Desiree's E-portfolio

I love reading poetry and writing poetry,but I don't think I'm very good. Sometimes I find it hard to decifer and understand poetry completely, so I tend to just mosy on by. When I do understand it though, I find it very beautiful and inspiring. My favourite type of poetry is poetry about love and relationships. I love that poetry can be about anything, and that it's so open and free. I do NOT like shakespere poems, they really confuse me. The poetry unit was fun and I really enjoyed seing different types of poems. My favourite part was listening to others perform their poems, it makes me feel like I understand them better, but there is still some left to the imagination. Poetry is very sly.

For me, the human library was a bit different. Instead of just attending books to see, i was also a book myself. I talked about my hardships and how i overcame them over the years. Being honest, human library was of the best experiences of my life. My favourite book was Raymond Koehler because he was really fab and nice. But i think the most inspirational book was Chris Lorey because he has done many things and he was really smart. I hope people walked away from my presentation and thought similiar about me. Overall i really really enjoyed it.

This is a picture of my baby neice Isabella.

HOW TO DO THE SPLITS First of all, doing the splits isn’t an instant thing at all; it takes lots of time. It took me 2 dance years to do the splits properly. Make sure, like before any workout or bodily activity, to drink water. Step 1: Relax yourself. Go into room (prefferedly with dim lights) and sit down and breath heavily for a couple breaths. Step 2: Go into a lunge position and stay like that for 30 seconds (each leg). Make sure your knee is at 90 degrees. Step 3: extend the leg that is bent at the knee forward as far as you can, and use your arms to prevent yourself from over stretching. Stay like that as long as you can. Step 4: Do the same for the other leg, starting from the lunge. Doing this every day will help you to get into the splits, quite quickly. Remember to not over do it, only do what you can handle

This is a picture of me taking part in collaboration in English.

Last year I was a very poor student and I never really tried. I would copy off others, weasle my way around work, and skip school. Some how I made it to grade nine and all of a sudden it hit me like a train: This is my life. I decide how I'm going to live, I decide how good my grades are, I decide how much effort I put into everything. So I changed. I started working super hard (mostly to catch up on all the stuff I didn't learn and ignored), did a lot of out of class studying and self directed learning, and gave my all. This year has been the best grades I've ever gotten and I'm proud of myself. The way I overcame the biggest obstacle: laziness, was by staying motivated and thinking: I decide what my future will be.

I really enjoy Art full stuff. I like drawing, painting, music, writing etc. I am in Art class with Mr. Mayer, I take a dance class outside of school (lyrical), I am in band (clarinet), and I am in the Snow White spring play.

In 3 years I plan to be in grade 12 and have very good grades, if not A's. I plan to be working a part-time job, and be saving up for a car/college/home, I also really want a cat. In 10 years I will be 24, and I plan to be doing very well in college/university getting an education in medicine, I plan to live close to the college/university and own a cat. I'm probably going to go to UBCO.

Science fair was a lot of wok, studying and out of school effort. But in the end it was very satisfying to present and show everyone how to temper (melt) chocolate properly. Although, presenting in front of a ton of grade seven and eight students was kind of nerve wracking at first, but once it began, I was fine. You have to talk very loud in the multi-purpose room. Taking all the results/data was very fun, although we burnt ourselves a couple times. If I could do it again, I'd probably choose different subject, because tempering chocolate isn't very science-like. But it was very fun and an enjoyable project as a whole.

I social studies, Amanda and I had to create our own project and make a criteria. It was difficult to figure out what to do and how to mark it, but we eventually had this really cool project in the end called "What if Artwork didn't Exist?"  and e had paintings, an essay and write up. The way we decided this, is we carefully studied the situation and decided if it was okay to step out of our comfort zone and try something new. Then in another project we used prezi, and had a lot of info, but only included key points in our slides, then we though it was quite suitable to include a quiet version "Cotton Eyed-Joe" because it was a project about the Cotton Gin. Our pun/slogan was: "It's GIN-ius". At first I ant in love with the idea of the way it was set up an how it ran in prezi, but after a while studying and thinking about it, it was probably the best option. Then another example of how I am a thinker is when I ad to switch in and out ingredients for a cookie recipe. It required many ingredients that I didn't have, so I made due with what I had. I had to carefully choose and think about the ratios of the recipe to make it good. In the end the cookies were very yummy and turned out great. 

Usually when I'm in a group I take charge and lead the group along even if I'm not the assigned "leader". I can't stand not being in control when it comes to acedemics/groupwork. I try not to take my leadership to a 'control freak' level. I always make sure people can handle the workload and that everyone is pulling their weight, nobody is ignored or forgotten. I also really enjoy putting my opinions out there and sharing my ideas. I like to think that my ideas are valueable and can contribute to the project/conversation. That is also why i like to do charity work when I can, because it makes me feel great and valueable. My favourite charity is the food bank, because there are so many ways to help. You can donate food, sort food, mark food and many other things. Helping people is the most amazing feeling.

After and out of school, i participate in many groups that have many people. Before this year i had problems with working with people and communicating. Now, I have made a lot of friends that I can converse and have fun with. At my Dance class on Thursday I never used to talk to anybody and now I am friends with everyone in the class, its been such an improvement for me. Also in that class we have to intently listen to the teacher and use her feedback to be better. Occasionally she will ask us what we want to do, and what we have been doing and we have to tell her. That class has really helped me in confidence, creativity and of course dancing skills.