#4 cs

4 C’s – Creativity, Collaboration, Communication, Critical Thinking

These four skills are necessary for STEM and engineering team members. Almost every workplace will require creativity, collaboration, communication and critical thinking. The 21st-century learning skills are often called the 4 C’s: critical thinking, creative thinking, communicating, and collaborating. These skills help students learn, and so they are vital to success in school and…

New blog post! It is an attempt to explain my new role as Curriculum Coordinator for 21st Century Learning! #edchat #pblchat #pretzelpride

Once upon a time I lived in the High Desert region of Southern California, doing service work for my church. As I met new people each day, I was inevitably asked where I was from and the following conversation took place:

Person: So, where are you from? Me: I’m from Illinois. Person: Oh, really? What part? Me: The central part–right near the middle. Person: Oh? What town? Me: Washington. Person:…

Diamonds are very valuable and expensive. This is why so important grading them. The grading system of diamonds founded in the 1940's when GIA established the 4 Cs with International Diamond Grading System. Now this is the official standard worldwide.

In the 4 Cs, "Cs" means

Cut

Clarity

Color

Carat weight

Let's see them!

Cut - The diamonds' brilliance, fire and sparkle depends on the diamond's cut. Classified of the cut there are two classes:

round brilliant cut

fancy cuts

The most popular cut is the round brilliant. Diamonds are consist of tables and facets. Tables are parallel with the ground and this is the bigger part of the diamond while facets are smaller.

Diamonds have an upper part, a girlde and a lower part. The girdle is in the medium, the lower part is in the setting and the upper part is that we see.

Different shapes catched various cuts. For example round shape based on brilliant cut, princess shape based on modified brilliant cut (fancy cut), trilliant cut based on step cut (fancy cut) and so on.

Clarity - Diamonds formed under extreme pressure and heat, this is why they contain internal and external birthmarks. Internal birthmarks named inclusions and external birthmarks are blemishes.

GIA's Clarity Scale has 11 grades:

-FL - flawless, there are no inclusions and blemishes under 10X magnification

-IF - internally flawless, no inclusions, only blemishes are visible under 10X magnification

-VVS1 and VVS2 - very, very slightly included, hard to see the inclusions under 10X magnification

-VS1 and VS2 - very slightly included, inclusions are minor

-SI1 and SI2 - slightly included, inclusions are noticeable under 10X magnification

-I1, I2 and I3 - included, inclusions are obvious under 10X magnification

Color - Rule: colorless is better. The color grading scale from D to Z. D is the best and colorless, and Z is the worst and light. Sections are:

-D-F - colorless

-G-J - near colorless

-K-M - faint

-N-R - very light

-S-Z - light

Carat weight - Diamonds' and gemstones' weight metric is the carat or ct. 1 carat = 0,2 g.

ATTENTION: Don't confuse diamond's carat with precious metals' carat which refers to purity.

This is diamonds grading system by GIA. I hope it was useful.