep, unable to see the true mayor, unable to wake up and see the real scarcity in Ember.  For example on Assignment Day, nobody thought twice about the mayors reaction towards Doon's outburst.  Suddenly Doon spoke up.  "But Ember is not prospering!" he cried.  "Everything is getting worse and worse!"  "Silence!"  cried the mayor. (13)  Nobody really suspected there could be something more to it.  Little trails the mayor leaves behind are not picked up by the citizens of Ember.  They are just left there, but Lina and Doon look more closely at them and go deeper.  Secondly,  on page 85, the citizens of Ember are invited to a town meeting.  He then, on page 87 says; "Slooshns!" he bellowed "Arbingfoun!"  "Solutions,'' the people in the front called to the people in the back.  "Solutions are being found?"  Later, he does not answer what king of solutions.  He just wants to cover up his tracks.  These are things that Lina and Doon would pick up, but other citizens are unable to see.  Finally, on page 156, Doon's curioustiy puts him in a position where the truth comes out.  He is in the pipeworks when he notices a key in the door he and Lina were looking at.  He then opens it.  "On the table were dishes smeared with the remains of food, and in an armchair facing Doon was a great blob of a person whose head was flopped backbard, so that all Doon could see of it was an upthrust chin.  The blob stirred and muttered, and Doon, in the second before he stepped back and pulled the door closed, caught a glimpse of a fleshy ear, a slab of gray cheek, and a loose, purplish mouth."  This, we later find out is the mayor.  Only somebody with curiousity like Doon or Lina would really get to the bottom of this.  Also, you realize that nobody really second guessed the fact that the Mayor was bigger than the rest of the citezens.        

Theatre 6 Quarter Reflecion

Throughout this past quarter, I have learned so many different things in Theatre.  During the Greek drama, I learned how to encorperate research into an interesting play.  At first, it was hard to include all of this important information, but I overcame this obstacle through dialouge.  When we did tableaux, I learned how important body language is.  My group at first struggled with conveying facial expressions to show part of a story, but we were able to resolve this by using critique in a positve way.  When we did pantomimes, we could not talk, and we really stuggled with making our characters have certain characteristics, without talking, but we then chose personalities that could be shown through body language.   During "Theif!," I learned how to work with a large group of people and how important other peoples' say is.  That was something we struggled with, because it was hard to organize how to say things when everyone was talking at once.  When we organized, however, the outcome was really good.  Our group stuggled with the pair scenes.  We were in a rush to get it done,  so we went with whatever idea came up.  Once we finally came up with something we could add a story to, we got feedback from Ms. Moraes to make it richer and it turned out nicely.
My goals for the rest of this quarter are to be able to speak up during perfomances and try to be more focused.  For this final assesment, I will try to be more prepared and memorize my lines, not rely on improv.