I got an L

In Humanities class the other day, Mr. Whiting had come over, and we learnt about what profile we were. I had gotten L, It means that my ear, eye hand and feet were dominant on the right side. I had also learnt that I am gestalt (right brained), it means that I see the big picture and do not pay much attention to the details.

I learn best while I am messing around, when I am reading at my house I usually lie stomach down on a rolling-spinning chair and just spin while reading. At school I usually swing my feet around and change my position in the chair every two minute. While I try to sit still I get off task and I find it harder to concentrate.

I need to always have something to do since I can not handle being bored. I need the environment to be quiet so I can think a lot clearer. I am easily distracted, and can get really annoyed, for example, if somebody is tapping their fingers.

Strategies that would help me in my learning is, sitting somewhere quiet were I cannot be disturbed or distracted in any way. It also helps me by doing Lazy 8's and Thinking Caps to help me relax so I can think clearer. It helps me focus better if I have something to do, for instance, sports, drama, drawing and writing.


I would like my teachers to know this about me because they would know where to seat me in a class and who I should sit with. They should also know that when I am stressed out most of my most of my senses are shut down.

lit Circle 2 discussion

On Tuesday(16th of November),we did our second lit circle discussion on chapter 6-11 from the book "Hatchet". From this discussion we manage to learn about the character and the contents of the book. A lot of benefits have been gained while we were working with our classmates. Firstly we get to interact with each other which lets us to share our knowledge of the novel better. Another benefit is that we shared a whole lot of different ideas and perspectives for example we talked about Brian's characteristics. Besides we had a better understanding of the chapters and the character as we discussed it together with our group members.

Although we had benefits during this discussion we also had to face some obstacles and challenges but we somehow over come the problem with our excellence and good teamwork. At first some of us did not understand the characters but we found our way around the problem with the help of each other.

There are a lot of new understanding that I have gained throughout reading the novel. I now understand the ways and the techniques of reading the novel as I could recognize the genre of the book easily.

Lit Circle 1 discussion

In humanities class we were divided into four groups, each group had to read a separate book. The books that we were given to read were, Hatchet, Julie and the Wolves, Thunder Caves, and The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle. My group (Shannon, Olle, Cienna and Myself) got the book, 'Hatchet', the genre is survival and adventure, because Brian (the main character) is stranded in the wilderness of Canada and has only a hatchet to help him survive. After we were put in our groups we had to write a Lit Circle, a Lit Circle is where you are told to write whatever it asks you to write, it is not a quiz it is more of a writing prompt. After you write the Lit Circle (the whole groups should have done one) the group members come together and read their Lit Circle. We learn about the book and understand it better. It helped me to understand the characters more clearer, after my groups discussion, which also helped me understand other things, like: storyboard, background story, and events that have taken place.

We had a lot of ideas and points when we were discussing that some how helped me to connect with my group members. The connections that I made during the discussion is that I had a chance to exchange opinions and ideas with my group members as we shared our opinions and talked about Brian’s survival in Canada. We also shared our personal stories that relates to the chapters.

I predict that further into the book that Brian will land the plane safely but will damage it enough that he would not be able to take off again. I think that Brian will have to hunt for food and live off nature to survive. I estimate that Brian will have to sleep inside the plane for warmth and will also have to get water from the lakes. 

Question number 2

Papa New Guinea is not that technologically advanced and less wealthy then its neighbor countries Australia and New Zealand but why? I think I have the answer to that question, you see that Australia and New Zealand's flag both have the Union Jack on the upper left-hand corner, well this means that those countries were part of the British Common Wealth. This is important because, when the British came to Australia and New Zealand they used the islands for different purposes. Australia was were they sent most prisoners since the jails in the UK were overflowing. They used New Zealand for land and living because back then it would have been extremely hard for someone to buy some land in the UK these people were known as free settlers. Some of my relatives were free settlers and so other were convicts sent to Australia.

I bet you are asking questions like: So, what does that have to do with Papa New Guinea being less wealthy and technologically advanced? Well if you think about it, the UK they brought their technology to Australia and New Zealand, but the UK never colonized Papa New Guinea, which means that they never brought their technology to Papa New Guinea. One of the reasons why is because of the trade routes, Papa New Guinea just wasn't on the main trade routes, which means that technology was slow to get there, and if you have a lack of technology then you have no developing.

Papa New Guinea is a very rugged country. It has a lot of rainforest's and mountains which makes it difficult to get around the country. Right now Papa New Guinea is made up of a few towns and a small city most of the people live in the countryside, but there are still places there where Papa New Guineans live in a more primitive way, like hunting and eating pigs and building and living in a bamboo house. We, however, live in houses that usually have fans and ACs running. We needn't farm nor hunt, we go to the grocery store. So development with technology hasn't really happened yet, but as the world becomes a smaller place Papa New Guinea is more likely to catch up with the rest of world.

When humans come...

The mud was cold under my flippers. The sun was beating down. I sat in the shade of a giant tree that was about a meter tall. The valley of craters left behind by the giants were terrifyingly gigantic. I was right at the edge of them. My brother was caught by one of the beasts and was thrown high in to the air, and was killed when he slammed into the ground I knew that no one could survive a crushing fall like that. I know that the creatures were coming and I was prepared for them.

A day later…

 It was the same as the day before, hot. Then I heard the monsters coming. I was waiting in the shadows to leap. They seemed to be drinking out of giant caterpillars. These are filthy creatures. Only two of the species were much larger than the others, and they seemed to be giving the commands, they must have had higher authority and they controlled the lower life forms that were crowded around them. Then the smaller ones and one of the commanders seemed to come closer to our territory. Three other bigger animals that I did not see since they were at he back, came on to the mud and seemed to roughly place a tree into the ground. And that’s when the first lower life forms came in.

They were clumsy on this type of terrain, slipping and sinking, but I had the advance, I was fast. When the first creature came near me I jumped on its arm. It reacted quickly, I was flung to the floor by such force, that it knocked the wind out of me. The creature was shrieking and roaring different noises not familiar to my ears, I looked up just in time to see the creatures foot about to crush me. Luckily I slid out of the way with mili-seconds to spare. I was outraged at these species, what had I done to them? I was so angry that I told my family that we should attack the creatures, or die trying. We all ran outside, but to our surprise about four of them had been defeated by the mud. We had found their weakness, my family and I just sat back and enjoyed watching them lose there legs and get stuck. A few hours later I am still in the same spot but plotting about what I should do to the next group!

Bullying

I have not had any bullying experience in my life but let me tell you what happened to my sister. Two months ago my sister was in the line for going from Language Enrichment to the bus when another 2nd grade student started to punch her in the back deliberately. My sister said. "Ow! Why are you doing that?" And the students response was: "Because you're a punching bag!" And then the student said. "Now the face!" And the student punched her in the eye. My sister started to cry and a teacher saw and came over to ask why she was crying but the student said that he hit her in the eye when he was turning around.

When my sister came home that day she told us what had happened and how she had felt when she was bullied. She said that it made her feel bad and angry and make her feel sorry for her self. My sister thought that the punching part wasn't the only bullying in the story but also the part where the student lied about what had happened which made her feel even worse.

If I was standing there and I saw that, whether it happen to my sister or another student, I would step in between them and threaten to tell a teacher.
Goals for the year:
1. Stop all acts of bullying if I see or hear one.
2. Walk away if anyone attempts to bully me.

Something I did that was courageous

The only thing I can think of that I did that was kind of courageous was when I was at the top of a hill in Thredbo, Australia.  I had to ski down.  It was so steep that the only way I can describe it is to say that when you walk and your hands swing it is about as steep as the mid-way swing of your arm.

I stood at the top and looked down.  Snowboarders and skiiers were going down really fast.  But I knew I was a beginner.  I shivered, not just from the cold but from fear that I would get obliterated by one of them as they zoomed down without looking. I picked up my sticks and pushed off downhill.  It seemed a long long way to the bottom.  My dad said "Hurry up!"

It wasn't an easy slope, we had looked at the map and found the route, it was coloured blue to show it wasn't for beginners.  The routes have names like "Michael's Mistake", which was coloured black for professionals.  I wondered what the mistake was...

I began to gather speed but then I couldn't stop so I fell.  But I pushed myself up again.  My dad stopped and waited for me.  He had to do a lot of that because I fell down around 15 to 20 times and I got bruises
from it.

There were times when I didn't want to go on.  It was annoying and frustrating.  But when I got moving it was fun because I could control it.  The snow was beating down and I could barely see, it was bone-chilling cold.  The freezing wind blew and stung my face.  My hands were freezing even though I had gloves on.  I kept on going because there was no choice, you couldn't go back up.

It took 45 minutes but when I got to the bottom I felt proud of myself for even having the guts to do it.

What do artifacts tell us about early humans?

Early humans also known as hominids have left tools and paintings for us modern day homo sapiens to study so we can learn about the early humans. In 1940 a group of teenage boys in France were playing around when they found a cave now known as the "Hall of the Bulls", there were paintings all over the walls and ceiling, before then people thought of hominids as unintelligent beings until most artifacts were found. Many artifacts from the hominids are in very good detail like this spear thrower that might have been for a great hunter:

Hominids did not only create weapons but also made art also known as cave paintings and that is actually the way early humans got the name cavemen. Here is one of the many cave pictures:

This painting is part of the "Hall of the Bulls" in France

As you can see early humans took delicate care in their work, which tells us that hominids were intelligent and could make a masterpiece of work. 

The Social Scientist I want to be.

The Social Scientist I want to be is a Geographer, because I would really like to explore and study the world. I would like to look at changes of the climate and I know I would be good at this job because of my sense of adventure and my confidence I would have in the job.

I am deeply interested in how people and nature sometimes work together and sometimes battle against each other, I listen and watch closely to the news about natural disasters and if they come from climate change.

Geography also includes how different people live around the world.  I would be good at studying this because I recently went with my dad to Cambodia to visit some kids in a village near Ankor Wat for a shoot for CNN and I had a lot of fun finding out about how they got water and how they go to school.

Flooding in Pakistan

Me at the school in Koh Ker, Cambodia

My first blog

About me

Hi, my name is Gabriel and I am from Philippines and Australia, most of my hobbies have to do with screens but I have just started a hobby of collecting models - figures from comic books.  You can tell that I have just started because I only have two figures. I don't play a lot of sports but I do running both long and short distance, and I also play badminton and basketball. I also play two instruments guitar and trumpet. I started playing trumpet when I was in fifth grade and I started playing guitar when I was 7 but I gave up for a while and started again a few months ago.

What are the last three books you have read?

• Harry Potter and the Prison of Azkaban
• Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
• Harry Potter and the Order of the Pheonix

All written by J.K Rowling

What is the last movie you have seen?

The last movie I have seen is  "Despicable Me" with the voices of Steve Carell, Jason Segel, Russell Brand, Julie Andrews, Will Arnett, Kristen Wiig, Miranda Cosgrove, Dana Gaier and Elsie Fisher. The issue of the movie is what would you do if you had to choose between love and something that you desire very much. The movie was about an evil scientist called Gru who was not doing very well in being so evil and was being overpowered by a new evil scientist but he loves cookies. So then Gru adopted some girls from the orphanage to sell cookies to distract him from seeing Gru steal his inventions.

What is one academic goal you have for this year?

My Academic Goal for this year is to finish my homework and hand it in on time. Another academic goal is to get at least over the average academic level. I have picked these goals because I want to improve on my academic skills from last year.

What is one social goal you have for this year?

To be a better friend.

What is your favorite vacation memory?

My favorite vacation memory is of when I went skiing in Australia for the summer holidays. We drove from Sydney to Thredbo, but we had to stop on the way to rent skis at Jindabyne. The hotel was awesome because they had bunk beds and HUGE heaters. The food was really big and I could only finish half of a kids meal! But the best memory was the skiing, the wind whipping at my face and the feeling of your feet just sliding down the hill, you just want to keep that feeling forever but then you reach the end of the hill and that's the feeling of skiing to just do it again and again.

List 5 adjectives to describe yourself.

Impatient, Green, Active, Loud, Lazy