Frédéric François Chopin

a) Romanticism is art in the late 18th century emphasizing inspiration, subjectivity, and the primacy of the individual.
b) Frederic Chopin played romantic music.
c) Nobody can be totally romantic in nature.
1) Chopin played Romantic music.
2) "Character Pieces" are a staple of Romantic piano music. It is based on a single idea or program. They are characterized by the idea they invoke.
3) "Etudes" are three sets of solo studies for piano played by Chopin. There were 27 overall.
4) Frederic Chopin was a very ill man. He also had a relationship with George Sand, a woman. After she made a comic showing him like a weak man, their relationship ended but their friends tried to keep them together.

Arnold Schoenberg

1) The understanding of his twelve-tone work has been difficult because of its “revolutionary nature”. He was “subjected to a range of criticism and abuse” – wikipedia
2) His music isn’t used much today, and only listened to by musicians
3) This type of music was mostly used between 1920 and 1940 mostly in Germany
4) It is difficult to find a connection to the past
5) It is absolute music
**$$** http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yR94CiqtFLs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D54-8RCh1So
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oarPobOc-js
++**++ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yR94CiqtFLs (12-tone music)
$$%%$$* Arnold Schoenberg most important contribution to music was the 12-tone music.

a. His most important contribution to music was the twelve-note technique
b. His approach to music was different because his idea was to play all 12 notes of the chromatic scale as much without emphasizing any
c. The influence of his music is waning.

17/11 What did I learn

Today, in citizenship class, we learned even more about social boundaries and cliques. We learned about how they affect our lives. Ms Sheilah told us that cliques are not always good. They can make people not included feel bad. The main social boundary in our school is language, I think... We also learned about stereotype. Stereotype is when people judge other big groups of people because of what they look like or what they do. Those are the main things we learned today.

Art 8 10/11

1) The two people I have to describe are two of the workers that were shaping the glass at the beginning. They were both wearing blue T-shirts and black pants. They looked like they were concentrating a lot. One of them was one of the people that had to blow in a tube to make the glass extend. His final goal was to make a kind of glass (to drink in). The other one was making some small animal shapes out of the glass to show us. It was very funny.

2) The glass in Hsinchu is famous because there is a lot of gas and silicon inside. Hsinchu is the Silicon Valley of Taiwan. It is still not as good as the glass in Venice.

What did I learn?

What I learned today where all the rules and duties that we have as citizens. And, I learned the rules in our class. The main rules we have are:
- no talking out of turn (talk when it is your turn, not when the teacher is talking
- sit up pay attention (makes your listening better)
- respect (same thing as the first one)
- cooperation (work and help others)
And a special rule, no food. Last class, they found a cockroach!

Citizen

I am a citizen of:
- France
- The World
- HIS
- European Union
- My House
- My Compound

Need For Speed Shift

OK, so I have this game in the title and unfortunately I got TOTALLY ADDICTED. Oh my god, it is so annoying, I almost can't think of anything except that. Even if I don't play a lot, like a few races per day, it is so fun! So bad Gordon is never here to stop my addiction...

I hate posters!

Oh my god! We have so many beeping posters due the 9th of November. Like the language arts, which should be huge, and the humanities, a bit smaller. But those teachers also gave us reports on the subject and everything. So much work!

Taipei Tournament

We did a tournament in Taipei, the third of October. It was pretty fun even if I almost didn't play. We finished 5th out of 7. There were four games. We lost the two first: 4-0 and 2-1, and we won the two last: 4-1 and 3-0. So sad.... I didn't even score. Anyway I played pretty well. So it was fun!

God's Children

In Language Arts class, we watched a video called "God's Children". It talked about extremely poor families in the Philippines. Some people live in garbage dumps. They live in terrible conditions. Most of the families had >3 kids. Most families hardly had enough food to eat. They couldn't afford rice. Their houses are made of scrap metal and wood; most of the houses don't even have walls. Their health is really low, the water is polluted. If someone gets sick, he dies because they don't have enough money for buying medicine. If something happens, like a typhoon or a landslide, most people would die and their houses would disappear. It is really sad to live under such circumstances.

Poverty

In India, right now, there are people without houses all over the streets because of over population, so not enough work, houses, and food. Most of them live on road sides, eat less than once a day, and hardly have any clothing. This is how poor India is!

Compare and Contrast

Book:
The book is way more descriptive and longer. The only thing there is less information about is Weedon Scott before having found White Fang.

Movie:
There is less information, a lot of scenes skipped, only a few added. The movie was very different to the book.

Both:
Most of the characters have the same names in the movie and the book. The characters have the same character also.

White Fang book review

I think White Fang is a pretty good book with a lot of action. It has a pretty hard vocabulary (for me). I would recommend it to other people because it is a very well known book and I think it is good. I would grade it 8/10

Dogs

Why humans like dogs?
I don't know. Personally, I don't like them. So I don't really know why other people find them attractive.

The main reason I think is: they can do jobs that humans can't because they are tireless, and a lot of their senses are more developed than ours. But I really don't know why humans like to pet dogs.

Earth Day

To save the Earth, we should:
- Have the lights turned off as much as possible.
- Walking as much as possible instead of using car.
- No AC or projectors in class.
- Taking very short showers.
- And the most important: REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE

There are still pirates

Eleven Somali pirates captured by a French warship are being taken to Kenya for trial. The pirates will be tried under an agreement between the EU and Kenya. The Somalian prime minister said that pirates could only be defeated on land. They would always find ways to escape patrols.

Big Explosion

Two months ago, there was a big explosion in Kenya because of a truck carrying petrol exploded. More than a hundred and twenty-one people were killed and more got hurt. Near the town of Molo, the tanker crashed spilling petrol over the ground. The people hurried to gather it. The petrol caught alight and the tanker exploded.

MY PHOTO JOURNAL

Going to School
7:40, time to go to school for a long day of work. I go there with my mom who drives me everyday there through the streets of Hsinchu.
I am lucky because I go there in a car so I don't need to get up too early, and I go there with my mom who’s got enough time to drive me.




Humanities
Every Tuesday and Friday, we got our humanities class. Like in every other class, we, strangely, use laptops. It is interesting, but the problem is that at the end you have so much homework. But it is only the first class in the day, still 3 to go.
The African kids don’t air conditioned class, and they definitely don’t use laptops, they don’t have enough money, they would rather use the money for food.



Sweet Home
I am finally back at home. Time to talk to my grandparents by the computer and also get a snack. I sometimes mess around with a tennis ball, also.
The people in Africa don’t have computers, they don’t eat snacks, and they do the chores instead of playing.




Homework, Cruel Homework
Most days, I have homework. Mostly humanities but also math and science. It is definitely the time I hate the most in the day.
I am even lucky for homework time, because I can use actual material, and after I am done with the homework I don’t have to do anything else, no watering the fields, etc...





Playing Time!
After finishing all my homework, I usually go play basketball with my best friend, or soccer with other people. This is my favorite moment of the day; I love sport!
I have a choice of doing what I want. I don’t have any obligations. When I am done with the work I do anything I want, like playing. I can play on a real field with an actual ball.







Dinner
After all this, I have dinner around 7:00. We sometimes go to the restaurant, sometimes not. I still like my mom’s food the best.
The day I took this picture, I was at the restaurant. I don’t think Africans spend money on restaurants.






Asleep…
After getting washed, reading, and playing, it is time for me to go to bed. Unfortunately, I hate sleeping and my parent make me sleep at 9 o’clock.
The little Africans don’t get washed everyday, they have no books to read, and I think they go to bed much later than 9 because of their chores.

The Culture in the Stories

Story #1
They have to leave the palace early to discover the world.
They believe that animals can always help you.

Story #2
It is not good to hit children even if it is usual there.
Their stories talk about daily lives.
They usually have morals.
You should always follow adults advice.

Story #3
There was magic in this story, the wizards, the magic honey, etc...
There was also two moral.
Laziness is bad.
making friends is important.

Human Rights Activists Hiding

The human rights activists in Kenya are hiding because of receiving death threats in wake of a scathing United Nations report on extrajudicial police executions.

Policeman Arrests War Crime Suspect, Kenya

In Kenya, a policeman arrested a man in the coastal city of Mombasa that was suspected to be involved in war crimes in Yugoslavia. The police is now interrogating him.

A Pyramid Has Been Unearthed

In Egypt, archeologists say that they have unearthed a pyramid older than 4000 years. The discovery was in Saqqara, south of Cairo. The site's known as one of the most famous burial place for rulers of ancient Egypt. It is the 118th pyramid found, it had belonged to queen Sesheshet. All that is left of it is a 5 meter high square base, but the most famous archeologist said the remains had been more than 3 times this height.

New Tomb Found in Egypt

Archeologist are celebrating their founding, they discovered more than 20 mummies. They might be over 2600 years old, and the items inside the tombs are even older. One sarcophagus is over 4000 years old. For the moment, archeologist only opened one sarcophagus, but they are hoping to find more mummies inside the others. Four of the mummies had a dog buried with them. It is very rare to find a burial site in as good conditions.

Draw Borders

I used what I learned about geography, economics, and sociology to draw the borders for Kenbrena Webquest because if a country is only mountains, how does it grow food, it would die. If a country is super long, how can you defend it. If it doesn't have rivers, it is almost impossible for it to survive. If there are not any resources, where do you get the money from? If people don't get along, there would be continuous fights which exetremely bad for a it. Any country wouldn't survive if the people that determined the borders didn't care about geography, economics or sociology.

How to Have a Strong Country

To have a strong country, you don't only need rich people. You need more poor people than reach people actually. If you don't have any poor people, who will go to war, rich people don't want to die for their country. Who will grow food, rich people don't want to do hard manual work. Who will build houses, they don't want to carry too heavy things that might hurt them badly. Without poor, there won't be any hard jobs done. That is why a country needs both, the poor and the rich.

Kenbrena Social Classes

Some groups get along together and some groups do not because some groups could be jealous of the others or some groups could feel superior. Maybe in the early history, the groups had a fight and they hated each other over generations.
My family makes me think the most about the Franklos because we don't look like any other, but I don't think we are like the Franklos either.

YouTube Blocks Music

If you are a big fan of watching videos on YouTube... too bad, because they blocked them all. At 18:00 on Monday, thousands of videos started becoming unavailable. YouTube which is owned by Google say that it would cost too much to keep them online. And not only the ones that are uploaded by companies are being blocked but also the ones uploaded by official fans of the site.
Stange...

Policeman Killed

A police man got killed after responding to an emergency call in Armagh, Northern Ireland. Shots were fired at two officers in the patrol car after being called in Craigavon on Monday. Politicians spoke out about the shooting and paid a tribute to the dead policeman. No one has admitted who carried out the attack which happened 2 days after 2 other soldiers got killed in Antrim

Were Scientists Fair?

No, I don't think the scientists were fair when they rejected Wegener's hypothesis mainly because he wasn't geologist. It isn't fair because he had evidences — same fossils were found on each side of the Atlantic Ocean, the continents seem to fit together, there is the same kind of rock on each side of the ocean — and he had researched on it a lot so that he knew as much as other geologists. So, just because he isn't geologist, saying that his hypothesis is wrong isn't good.

My Learning of the 5 Themes of Geography

Geography is the study of the natural features and inhabitants of the Earth.

Right now, I am at home, in Kao Fong Road Lane 194 Alley 8 House 7. I am 15 minutes away from my school, HIS. I am in the living room. My parents are in the room where one of the computers are, they are in front of me. From here, I can see three other houses.

The term physical when we describe a place is the land features around it, the natural things. The term human, is what the humans made, the buildings, the cars, etc... And the cultural is how the humans interact with the geography.

Humans adapt to the environment because we can't just blow off mountains or drown lakes. And we settled near rivers a long time ago for water and food. We change the environment when we cut off trees, when we build houses or factories, and when we make dams. Almost everything we build changes the environment.
Humans depend on the environment for water which is in the rivers, for food, the animals that we hunt, and for many more things. Without the environment we wouldn't be able to live.

Movement always affect because you rarely do not move. During the day, you are always in movement, when you go to school, when you move from class to class, even you go eat dinner.
I interact with the fruits I eat everyday. Some of them are moved from one country to my house, while some of them are just moved from a field, but in anyway it is movement. I interact with the car that brings to school, it is always in movement. And I interact with many more things.

A formal region is a region that has been determined by the government, it is official. A functional region is like the city where people work and the suburbs where people live. A perceptual region is what the region is in your head, how you imagine it.

Resources

Capital resources: the money you use to produce more wealth. ex: hiring people, building factories.
Human resources: the quantity of people, the skills they have. ex: carpenters, teachers.
Natural resources: the resources that the nature gives you. ex: water, mountains.

Big Winner

Day 1,
Hello, my name is John, and I am one of the most unlucky and poorest person on this planet. Today, like every day, I am going to sign up for a lottery game like every other day in my life.
I hope I will get money to end my life of beggar. Come on luck! Oh no! I lost again. I have to go back to the streets and continue begging. I hope tomorrow will be my lucky day.

Day 2,
I will try it again today. Please luck... Help me... Yeah!!! I won! My life as a beggar is over now that I won this 1000000000 US$.
I will finally be able to buy myself a house, a car, have some food without asking it to people. My life has a meaning now!

Day 3,
Right now I am on the way to get my money, it is 9:00 AM. I am where I am supposed to get my money.
Why doesn't anyone look happy, what did I do. Who cares. I want my money. «Could I have my money, please?» The guy gave me the money after having show him my ticket. He didn't even talk once.

Day 4,
It is the first I have my my money. I am going to the bank to put my money there. But first, I will go see my friends.
_Oh, hi guys!
_Get out of our way rich man!
I lost all my friends…
I went to the bank and put my money there. Tomorrow, I will buy myself a house and a car, hopefully.

Day 5,
I am on my way to one of the most luxurious houses in the town, Hsinchu. The house is bought now, the car also.
No one is smiling, everyone looks at me badly. I am hated from everybody even my closest friends. Maybe this money wasn't that good to get.

Isolating the Variable

For the SMASH day, we did an activity where we had to make a small boat and try to make it hold as much weight as it could without sinking.
The activity isolated design as the variable because we started with the same materials, the same rules for everybody and we put the same kind of weight on the boat. We tested the boats on the same water.
The variables that were not controlled were mainly the design, how big you made the boat, where you put the straws. But also where you put the weights, and how you put them.
Every variable affected the outcome!

My Holidays

For my holidays, I went many times (almost every summer) into a region of Spain called Cataluña.
It is both, formal and perceptional.
The formal part is because it is a real region of Spain. There, the people have their own language, Catalan, but they also speak Spanish; they have to learn both at school. This region also wants to be independent from Spain. So, it is really formal.
The perceptional part is that when I go there, I only think of the coast, where I really go, Salou. The labels in the stores are not written in Spanish, they are written in Catalan. It is a very touristic town. There is the sea, huge hotels. You can meet people from all sorts of countries, the menu in the restaurants is in many different languages. But this happens only in that part of Cataluña. It is also perceptional, then.

Volcanoes....

About 150 people had to leave their houses for the second year because of a volcano that is 10km from the town started erupting. The Chaiten volcano was said dormant for 9000 years until it woke last May. Thousands of people had left the town as ash covered the ground and went into rivers causing flooding. People had just returned but then they had to leave again because of the eruption on Thursday.

Bushfires

More people in Australia had to leave their homes because of bushfire that destroyed one house and injured three firefighters. Two weeks ago there was a fire in the state of Victoria that killed 210 people and left thousands of homeless people. Firefighters struggled to keep the fire off, but there are fears that the winds are driving the fires to other places.

Geographic Lens #4

The video is talking about the geography standards.
It focuses on the content of geography and the skills of geography.
18 content standards are divided into 6 elements: the world in spatial terms, places and regions, physical systems, human systems, environment and society, the uses of geography.
The geographic skills are: asking geographic questions, acquiring geographic information, organizing geographic data, analysis and synthesis, finding answers.

To My Friend's House

When I go to my friend's house:
I walk outside my home and I see this dog with its ripped T-shirt in front of its owner's garden. I turn left and go for 16m. While walking, I hear birds singing and on the right there is a small garden with pink and red flowers. I turn left again and walk up a small hill for 30m until I see a swimming pool in front of me. I go left again and go along the swimming pool with its palm trees around for 13m; dogs start barking at me. I turn right, around the swimming pool, and go up 75 stairs still hearing the birds singing. After going up, I turn left and go forward for more than 35m, on the sides I see parked cars, gardens, and many flowers of different colors. I stare at my right, and finally I see my friend's house. In the house in front of it, there is an old man cultivating tiny trees; he also has a parrot that his always singing. And then, I look back at my friend's habitation. Over my head, there is a basketball hoop. On the right, there is a ping pong table. On the left, there is a car. And straight ahead, I see light going through his door.
This is what I do, see and hear when I go to his house.

Puzzles and Drift

In class, we tried to make puzzles. We had pieces of blank paper and had to reproduce an double A4 piece of paper. And then, we had to reproduce a newspaper page.

Continental drift is the moving of continents. The parts of the Earth are arranged in many pieces that come together and move apart. This is the idea of continental drift.

The puzzles related to continental drift because the pieces of a puzzle are a lot like tectonic plates (which make the continental drift), when they are together, they make a whole thing, a piece of paper, or the Earth.

Geography

The first video talked about how geography affected climate, how the dry season and the monsoon are related to geography. And they tell us that geography in Greek means the description of the Earth.
The second talked about how geography affected people. In different places, they grow different kinds of food, wear different clothing, and live in the different kinds of houses.

What do I like and what do I dislike about this book?

I liked the way he survived for so many days on his skiff.
I disliked the fact that there was hardly any action, the book was mostly description. I also disliked the main theme of this book, I am not very interested in fishing.
Overall, I didn't like the book because there was really no action for a young person.

World Tour

We have to make Mr. Carpenter go around the world, and cross twice the equator.
So, I will send him:
- First, you will depart from Taipei (25º 04' 00''N and 121º 33' 06''E) at 10 AM to go to Los Angeles ( 33°55'44"N and 118°24'41"W). The flight will last about 11 hours. You will arrive at 5 AM!!!, because of the time zones. You will spend 5 hours in LA.
- Then, at 10 AM, you will take a 7:30 hours flight to Brazil (3°17'3"S and 60° 4'45"W) which will be the first time you cross the equator. You will arrive there at 21:30, for the same reason, time zones.
- You will spend a night in a five star hotel called Hotel Ariaú.
- At 9 AM, take a flight to Barcelona, Spain ( 41°16'48"N and 2° 4'55"E) with an arrival at 20 o'clock and will stay at the center of the town in Hotel Rivoli Ramblas.
- Then, the next day, you take a flight at 8:30 to Madagascar (13°43'40"S and 48°34'24"E) that will last 8 hours, and you will arrive there at 18:30 AM.
- After 4 hours, you will go to the Northern Territory of Australia ( 12°36'36"S and 130°54'23"E). You will get there at 3 AM and spend more than 1 day in the Travelodge Mirambeena Resort Darwin, another five star hotel.
- The next day at 10, you will go to Hong Kong ( 22°18'42"N and 113°55'48.79"E) in a 4:30 hour flight, and arrive there at 13.
- Then, 5 hours later, you will take the final 1 hour flight back to Taiwan (25º 04' 00''N and 121º 33' 06''E). You will get there by 19, and go home.

I know my flight wasn't too much of visiting. It was more of doing the whole world in a small amount of time and going to the very important places.

Where is the Art Room?

Absolute Location:
24º 47' 47'' North
120º 56' 34'' East

Relative Location from the entrance of the school:
30m N
20m E
6m N
20m W
And you are in the art room

Geography

Geography is the study of Earth and its lands, features and inhabitants.

The Old Man and the Sea

The scene I drew is when the old man caught a tuna when he was fishing for the huge marlin. After catching it, he ate it because he was starving.

Why Is Where Important?

Where is very important because depending on where you are, you have to change your habits. If you are in Alaska, you won't wear the same clothes as if you were Thailand. If you are in school, you don't do the same things as if you were in a holiday. But it also changes the job you might have. But it would change many more things.
So knowing or telling someone else where you are is very important for yourself and the other person.

Submarine SMASH Day Reflection

Summarize:
For SMASH day, we tried to make a periscope, the thing submarines use to see above water. We had to see what was inside a box that was on a table, keeping our heads under the table. We were given a cardboard box, 10 pieces of paper (that our group didn't use), 1 meter of tape, and 2 pairs of scissors.

Reflect:
We modified our design only once, first we did a simple way, and then we consolidated our periscope. We knew that we should modify it because usually, the first way isn't the best. We knew what to modify, because we were trying every time we changed a little thing. Everyone gave ideas of how to change it. For example, someone might say that we need to make a part stronger, the other might say where we should put the mirrors, etc...

Tips and Suggestions:
First, do something very simple where you can kind of see what is in the box.
Then, improve it.

What do you think the moral to The Old Man and the Sea is?

The moral to this story is: The fight between human and nature. How sometimes human win, sometimes nature wins.

Peter's Presentation

I didn't know about religions and wasn't interested in it, but Peter's presentation was fantastic, and interesting. I couldn't remember much because I didn't know anything before. The thing I could remember the best was the chart of how many percent of people were from each religion. I could remember some of this because I really love math, so I remember pretty well what deals with numbers. I discovered that about: 33% were Christians, 20% were Islamic, 20% nonreligious, 10% Hindu, 6% Buddhist, and only 1% were Jews. I thought much more people were Jews. I forgot some religions but those are the main ones. And that there were three main monotheistic religions, Christianity, Judaism, Islam. So this what I really remembered. And sorry Peter for not being able to remember more.

Nadal Number One

Nadal, the Spanish tennis player, is the first Spanish man to win the Australian Open. The number one, winner of the French Open, Wimbledon, and the Olympic Games 2008, and now winner of the Australian Open, beat Federer in a wonderful final. The score was 7-5 3-6 7-6 3-6 6-2. It was one of the most beautiful games in the history of tennis. Every point was on the lines, and the two ran like crazy. Now everyone, remember this name: Rafael Nadal.

Hit the Jackpot

If I won £10,000,000 in the lottery, I would give half of it to the Red Cross, because it is the only one I know, so I guess it is the best.

Write about your luckiest moment

The luckiest moment in my life was when I was born, but I can't talk about it.
The luckiest moment that I can talk about is when I found my best friends in Spain. I started playing with them when I was seven, and I still play with them.
But I am not a lucky person.

Effective Communicator

I think Patrick Chen, my friend from G7, is an effective communicator. For me, he is an effective communicator because he speaks loudly and clearly, he looks at people, he answers a lot of questions, and he doesn't stress when he has to talk.

Active Learner

I plain to improve my active learning in concentrating more during class. Listening better to what the teacher says. Chatting less in class, because I chat a lot, but not using the computer. And when I don't know what the teacher is talking about, I could ask questions, or go search more about it when I come home. I hope I'll be able to improve my active learning!

Reflecions on the Portfolio

I would like to reflect about the project we did in Language Arts. It is a book report that we had to present orally. The book I chose is the Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan.
For this project, the learning outcomes I used are: active learner, effective communicator, and critical thinker.

When I read the book, I was an active learner because I like Greek mythology very much, and this book talks about it a lot. When I came home I went to search on the monsters or the gods.
Before doing the book report, I was a critical thinker because I prepared how I would break the book down to make the plot. I was thinking of the next step.
When it was time to present, I think I was an effective communicator, I spoke loud enough, and I said what I had to say.

Murray Wins Again

The Scottish, 21 years old, #4 world best tennis player, Andy Murray beats Andy Roddick, 6-4 6-2 in 70 minutes, to keep his title at the Qatar Open. There were doubts of him not playing because of a back injury, but he played and won. He is now the favorite for the Melbourne Open, one of the four biggest tennis tournament.

Will he have as much success in 2009 as he had in 2008?

Wall-E

The animation movie called Wall-E won the Golden Globes, the biggest award after the Oscars, in Los Angeles. Wall-E is a robot that picks up garbage on Earth, while humans left the planet and went in a spaceship because of the pollution on Earth.
To win the competition, it had to beat "Kung Fu Panda" and "Bolt".
And during the same night, a British actress called Kate Winslet won two prices for two different movies.

Slavery Today

We think of slavery as something that happened long ago. But it is still happening today! Among the huge number of slaves, about 9 million are children. Slavery is when someone is owned by other people and doesn't have freedom, and is forced into an exploitative, humiliating and abusing life. Slavery mainly happens in Africa, large parts of Asia, Middle East, South America, and few parts of Europe. Would you like to be owned by someone?

My Holiday Break and My School Goals for 2009

My Break:

The first thing I did during my holiday was finishing all the homework I had, the mindmap (humanities), the book report (L.A.), and the math exercises.
Another thing I did after that is going to Japan for 5 days. I went there to ski. The station was called Rusutzu.
The third thing I did is visiting parts of Taiwan. I went to Hualien for 2 days, then to Yilan for 1 day, and finally to Jiufen for another day. I came back on Saturday to play with my friends, and then, it was time to go back to school.



My 2009 Goals:

My first goal is to go play more outside during recess. Because I usually play computer with the other grade 7.

My second goal is to read more books. I don't read a lot. At home, I usually play with my father or my friends. And i'd like to read more to improve my vocabulary, too.

The Culture in the Video

I learned about Egypt in the video, The Ten Commandments, that we watched during humanities. I learned in what conditions slaves worked. They could hardly drink, they couldn't stop working, or they'd get whipped, and they could only eat when the director of the building site authorized them. The slaves were Hebrews. If you were born Hebrew, then your destiny was to be a slave.
I learn about Ramses before he was king. How he competed Moses to be pharaoh.
And mostly, I learned about Moses. I didn't know that he almost got pharaoh. I didn't know he wasn't raised by his mother, she had to abandon him because the pharaoh had ordered to kill any male Hebrew baby. There was a prophecy that said that a Hebrew would destroy Egypt. So the mother put him in a basket and let the Nile chose where he'd go. The pharaoh's wife found him and raised him like if he had Ramses' brother. He was a prince. And when he discovered he was a Hebrew, he became a slave without anyone telling him to be one. Then he got captured by Ramses who sent him in the desert with just some water.

During the second part of the movie we learned more about slavery in Egypt, how slaves were treated. I learned more about Moses. I saw how a family rescued him when he was in the desert. I learned about how the pharaoh could do whatever he wanted. We saw how Moses heard god and went to help his people, who were slaves. We saw how god destroyed Egypt. How magic stick who transformed into a cobra and fought 2 cobras of the pharaoh and won. How he colored the Nile red with the same stick. How he killed the son of the pharaoh after the Ramses ordered to kill his son.