Model Senate
For this project we started by researching the legislative processes and how bills become laws. After that, we were assigned the role of Senators, Experts or Lobbyists. I was a lobbyist. Each role was assigned to the topic of either the Climate Change or the Fiscal Cliff. Every senator was grouped into pairs and wrote a bill on their assigned topic. Because I was a lobbyist, I had to write a mock bill for the groups to use in a practice senate. From the bills written, a final bill was created for each subject to be used in the Mock Senate. The Mock senate was split into two parts for time reasons. The first day of the senate, lobbyists and experts gave their speeches. The second day was the more formal 3.5 hour mock senate. In the mock senate the senators gave their speeches and we amended and voted on the bills. The the Fiscal Cliff bill was passed, while the Climate Change bill wasn't.
Video Reflection
Writing Reflection
My first goal is to work on developing a thesis for my writing. I have never really been able to grab the concept of the thesis no matter how many lessons or examples I have of them. In my college essay writing I did not even have a thesis, or I could have but I am just so unclear on them that I had no idea. When writing I never even think about making a thesis for my paper. To work on this I am going to start planning out my writing, starting with a thesis for my paper. I will also have my teacher help me develop a thesis if it is still a struggle for me.
The second thing that I need to work on in my writing is my evidence. When I write I usually just state my opinion and expect everyone to just believe me. I need to start using evidence to back up my opinions and make my papers creditable. In my Tocqueville writing I got a five out of ten in my evidence section because of my lack of proof to support my ideas. I can push myself to use evidence by starting to plan out my writing, as I previously said about writing a thesis. I will think of an opinion that I am trying to convey and then I will find supporting evidence to back it up.
The last goal that I have to improve my writing is proofreading. I personally find it difficult to go back and read through a paper that I have just written. Because of this I almost never edit my papers and they are left with a lot of small, easily fixable mistakes. I am also not very good at catching issues such as grammar or punctuation. Having Lori and my peers edit my college paper was incredibly helpful. They caught multiple little mistakes that would have brought down the quality of my writing if I had left them. To fix this problem I am going to ask my friends or classmates to help me edit my papers. We have a lot of generous students who would be willing to help me and I am going to utilize them.
Writing my college essay was actually very beneficial to me. Before writing it, I was not very confident in my writing, but the essay helped me realize that I can be a strong writer when I put my mind to it. I improved my organization skills and my writing actually turned out to be fairy good. My original version of my essay was literally multiple half written, random paragraphs thrown together on one piece of paper. I often struggle with starting my writing, and when that happens I try to just type whatever comes to my mid. It is a way for me to get started and get something on paper, and then I organize my paper from there. The most useful feedback that I got on my paper was how to organize it. Most of my paragraphs were written and I just needed help putting them in an order that made sense. After I coordinated the paragraphs, I got a lot of positive feedback about my writing. My peers said that my ideas were clear and that I did very well. I had a lot of help from multiple people about how I should from my paper and from this I was able to learn how to organize not only my essay, but also my future writing. Utilizing my teacher and peers ideas on how to orchestrate papers made me a better writer and improved my organizing skills.
The second thing that I need to work on in my writing is my evidence. When I write I usually just state my opinion and expect everyone to just believe me. I need to start using evidence to back up my opinions and make my papers creditable. In my Tocqueville writing I got a five out of ten in my evidence section because of my lack of proof to support my ideas. I can push myself to use evidence by starting to plan out my writing, as I previously said about writing a thesis. I will think of an opinion that I am trying to convey and then I will find supporting evidence to back it up.
The last goal that I have to improve my writing is proofreading. I personally find it difficult to go back and read through a paper that I have just written. Because of this I almost never edit my papers and they are left with a lot of small, easily fixable mistakes. I am also not very good at catching issues such as grammar or punctuation. Having Lori and my peers edit my college paper was incredibly helpful. They caught multiple little mistakes that would have brought down the quality of my writing if I had left them. To fix this problem I am going to ask my friends or classmates to help me edit my papers. We have a lot of generous students who would be willing to help me and I am going to utilize them.
Writing my college essay was actually very beneficial to me. Before writing it, I was not very confident in my writing, but the essay helped me realize that I can be a strong writer when I put my mind to it. I improved my organization skills and my writing actually turned out to be fairy good. My original version of my essay was literally multiple half written, random paragraphs thrown together on one piece of paper. I often struggle with starting my writing, and when that happens I try to just type whatever comes to my mid. It is a way for me to get started and get something on paper, and then I organize my paper from there. The most useful feedback that I got on my paper was how to organize it. Most of my paragraphs were written and I just needed help putting them in an order that made sense. After I coordinated the paragraphs, I got a lot of positive feedback about my writing. My peers said that my ideas were clear and that I did very well. I had a lot of help from multiple people about how I should from my paper and from this I was able to learn how to organize not only my essay, but also my future writing. Utilizing my teacher and peers ideas on how to orchestrate papers made me a better writer and improved my organizing skills.
College Essay
Mini Project
For this mini project, we learned about our rights in the Fourth Amendment. We read through the amendment and determined what our rights were in certain situations. Our class studied what rights we hold weather we are at school, in a car, on the street, and so on. From there, we were able to pick a topic about search and seizer. We did not have a proper exhibition for this project so we had to pick a way to display or work such as a poster or a video.
I connected with this project because it was fun to fully learn my rights. Teenagers are constantly interacting with cops and it was nice to do a project that was so relevant in our lives. I chose the topic of if a cop can legally search you for drugs. I chose this because I have seen quite a few kids bullied into drug searches because they did not know that they could refuse. I created a poster to inform other students that the did not have to consent to drug searches and cops cannot legally pat you down just for drugs.
I connected with this project because it was fun to fully learn my rights. Teenagers are constantly interacting with cops and it was nice to do a project that was so relevant in our lives. I chose the topic of if a cop can legally search you for drugs. I chose this because I have seen quite a few kids bullied into drug searches because they did not know that they could refuse. I created a poster to inform other students that the did not have to consent to drug searches and cops cannot legally pat you down just for drugs.