Van Gogh Alive Museum

Last week on Sunday, my Mum, my cousin and Aunty went to the Van Gogh Alive Museum. We got there a bit early, so we bought some chips to eat whilst waiting. When it started, we arrived at the first exhibit and we were already amazed. Along with many large variations of Van Gogh's paintings, there were several columns explaining some of Van Gogh's history and his paintings. His painting, "The Bedroom" was expanded in to an alive, Three-dimensional variation, where you could interact with the object, such as the chairs and bed. (Actually, my cousin almost got kicked out for going on the bed). After a few minutes, we went to the next exhibit which featured large walls, with projected paintings on to them. Some of the paintings were even animated! One wall featured paragraphs featuring Van Goghs life and some of his inspirations or emotions.m I even got a T-shirt showing the painting "Starry Night" at the end of it! :D .     

Overall, it was an amazing experience, and I can't wait to do more stuff like this with my family.

Note Taking

 -One of the most impressive legacies today

-Culture interests people even now

-Richest and most powerful nations

-Pyramid of Giza only great wonder left

-More than a hundred of pyramids

-Believe in the after life

-Plateaus for the dead

-Step-Pyramids

-Pharaoh to the heavens

-1000 years of pyramid building

-Red Pyramid

-Kufu

-Pyramid of Giza, largest pyramid - 10 - 20 years

-For 4000 years tallest man-made structure

-2.3 million blocks of stone

-Encased Polished white limestone

-Burial treasures

-Guards (Fake burial chambers, fake pathways)

Egyptain Culture	Egyptian Legacy	Modern View Of Egyptians
-Burials were first built under sand, but wild animals had dug up their corpses and their belongings. -People were buried with things they may have needed in the afterlife. -There were fake burial chambers and fake pathways to prevent thieves from stealing their stuff.	-The Pyramids remain till today. -Great Pyramid of Giza. -Smooth Pyramids were built, thus creating the Red Pyramid.	-Millions of people visit each year. Still a mystery to how the Great Pyramids were built.

Miscellaneous: 

Hemiunu’s sons created the Great Sphinx.

Three smaller pyramids for Hemiunu’s wives.

Mastaba, the architect?

Leadership questions....

Who can be a leader? What does a leader do?

Anyone can be a leader, though, it’s a large responsibility as it primarily includes carrying their team and directing them to success.

What qualities does a great leader have? Do you have to be smart to be a leader?

A great leader is someone that has a variety of skills required for the topic, someone that’s willing to listen to

suggestions from their team, someone that’s able to lean their team to victory. It’s likely a leader would have to have

some intelligence, however, one could still be a great leader as long as they're able to be of service to their team.

What do you do/could do in your life as a leader? (picking your sisters/brothers up)

As for now, my leadership properties are likely to fall with me and my younger sister, as I try my best to guide her towards her talents as well as helping her with her goals.

Who is a leader in your life?

There are several, for example, me Mum is one of my leaders. She helps direct me towards the right path and always does stuff for me. My teachers are another example, helping me prepare for my future.

Are there bad leaders?

Yes, someone that lets their team down is an example of a bad leader, as well as guiding their team to the wrong path, or even just being a leader that lacks in self-confidence.

Do you have to listen to every leader?

Depends on the efficiency the leader, if they're doing well then it's unwise not to listen, doing so could let your whole team down. If you know or feel that leader is wrong or needs help, it's better to stand up and help them to the right direction.

MATH(S)

Spheres!

Why Mars could be our future home (Mars report)

Mars - Why it could be our future home

Classification/Introduction ( What is Mars? )

Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun, known as the Red Planet and is home to the largest mountain, Olympus Mons, but why is it so widely known? Well, Mars is a very famous planet, a neighbour to our home Earth. It’s placed closely at the edge of the Goldilocks Zone, just like Venus, this means that it is capable of life. 

What does this mean?

Many Scientists have argued about the topic of terraforming Mars, and making

Mars a future, habitable planet. Though there are many risks. It would possibly be a last resort to sustaining human life in the situation that Earth is no longer habitable due to a catastrophic event. For Example, Asteroid impact, Rogue technology, Supervolcano eruption, Alien interaction and many more. In the event, scientists believe that Mars could be a possible home in the situation, though, this means that we may have to abandon our original planet, Earth. 

How could we achieve this?

The thought occurred as early as the 1960s. Meaning that there has been

many ideas and inventions already made. At the very moment, the Curiosity rover is on the surface of Mars, studying and exploring more of Mars and helping humans learn more about this interesting planet. More early projects such as Biosphere-2 (A project where several people were cut from civilization and had to survive in an environment like Mars, and had to survive using a certain amount of tools.) have also been developed, however, Biosphere-2 is also a great example for failed projects, of course, there will be many failures towards many projects, but some have turned out to be successful. It’s impossible to know how we could terraform Mars now. Over time we will slowly be closer to the success of terraforming Mars (If we were planning to that is). 

What have we already done?

    As I’ve mentioned, a Rover is exploring Mars at this very moment, analysing

The surface of Mars. One day a human will set foot on Mars, and humanity 

would’ve claimed yet another location in space. Though the Biosphere-2 had not succeeded, it’s failure had turned out helpful, alerting us of the many likely problems of Mars. So far, many Space Stations have spoken about the idea of going to Mars, here is a large info-graphic from NASA themselves, talking about the journey of visiting Mars.

Are there problems?

There are many. For example, we may lose a lot of lives during the process of getting to Mars. Are resources may not even work on Mars, in fact, terraforming Mars may not even be possible! But we don’t know that yet, it could always be possible, quantum physics 101 bruh. Anyways, problems such as reduction of lives during the attempt of getting to Mars, wasting resources as they may be of no effect on Mars, making it impossible to escape to Space by destroying too many objects in Earth’s orbit, creating an imprisoning shield of metal shuttle parts. There could also be obstructions to Mars, like money, government decisions and many more. 

Conclusion

Terraforming Mars for our future would be risky, but certainly should be worth it, there will be many arguments about the topic, but it’s likely it will happen. But only time can tell, so in the meantime, just sit back and watch humanity grow.

 

Some juicy, fresh fractions

Fresh Fractions

We are learning to add and subtract fractions with different denominators 

We are learning to find equivalent fractions and improper fractions

Show your working to some of these

What is 1/4 of 20?  5 ( 5x4 = 20, 20 / 4 = 5)

What is ¼ of 8? 2 ( 2 x 4 = 8, 8 / 4 = 2 )

What is ⅓ of 6? 3 

What is 2/6 of 12? 6

 

What is ¼ of 20? 5

What is 1/10 of 20 ? 2 ( 1/10 x 2 = 2/20 )

What is ⅔ of 30? 20

What is ⅕ of 25? 5

What is ½ of ⅓ ?  ⅙ 

What is ⅓ of ⅓ ? 1/9

What is 4/8 the same as? 2/4 

What is ⅖ the same as? 20/50

What is 10/30 the same as? ⅓ 

What is 25/50 the same as? ½ 

What is 25/25 the same as? 1/1 (1)

I have 2/16 of a cake at a birthday party. I am then given ⅝ of a cake. How much cake do I have altogether? 12/16 

10/17 + 10/17 =    or 

20/25 + 17/25 =     or

Show your working for some of these!

½ + ¾ = ⅜  

2/6 + ⅔ = ⅓ 

⅕ + 2/10 = 4/10

Boat Challenge!

Task description: Today, Room 4 had a challenge of creating a boat (using straws, duck-tape and other stuff) and seeing if it would float. We had fifteen minutes to achieve a water-proof boat. Although our team was arguing at the start, in the end, we came to an agreement and made the boat on the picture above this text. It floated for a while, however, because we included card-board in our build, the card-board absorbed the water therefore making it heavier. But, the activity was fun nonetheless and I hope we're able to make more stuff like this in the future! :D

Matheletics!

 

Task description: Today, we did a series of challenging maths challenges in teams that were split from the class. Although it was challenging, it was a good opportunity for teamwork and maths skills. My team included Angelica, Sauma, Mary-Tiana and me.

Yr 7&8 Extension, Topic: Escape from Earth

Task Description: Today, Extension had discussed a situation where Earth was going to be uninhabitable in the next twelve-months. So Mrs West shared a slide with us to share our answers and ideas for each question. In the end, we came up with different and unique ideas that had us split up into pairs.

Learning how to make music!

You're probably wondering what this is, well... It is a music piece that I created! Recently, I stumbled across this awesome music making software. It's called "Beepbox"! When I started using this, I kept experimenting for about an hour. That's when I created the first song I showcased. (First song... 8D ).

Anyways, after I thought my first song was okay, I created the second song showcased! (On the run... For a dog). Don't ask why I called it that.... But yeah, that's basically this blogpost! :)

Python Learning: Pig Latin Translator

This is my code that resulted in the creation of my Pig Latin Translator!

How this works: First, I create variable called "pyg". I then set this variable to a string "ay". After, I create a variable named "original". I create a raw_input (Basically asking a question that requires you to type in a answer) and set it to the variable "original"

 

Animation Learning

I've been setting some work for myself to complete during the holidays to keep my learning up to date. Over the following days I shall blog-post about 3 things. My learning of animation, the progress of my narrative, and my thoughts on this new book I received.

I've recently been learning about the qualities of animation in my free time, this included watching several videos on YouTube as well as some tutorials. 

One of these included an informative explanation of the 12 principles of animation by Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas, re-explained by Alan Becker: 12 Principles Of Animation

Once I saw the video, I began working on the first principle, "Squash and Stretch". This is the rule that certain objects must sustain the same volume during changes of their shape. For example, say a ball fell to the ground, the ball will seem as if it's stretching, before hitting the ground and flattening, as well as taking a few more bounces before finally returning to it's original shape. In the process, though the ball seems as if it's stretching and flattening, the ball keeps the same volume. Unless something is growing or shrinking, the objects will have to shorten if adding on to it's width, or decrease it's width when it stretches it's length. I began working on an animation that emphasizes this value on Flipaclip:

This animation shows the differences of mass between two falling.... Spheres.... The first ball that falls from the screen probably has the mass of a bowling ball, while the other is more-likely to be something like a hand-ball. So that's my animation that supports the "Squash and Stretch (SS)" rule.

Once I had finished that, I began working on a more complex version of SS:

This includes an animation of a stickman jumping over a gap. The SS featured here is the stickman, widening as he crouches, before leaping and stretching their appearance, as well as looking as if they're keeping the same volume. Though, I'm unable too keep the same volume for some of my animations as I believe I'm not skilled enough yet. 

Well, this brings my blogpost to an end and I hope you learnt something new from it.

Percy Jackson: The last Olympian ( Book review )

I've been setting some work for myself to complete during the holidays to keep my learning up to date. Over the following days I shall blog-post about 3 things. My learning of animation, the progress of my narrative, and my thoughts on this new book I received.

To be honest, I've actually had this book for quite some time, but only started reading it recently.  ( Don't worry, I've read the previous books in this series )

I'm thoroughly enjoying this book as it is full of action-packed adventure, as well as interesting and well structured characters.

(Spoilers!!! Including the rest of the books!) 

The storyline is a great feature of this book series as young Percy learns about his place as a Demi-God, also known as "Half-bloods". He goes through a series of adventures, conquering the golden fleece, defeating a giant cyclops, fighting alone, against The Greek god of war, resurrecting a demi-god, visiting the underworld and much more!

(End of spoilers)

I began reading this book yesterday, and I'm already on page one-hundred and sixty six. That's how intriguing it is! Nonetheless, I recommend this book to fictional lovers, or people that enjoy Greek mythology. (Basically me). It features a variety of epic and emotional scenes that keep the reader hooked and wanting to read the whole series. 

What I loved about this book and series is the exploration of Greek mythology, and how the author (Rick Riordian) creates a modern world based on Greek history. Percy is a likeable character. He's humble, but confident, and is able to think in intense situations, resulting in victory. 

This particular book in the series features (More spoilers) Percy Jackson and his friends, who aid a group of gods in the takedown of Kronos and his growing army. This happens at the same time that Typhon (A titan), is reeking havoc throughout his journey to New York City.

What starts off as a mission to help others quickly turns into a fight for life when Percy and his friends are confronted and challenged by the Father of monsters, Typhon. Those angered and betrayed by Percy and the Olympians lend their might in helping Kronos to strengthen his army, determined to stop Percy in his tracks. Not only does Percy have to deal with these confrontations, he also turns 16 in the following year.

So will the prophecy be true? Will he be the decider for the future of mankind?

Anyways, that's my review, so I hope this encourages you to read the book Percy Jackson: The last Olympian. Maybe even read the whole series!

Immersion Assembly

Today, team 5 produced an item where they acted out a play based on "The Magic School Bus". So in the play, they act as if they're in a Magic School Bus. They used it to travel to different planets in the Solar System. Each teacher in the play explained something about each planet, such as Jupiter and their place as the largest planet, or Mars, home to the Olympus Mons, the largest mountain in the Solar System.  They repeated this trend until finally returning home. (Earth).