The purpose of this project was to learn about food. We learned various things behind our food and how it is affecting us. It taught us what can happen to our society and the consequences. We learned the differences between organic and non-organic food and what the benefits and disadvantages to eat them are. It also taught us where our food is coming from and how it's being raised. We took several field trips to take on the experiences and help us learn more about our project. We visited more than 3 places and they were all great experiences. We created many products like recipes, posters, bags and a magazine. We raised awareness about our food system by having an exhibition in Seaport Village. We set up various booths all teaching different things about our food system. We also sold some of our products like our bags and magazines and we gave all our profit to a non-profit organization called Father Joe's Villages.
We investigated our food system in class research and field experiences. I learned that organic food is healthy for you but more expensive. They put many chemicals in our food and that can lead to some consequences. Its very important to be aware of what we eat because throughout the process between the farm and the store, the food changes drastically, GMO's and pesticides will be added sometimes. Learning about the story behind our food has made it so I am more aware and conscious consumer.
Refugee Documentary Project
In this project we created a short documentary to tell the stories of refugees that have come to the US that are our age. I learned so much about what is going on in the world around me with the refugee crisis. While making the documentary we worked with Outside The Lens and with the International Rescue Committee (IRC).
In our documentary we wanted to bring attention to what is really happening with the refugee crisis. For making our documentary we started off with interviewing teen refugees to find out more about their lives. Next we all went through all the footage and took notes and decided what clips we should put into our documentary. Next we split into separate groups and we were assigned different tasks. I was in the story teller group so my job was to pick two of the refugees and write a story about each of them. This required me to go through their interview footage many more time and take more detailed notes. After that we wrote our stories. When we finished our stories we went through ridiculous amounts of critique to get great final products.
I’m so glad I had the chance to do a project like this. This is the first project I have done that is mainly reading articles on the issue and learning many different sides to the issue. I am glad that now I have a better understanding of what is going on in the vast world around us. Something that stood out to me in this project would definitely be the crazy amounts of research we would do and all the class discussions we would have about this topic and all our views on what is going on. I think it was really important that we did all of that because we needed to open up our minds to not just similar opinions to our but also to the opposite side and thoughts. I don’t think it’s possible to make a good documentary when you are uninformed or only see the pros of one side and only cons on the other. I am very proud of how all the work that the storytellers group put into writing stories that show us the background of teen refugees after only watching a short interview about them. From this project I have learned so much about refugees and immigrants and all they go through just to get to a country or refugee camp that they believe will be safer than their home. So many people in countries all around the world don’t want to accept refugees for fear of them ruining the economy or being terrorists. I have also learned about the extensive background checks that happen before accepting a refugee or immigrant into a country and how sometimes those checks aren’t enough. I think it’s good that we learned about the refugee crisis because we should be aware of what’s going on in the world around us. Something I will take away from this is to research topics that I don’t understand to get a better understanding of the topic.
I am proud of our exhibition because of the way people reacted when they saw our documentary. They they stayed after our showing to ask questions to know more about what we were doing and what we learned about.
Model United Nations (MUN)
The United Nations is a worldwide organization where about 190 countries cooperate and discuss the many issues around the globe. As many politicians all over work together to create peace, we set a model of what the UN does and discussed current world issues. Model United Nations (MUN) is our version of the United Nations simulated by us as students. The purpose of this project was to give us a better view of the political aspect globally and to learn about the many issues around the world. We all represented different countries in different committees we went deep into research for our assigned country. With that we learned much about relations between nations and ongoing or past events that effect the world today. After a lot research we held our two day long conference where we discussed the current issues around the globe as representatives of our assigned country, giving their views and creating and discussing solutions that may benefit that country. The conference was on the topic of the current global refugee crisis. I represented The People's Republic of China. The committee I was a part of was the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF). During the conference we had two separate topics, one on each day. For each topic we wrote an opening statement. An opening statement is a statement that each delegate should have already prepared that will explain how their country feels about the issue at hand. In the beginning of the conference we asked to be placed on the speakers list and when it gets to us we stand up and present our statement. My two topics were about War-Torn Children Refugees and about Sexual Abuse In Refugee Camps We also had to write a Position Paper. This would explain the issue and how our country has helped, how they plan to hep in the future, and how they are helping right now. Then at the end of the paper you talk about what your country suggests to do to solve the problem.
After putting in so much work to research my country and topic I felt really accomplished after we completed the 2 day conference. I really enjoyed having the challenge of taking on a completely new opinion of a different country. I am proud of all the work my committee did together. All together we passed around 8 resolutions and only declined 1 in 2 days. I am also proud of myself because I put in so much work and effort into a project that I didn't really want to do at first. Now I am so glad we did that project, I had a lot of fun with it. Through this project I learned not only more about the refugee issue but also about how countries are reacting to the issue and how they are contributing or not. I do think it is important to be aware of these topics and issues so you can have an informed opinion.
Little Free Library Project
For this project we built Free Little Libraries for the community at our school. We decided to do this because there are a lot of benefits of reading and since we don't have a library at our school we thought it would be a good idea to do multiple libraries around our campus. Our process was pretty simple, we started with creating a design that our group liked. Once we found our design we started making blueprints and making a list of all the things we would need. After finishing our blueprints we put all our measurements on the computer so we could laser cut the pieces of our library then we got all the materials we needed and we cut our wood. Since everything was made out of wood we used wood glue and nails to put everything together. Then we stained our house shaped library, attached and painted the roof, and finally added all the books inside and placed it in the front of the school.
Placard: Reading is amazing. you can be taken to another world and become a whole new person just by reading through the pages of a book. The possibilities are endless every time you pick up a new book to start a new adventure. You empathize with characters that you come to love and you learn something new each time. Although it keeps you at the edge of your seat sometimes, it's a great way to kick back and relax. It's scientifically proven that reading can reduce stress and help you go to sleep if you read before bed. Reading can also keep your brain healthy. Reading not only stimulates your mind to keep you smart and get you in a creative mindset, but also fights Alzheimer's disease. Little Free Libraries are here to provide books and spark a love of reading. You can take and return them to read another story. Our little Free Library is a simple design inspired by fairytales. We loved the simplicity of it and how well it seemed to fit into its environment. We hope you can feel its magical powers as you start another adventure.
This project really interested me because I really enjoy doing hands on project work with building and designing. In this project we had to first draw out our design and get critique for all our classmates. After our critique we refined out library to make sure that the final product would be better than before. I am really proud of how well our group worked together throughout the entire process.
I have always loved and enjoyed reading. I don't tent to read any books based on history or any real world issues but recently I read two different books about what has and is happening in our world. Both books were pretty heavy subjects and I don't want to say I enjoyed reading those books but I liked how the authors were so informative about what has happened. I liked hearing about the issue from the perspective of someone who went through it. Reading those books made me realize that I would like to balance out the amount of fiction and non-fictiction.
During this project we all wrote a Vignette about who we are on the inside and the outside.