Weekly Report 39

Language Arts: I diagrammed sentences with compound subjects and compound verbs. I worked on a short article about reasons to visit patagonia. I reviewed parts of speech and read more of the story in my book about Vinzi who lives in the mountains.

Math: I worked through two more tests from Saxon Algebra. Reviewed problems I missed with my mom.

Science: We watched the next episode of Cosmos. It was about the women who figured out how to categorize stars based on their color spectrum and also that the color spectrum was correlated to the temperature of the star. The professor they were working under did not believe them but he eventually came to see that their calculations are correct.


History: I listened to the next episode of the history podcast. It talked about the story of Joseph and how he was not killed because he was able to figure out what the Pharoah’s dream mean.

Makerspace (Tech):  We had our Maker Showcase this week. In class we didn’t have assignments but I got to use the VR viewer and I cut out eyeball stickers for the Oculus Go headsets. Oculus Go is really fun because it is basically internet VR. You can watch movies. If you have a friend also watching one, you can connect with your friend and see them like you are watching in a theater. It’s pretty cool.

Programming (Elective): I am stuck on this one Programming Variables with the Bee exercise. I might see if my dad can help me figure out what I am missing. I tried it three different times this week and still couldn’t get past it.

My clock that I made at Makerspace

Some of my maker projects displayed for the showcase. I did the vinyl sticker on the
skateboard, not the skateboard

Week 38

Language Arts: I did the Study Island end of year assessment. I am working on a short article about Patagonia. I did some dyslexia workbook lessons and some lessons in my language arts program. 

Math: I am working through the Saxon Algebra tests to see what areas I need to work on. I did tests 11 and 12 this week. 

Science: We watched the next episode of Cosmos. It was about determining the age of the earth using the half life of uranium. The guy who figured that out was also the one who was mainly behind the oil industry finally removing lead from the gasoline. The oil industry claimed the lead was not causing problems and levels weren’t higher than in the past. He got ice samples from far down inside a glacier to prove that lead levels were much higher.  We also watched some youtube science videos. 


History: I listened to the next episode of Podcast History of our World. It talked about Moses and how we don’t know a lot of historically proven facts but we can still learn from the stories recorded in the bible. His story is similar to other stories of leaders in the ancient past so there might have been some borrowing between cultures and some fiction mixed in with fact. 

Makerspace (Tech):  I made a Punisher sticker for my phone. Since I finished my final project, I just had time to work on other things. 

Programming (Elective): I finished Variables with Artist on code.org. I did the first five exercises of Changing Variables with Bee.

Other:  Had basketball practice two times and a game on Saturday. We went to my cousin Theo’s 3 year old birthday party. 




Bandit "helping" with my lesson

Some science related videos we watched

Playing with my cousin Theo and his cousins his mom's side

Week 37 5/3/2019

Language Arts: I finished my Brazil article this week. I also read more in the Unwind series book I am reading. I kind of set it aside for a few weeks. I also did some language arts lessons and read in the assigned book.

Math: We learned a bunch about quadratic equations and how to determine the roots and the vertex. We learned about derivatives. Practiced finding everything needed to graph the equations.

Science: We watched the next episode of Cosmos. There are differences between molecules. Solids, liquids, and gases are different because of the speeds at which their molecules can move. Solids only move a little bit, kind of just jiggle in one place.

History: I listened to the next Podcast History of our World. It was about the Israelites and how some of their history is mixed up with myths and stories of the bible, so we don’t know for sure what is factual, but this is the case with a lot of ancient people.

Makerspace (Tech):  I have pretty much finished my project so this week I got to do whatever. I made a paper flexagon.

Programming (Elective): I did more code.org lessons. I did all of “Build A Flappy Game, “ did some more Functions in Artist exercises.

Other: I had basketball practice. My friend Heber had a birthday party. I practiced guitar and am working on learning a new song.

Screenshot of my Brazil article from Google Docs

Bandit

Week 36 4/26/2019

Language Arts: I read some more of the story that is part of my L. Arts program. I also wrote some more of the body paragraphs from my notes about Brazil. 

Math: I did a chapter in the Algebra textbook and we also got some more homework from our tutor to work on. He really wants us to master the concepts we have been working on. We weren’t able to have class with him this week because he had to go to the doctor. 

Science: We watched the next episode in Cosmos. It talked about the speed of light and how telescopes allow us to see back in time because of how long it takes light to reach us from far away. At HeeHaws we learned about dairy products and about the multiple stomachs of cows. 

History: We listened to the intro of Story of the World Vol 1. It talks about how we know what happened in the past. We use both written records and also archaeology, which looks at objects that people leave behind. 

Makerspace (Tech): This week I finished my clock. I had already assembled it so I had to take it apart a little so I could paint it. Then I painted it. I couldn’t bring it home yet, though. 


Programming (Elective): On code.org I finished Functions in Artist exercises. I also did the first couple of exercises for Determine the concept. 

Other: We had our last week of co-op for this semester. We also had a field trip to HeeHaws with some members of our co-op. We also went to Avengers: Endgame on Friday. My mom had already seen it on Thursday night with my dad, but she took most of us kids on Friday. My older sister couldn’t come because she had school. I had two basketball practices but we had an off week from having a game. I got to go to Night of Gaming at my friend's school. It was a fundraiser. We had fun. They had lots of different types of games, board games and video games, you could play. 

Week 35 4/19/2019

L. Arts: I worked on my Brazil report this week. I did some more research, and I got drafts of the opening paragraph and two body paragraphs written. We also did some reading and lessons in the language arts book, but most of the assignments were just to work on the paper.

Math: We had some worksheets from our tutor to work on. They covered a lot of the topics we have worked on so far, including complicated solve for X problems and linear equations. 

Science: We didn’t have a science lesson this week because my mom had to go out of town for a funeral and we didn’t have as many days for school as usual. I did take apart my phone because the screen stopped working so researching that and trying to figure out what was going on was kind of a really annoying and frustrating science lesson. 

History: No history this week because of my mom being out of town. 

Makerspace (Tech): Worked some more on the final project. I measured stuff out. I divided the clock face into the twelve sections so everything will be in the right space. 

Programming (Elective): I finished the final two exercises of Functions with Harvester (#13-14). I did activities 1-10 of Functions with the Artist. 

Other: My mom took me to FanX with her in Salt Lake City this weekend. It was fun, even though there was lots of standing and walking around. We got to meet a couple of actors from the Marvel movies and take pictures with them. I got a cool Punisher hat, a dragon knife, and some other small things. It was fun to see all the interesting costumes people make. 

Cool costumes

With Pom Klementieff, the actress who plays Mantis

Super cool Star Wars droids that can really be driven around

Mom rented me a bird scooter to ride back to the parking lot

Some more awesome costumes 

These lightsabers were really cool. They cost $200-300 so I wouldn't buy one
but they are fun to look at

My Precious

With Clark Gregg who plays Agent Coulson in the Marvel movies and on Agents of SHIELD

Fun optical illusion room that makes mom taller than me again--haha

Weeks 33-34

Language Arts: I did some language arts lessons and reading. I am gathering research for an article I am writing about Brazil. I am researching a bit about the people, climate, land, food, activities, and plant/animal life. 


Math: Working on linear equations some more. Solving for X in kind of involved problems. Also rules of algebra and getting those memorized. 

Science: We watched episode 4 of Cosmos. Black holes are not that big—the center of one is estimated to be 64 km across. We went to the aquarium and the Ogden Dinosaur Park. My favorite thing at the aquarium was the sharks. The tank they have is huge. 

History: No history lesson this week. 

Makerspace (Tech):  This week we worked more on our capstone projects. I cut the wood that I am going to be using to build it. 

Programming (Elective): I finished Functions with Minecraft activities. I also did Functions with the Harvester activities #1-#12.  




Some of the dinos from the Dinosaur Park

At the Aquarium by the Shark Tank

Cool rock at the Dinosaur Park

Camarasaurus at the Dinosaur Park

My cat, Bandit

Week 32 3/29/2019

Language Arts: I did some sentence diagramming of compound sentences. I went through the checklist on one of my paragraphs I wrote to look for the style improvements. I read an article about the Andes mountains and identified the main topic of each of the paragraphs. I started reading UnWholly again, since I haven’t read it for a couple of weeks. 

Math: With our tutor his week we learned how to find the determinant of a matrix. We also reviewed algebra rules and learned how to calculate percent increase and percent decrease. 

Science: We watched episode three of Cosmos. It talked a lot about Robert Hooke and Isaac Newton and Edmond Halley. Halley was a real advocate and friend to Newton, who didn’t really have a lot of friends. If he hadn’t taken on the task of encouraging Newton to publish Principia and then financed the printing, it might never have gotten published. Pretty interesting to learn more about their lives. 

History: We finished up the history podcast episodes on Egypt. We learned about all of the pharoahs in the Ramses line but mostly about Ramses II. 

Makerspace (Tech):  We are planning our final project. It is going to be a clock. 

Programming (Elective): I did more Harvesting with Conditionals exercises and finished up that lesson/activity. Then I did Functions with Minecraft exercises 1-11. 

Other: I had basketball practice twice and we also had a game this week. 

My cat Bandit checking the table for food

Week 31

L. Arts: I wrote a paragraph about the history of humpback whales. I did some of my Dyslexia workbook. I did some lessons and readings for my language arts program.

Math: We did more practice and work with linear equations and matrices. We had another take home test. I also did a lesson in the textbook.

History: We learned about Amenhotep IV who changed his name to Akhenaten. He was married to Nefertiti and they had 6 daughters. He tried to shift Egypt to worshipping the god Aten instead of multiple gods. It wasn’t widely accepted. He was the father of Tutankhamun.

Science: We watched the next episode of Cosmos. One cool thing in this episode was how the eye evolved. The video showed what vision was like for early organisms that had light sensing cells and how it improved over lots and lots of years. Our eyes don’t actually work as well as the eyes of water creatures do because the sophisticated eye evolved in a watery world. We did some MEL Science experiements about appearing ink. One of the inks we made is based on a really old type of ink that’s been used for over 1000 years. It is an iron ink and it is really durable and water resistant.

Maker Space: I finished up my upcycling chair and brought it home. You can see a couple of pictures of it below.

Tech (Programming): I did more code.org activities. I went through all the  Until Loops in Maze exercises, the If/Else with Bee exercises and started Harvesting with Conditionals.

At basketball practice

Another basketball practice picture

Our appearing ink experiment

My upcycled chair, front view

My upcycled chair, back view

Week 30 3/16/2019

Language Arts: I did some lessons in my Language Arts program. I made some edits in my humpback whale paragraph. 

Math: We had a take home test to complete, and also an in class test over matrices. I actually understand matrices pretty well so far. 

Science: We watched the first episode of the Cosmos series. One thing I remember is that lots of people had the idea of an infinite cosmos but it wasn’t accepted by most people for a long time. 

History: We listened to the next episode of Podcast History of our World. It was about Hatshepsut, the female king. The ruler after her destroyed a lot of the records of her. We aren’t sure why, but one theory is that having a female ruler went against the Egyptian idea of Maat, which was truth. Another theory is that he resented her ruling when he was the rightful ruler, since she ruled as regent since he was a small child when he became king. 

Makerspace (Tech):  We worked some more on our upcycling project. I wrapped yarn around the back of the chair. That’s pretty much what I did the whole time since it takes a long time to wrap. 

Programming (Elective): This week on code.org I learned about If/When blocks. You can use one if you are trying to have something happen as a result of something else. Like “If there is food in front of you, then eat it.”

Other: I had one basketball practice this week. For our combined church youth activity we played Giant Twister. It was really fun. 

Week 29 3/8/2019

Language Arts: I wrote another paragraph about humpback whales from multiple sources. I typed it up another day. I also did some of my dyslexia workbook and started reading book 3 in the Unwind series.  

Math: Did a lot of review this week because we have a test next week. With our tutor we went over multiplying matrices. It’s kind of tricky but not that hard once you memorize the steps. Also did the next lesson in the math book. 

History: We learned about the takeover of Egypt by the Hyksos. One of the technologies that the Hyksos introduced was horse pulled chariots. They were big enough for two people, a driver and an archer. The Egyptians took the chariot design and made improvements. In my co-op class one of the things we learned about was the dance the Twist. 

Science: This week in Outdoor Survival Skills, students were given the scenario of needing to we a fire with only items that might commonly be found in a lady’s purse.  We predicted how each item would perform (lipstick, lotion, chapstick, sunscreen, etc), then watched a video that demonstrated actually lighting a cotton ball covered in each substance.  We also discussed the value of having versatile items in a survival kit. At home we did some experiments from our MEL science kits. One was to make homemade batteries and use them to power a small LED. It was cool to think you can make batteries with chemicals and to learn more about how they work. We watched some videos about batteries, electricity, and solar panels. I tried testing our batteries with our battery tester but they didn’t register. It doesn’t take much power to power a single LED light. 

Tech (Maker): This week we mostly planned stuff. We are going to do an upcycling project so we talked about that and brainstormed ideas. 

Elective (Programming): I did more activities on code.org. One of the projects was to write a program to draw a snowflake. 

Other: I had two basketball practices. For my church youth group we are in charge of the next combined activity so we planned that. We are going to do giant Twister. 

Another experiment we did had electricity flowing through this solution and it caused
the Tin ions to come out of solution and form into tin metal. 

In my survival skills class, testing the water we filtered using different techniques

Learning about what items in a woman's purse could be best used for fire fuel