Describe what you know about life in the trenches.

Trenches are made during a war. There are absolutely no hygiene in it, bacteria spreads around because of the many injuries the soldiers get during a battle. Most of the time, rats lived and bred in the trenches, which causes soldiers to get diseases. There are other diseases caused by lack of cleanliness with corpses lying around and dirty rainwater, one of them is the Trench Foot disease. The soldier's feet would slowly rot because of the long period of time they stay in the trenches with water. Due to loads of stress, some soldiers fall into shell-shock as well.

Why do you think the idea of conflict is more prominent than peace in the world?

I think the idea of conflict is more prominent because it's human nature to want to hear or watch bad things happening like a conflict war as it's interesting, compared to a story only about making peace. People would rather see others fighting because it has more drama to it, it's just human nature.

What is conflict?

When two sides have opposing views on a subject, it will create conflict if none of them backs down. Conflict also means a clash of something against another.

Grace & Fairtrade

Grace is excited because she finally gets to go to school because her father is working with Kuapa Kokoo and he is getting higher profit from his cocoa. Usually, it's only the boys who go to school in Ghana but Grace has the chance to start schooling even though she may be behind some of her classmates. 

Measuring Development

Diamond Rank

1) 3 (Gross National Product)

2) 1 (Literacy rates)

3) 9 (Infant mortality rate)

4) 2 (Number of people doctor)

5) 4 (Population with access to clean water)

6) 8 (Population Growth Rates)

7) 7 (Population living in urban ares)

8) 6 (People employed in agriculture)

9) 5 (Population density)

The most important indicator to me is the Gross National Product because economy plays a vital role in measuring development of a country because it's leads to access of basic needs. So, if a country is wealthy, it could provide education, clean water and shelter to most civillians. The least important indicator is Population Density because it doesn't really determine the status of a country in terms of development. A country may be big but poor, and at the same time, another country could be big but rich. The indicators in the middle are the smaller factors to measuring development but also important because these factors add up to the main conclusion whether the country is doing good or bad. We didn't use Car Ownership because we figured it's the least important factor out of all of them.

How do you think we can measure development?

We could measure a country's development in terms of economy status, rate of trade, citizens' standard of living and the amount of access to essential needs. We could also gather statistics on age expectancy, population, death rate, amount of medical healthcare and birth rate.

Reflect about the hazards fair:

What went well?

The kids were astonished with our visual presentation. My teammates did a good job at explaining the hands-on to the kids.

What could have been better?

The box of our hands-on, because it was leaking and wasn't sturdy after it got wet.

Describe the experience.

I was quite nervous at first, I was worried about our hands-on experiment, our explanation skills. But once it started we just went with the flow and we managed well. It turned out to be a refreshing experiment because I've been to fairs but I've never been involved in one, so it was a new experience to be behind the counter explaining my work to others.

ELP Hazard

The hazard I'm choosing is the one I've chosen for the hazard fair, which is Tsunami. I chose it because I've already researched the essential parts of it, and I don't mind expanding my knowledge of it with this project.

Success Criteria:

• To be able to research and list all procedures and factors on how to deal with a tsunami and elaborating on it with reasons.
• To be able to make an inference based on past tragic events and facts, and to decide the level of management on different tsunamis in different locations.
• To be able to predict the consequences of my hazard by linking it to other hazards and past tragic events.

Tsunami Presentation Feedback

From Jasmaine’s Group:

What stood out as great?

- The way they presented. The information was short but clear.

What did you not understand?
- I understood everything it was very clear the way they explained it.

What needs to be improved?
- The whole presentation was just talking and reading, maybe add some sort of activity maybe a game or a hands-on. (Yes, I know that you didn’t set up your hands-on)

From Darren’s Group:

Your presentation was very good. It displayed a lot of information about the natural disaster that you were studying. The poster described all the information. However, there was no hands on activity.

From You Zhen’s Group:

The tsunamis group was excellent in presenting the information as their presentation, flyers and posters were extremely informative, concise and organised. The layout of everything was also extremely well done because it was organised and presented in a very informative manner. The only thing that they can improve on is most probably create a hands on activity as everything else was extremely detailed and well-done.

From Thomas’ Group:

Good points
- They had their information clear and readable

What could be improved?
- Nothing needs to be improved, the information is clear and the presentation is informative

Describe what you still have to prepare to finalize your project by tomorrow

What we have left to prepare for tomorrow:

We have to finish off with our poster, we still have a board left to fill up.
We also have to edit our flyer and make it more interesting.

Discuss what you learned from the process of preparing for and doing the assembly.

I learnt some teamwork and coordination, because we had to know the timing of when the models were suppose to walk out and when I was suppose to announce their work. We had to communicate with each other before the actual fashion show so we were all very sure on what to do. I also learnt to make a statement with a different approach to our usual presentation-showing technique. It was an amazing and information-filled experience.

S.C For Today's Lesson (10/1/12)

Our team and I are in the stage where we are researching. Afterwards, we will compile our information and  put it in a presentation.

What could the outcome of your research look like?

We've split the whole research process into sections, so each of us would have different parts to work on. After we've done all of our research, we will compile them together and use them for mini presentations.
We have decided to have two different presentations, one for Primary audiences and another one for Secondary audiences. We will be recording a puppet show for primary kids to let them understand better and for secondary, a practical model of how a tsunami works.

So our outcomes would be:
A completed research
A recorded puppet show
A Tsunami model

What is the difference between a factual and an interpretive question

A factual question is a question that has only one answer because it's fact-based.
ex. What is a tsunami?

An interpretive question is a question that has more than one answer, it's based on the person's interpretation of it. So, the answer will be an opinion, not a fact.
ex. Why are people scared of tsunamis?

What is a question and how do you come up with questions for learning opportunities?

A question is a worded sentence that will be responded with a piece of information.

It is:
Something you ask
Ends with a "?"
The tone (goes up)

Inquiry questions are important because:
- It indicates the research you want to do
-

Group Success Criteria

Brainstorm and consider what items your want to include on the poster.

Pictures describing the characteristics of the role
Colors to make it exciting
Title of the role being focused on
Information of the role
Keywords
Advantages & Disadvantages of the role
Creative drawing

Belbim Team Roles Questions

1. Compare your actual Belbin results to what you thought you would be.
I thought I would be a Complete Finisher, a Shaper and a Team Worker. I was far off with my deduction because my actual Belbin results showed that I was an Implementer, a Shaper and a Co-ordinator.

2. Do you agree with the results.
No, I do not agree with the results. Personally, I thought I would be more of a complete finisher rather than an implementer. From the definition I saw in the Belbin Roles document, I thought I was the opposite of being an implementer. I do like to be organized with my work but I get reluctant to accept tons of work. I do agree on being a co-ordinator and a shaper though because I sometimes like to lead my group and have things my way.

3. Discuss how your group balances its Belibin roles.
Based on our results, our group has balanced out quite well because each of us has our own individual skills that would benefit the progress of the work.

Ubennyah: Resource Investigator, PLant, Completer Finisher
Aqmar: Team Worker, Monitor Evaluator, Resource Investigator
Me: Implementer, Shaper, Co-ordinator

We are all stronger in different parts.

4. How can the team wheel help our group to complete projects.
It indicates the different skills each team member has. Therefore, picking out individual roles are easier because our team knows which person would be better at doing that specific job.

Belbin Team Roles

I am a Completed Finisher because sometimes I don't trust people to finish the job well, so I like to take charge at times making sure things are going my way. For example, while filming our Year 9 film, I made sure all the angles looked appealing to me and when one of them was not, I shot it myself even though I wasn't the camera person.

I'm a little bit of a Shaper as well as I am competitive and I like to win. In group quizzes, I always strive to make our group have the most score. Also, when my teammates answer questions correctly, I praise them, making sure they feel important to the team. That is why I'm also a Team Worker.

I am a Team Worker because I hate it when people leave me out of groups, so I make sure everyone is involved and feeling great about themselves and the team. I love to encourage my teammates because I want them to know they're doing a good job, but if they slack off, I put on my shaper role and ensure they get back to work.

Learning Intention

L.I:
To plan and undertake an enquiry into the causes, impacts and management of natural hazards.

My version:
To organize and research and tackle questions based on the causes, effects and the handling of natural disasters.