Metacognition:Thirteen ways to looking at an Apple.

In the class on Friday, our group was gathered for a poem project. To write a poem like Thirteen ways to looking at a blackberry we read in the class the other day. Overall, this activity was fun! But if I knew what we were doing for the project, and if I prepared, I would be better than what I did on Friday. I am not really good at create a poem in few minutes. But it was so fun to work with my group! They had the greatest idea and lines of poem of all. I was jealous of their creativity and I hope I can be like them.

Best of Today: Hmm....Bach?

J.S. Bach..... People often call him the Father of all Music. To me, Bach is the composer of boring, long church music. But actually, he wrote some amazing songs too. Like, my favorite of all, the first Cello suite. I play cello and whenever I play that song, it amaze me by how cool it sounds with just one instrument. His violin solo, I heard today in the class was amazing too. It amazed me by how it sounds like multiple of violins in just one violin. Also the song has the variation of speed, feeling, and the texture were very interesting. Sometimes it got really serious, and sad but sometimes it was light and joyful. Once Mr. Allen said Bach's musics make head clear, and today, I experienced that.

iMedia: Korean traditional music

Have you ever heard about Dae-Geum, the Korean flute? It has THE amazing sound. When I was in elemetry school, Korean music was really boring. Korean traditional music is usually very structured and slow because it was often played for kings and nobles' party. Since few years ago, people created a team with Korean traditional instruments and orchestra and remake music so everyone can enjoy it. As a result, it became really creative. At first, it was not as popular as now, but movie makers started to using songs for movies, it became popular. Just Korean instruments, it sounds really boring and difficult to listen, but the new songs they made, with the orchestra and bands, made Korean instruments much easier to listen, and actually people can enjoy listening. Dae-Geum has an unique sound. It sounds similar to an ocarina or a pan flute but it has more texture in to it and the feeling some kind of depth, sadness, and nature.(I can't put this into words.) The first time I heard this, It shocked me. I never thought it goes good with piano, drum, and violin like foreign country's instruments. When culture meets the other culture, it creates a new, creative, unique culture. I am proud of people who tried to combine two different things and make a creative things.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDEtpuHPaUU

Best of the Week : Born into Brothels

This week was little relaxing but tight week. We watched a documentary about the kids born in the Brothels. It's a personal thought, but I thought they looked unhappy and born in the one of the worst place in the earth. But the kids actually born in Brothels, they live happily everyday. Even happier than me. Also in the worst place, their photography skill is the best. I was really surprised by how they express themselves with the camera. My older brother is an amateur photographer and I usually not see the good photographs often, and he said that's normal. But in the documentary, all their picture was good. The each pictures have meaning of it, and each of them has the unique style of photograph. It was very interesting to see the other side of the world. I saw many documentaries about North Korea, China, and Africa but this one was the saddest documentary I have ever seen. Because, the kids never get to dream about what they want to be and can't get educations even though they want it, but they are satisfy by their situation. I was thank that I am the 2% of the world that could get the electric accesses, water, foods, best educations, and Internet. At the same time, I was embarrassed by how I always complained about things and some of those are the dreams of the kids in the other side of the world.

Metacognition: QE essay

Ok, it's ok to be honest here. Even though we finished the book and the final test, I still don't get the book. But, I learned a lot and thought about the book a lot when I write QE essay. The last three chapters are the QE essay questions are based on. So I read many times as I could, and try to recall the previous chapter those relate to the last three chapters. I found many things when I prepared for the test. First thing was Marianne used metaphors over and over and over again through out the book. Train, the sound, and she used the same word repeated many times. i thought it was cool. Second, she connects the stories those are not supposed to connect to each other. What I mean by that is, the film making story, the Edward and Clara's story, Marianne's father's story, and to herself. They seem like they don't have commons, but thinking more deep to it, it's all connected somehow. It made me more fall into the reading. Lastly, she wrote so many beutiful passages. As I read the book, I was surprised by how her word choices were very interesting and thoughtful. So the flow of the book was really calm and smooth. (but not easy to read).

Doing the QE essay, I thought many times about the same thing to make sure that is Marianne is trying to say here. But the answers were mostly the open end question. Preparing the test with Hannah, I learned many things and it was good time for me to compare my thoughts to her and what I have been missed, she filled me up with lots of new ideas. It was a great time. Again, I don't really get this book but through QE essay, I learned how to think the opposite side of the things really are. And the Shadow Cather was an interesting book that I really enjoyed reading it.

Blogging Around

I visited Hannah Roh and Yesenia's blog and posted comments
First, Hannah wrote about her vertical listening skill we learned in class and I wrote to her,

Hannah, I agree with you. When Mr.Allen taught us to vertical listen, I could hear the different side of the music. Also it helped me to improve my listening. And I was the familiar with the song Maple Leaf Rag too but when I applied the vertical listening, it became totally different song. I guess we all had the same experiences. But when I tried to block the melody part and hearing the bass part, it was hard for me. I like how you connect your music experience and the vertical listining.

Yesenia wrote about the article Pass me the Plate Mr. Feynmen, with connecting to the future and colleges.

Dasom Lee said...
Yesenia, you wrote so good! I really agree on the part where many of us don't know what to do in future. It is very important to us to know where we are going. And people who know what they want to do and know where to go, will have more successful life than those who don't. My parents want me to do something will make lots of money instead of not what I want to do. Your writing had inspired me to think what will make my life more fun and good. I think you did really good job with connecting the future and college mean to senior to the feynman story.

While I am doing this blogs, I read many people's thoughts and all of them were good.

Metacognition:Mindbook

We did mindbook twice since the beginning of the school. I like doing mind book. I like how I try to think what to put in the mindbook to look pretty and creative. I like how I can express myself with a piece of artwork or writing. To me, the main goal of the mindbook is show my own creativity with certain form that is given, but feel free to express myself. The best part of mindbook is that to no one really can say about it. it's all about what is in my mind, what I think.
For the first entry of my mindbook was the art work that mixed every part of the body that I thought was pretty from charities and put it all together to make a "dream girl". What i ended up getting was a monster. So I found out that the beauty people think, is something imperfect. Not everything perfect isn't good. I was surprised how I came up with the thought to create a girl with every perfect part but it came really ugly. Also I like the conclusion. The second entry I did for my mindbook was write a poetry about the first thought when I first came to the U.S. It came from the old diary that I was reading one night. I thought it would be nice if I could make a poem out of it. So I put it in the mindbook. It was so much fun because it was all about me, like how I thought, felt, and saw. I named the poem "where I want to be", and it refers to the U.S. And I was surprised that how I rhymed for the last word of the sentence to sound like a poem. Also I never used what I was referring to but used kind of metaphors to describe the place where I want to be.

I always have many thoughts about many things but sometime I don't know how to put together or where to put it. But mindbook gave me chance to set all things together and made me creative.

Best of Week: College essay

This week, we learned about how to write a good college essay. The answer is very simple but hard: write what's creative. I've been very anxious about college applications, especially writing an essay. I have started my essays since the school started, but never get to finished. Anyways, I'm always stuck where a part that why I want to go that specific college. Some people have a really good reason to want to go that school but I don't. I want to go that school because it's maybe cheaper, has some benefits, or close to the home. Now, I can't write that on my actual college essay. Also it asks me to write my personalities that I haven't really thought about before.

On Thursday and Friday, Mr. Allen taught us about how to write a good college essays and showed us what to avoid write in college essays. It was very interesting to read someone elses' college essays and at the sametime, I was thinking that why I couldn't think to read others' essays first and then write mine. Well after I read, the first thing came to my mind was they were really good. Way better than mine. If I am an professor who gets to read the essays, I will definitely accept those students. Their essays showed how interesting person they are and creative. With Mr. Allen's explanations, I know the good essay and the not-good essay now. I wrote the new essay over the weekend. It's the draft and of course it stinks but I will work it out as I read more essays and learn from Mr. Allen.

Connection: What I've missed

Forest Gump said, "Life is like a box of chocolate. You never know what you're gonna get!" I think that is the part where I get most freaked about. You never know what is going to happen.
For most seniors, include myself, are in the position where we have to choose something will definitely affect on our lives. Knowing this is a pain, I am having so hard time with balancing the school works and the college applications. By last few days, I was so sick and tired of this stressful life. I come to school, learning all the unconnected stuff without breaks, and go to home, do the homework, sleep and so on. There was only work, work, and work in my life. Until I read about Feynmen.
Richard Feynmen is a famous physicist, who had received Novel prize. He wrote many books and did lectures, in his lifetime, so people know him fairly well. His life got harder when he made the atomic weapon. After the war, he became depressed by the thought that he destroyed the village, families, and country made him guilty and unfortunately, his wife died of tuberculosis. It's hard to go through those stuff when it comes altogether. Then, one day he was sitting in the school cafeteria and some guys tossing a plate in the air. Feynmen saw it, and was fascinated. He came up with the complicated equation and had fun with it. The plate brought him back to his normal life. A plate! After I read about it, I tried to see things positively and with curiosity. I noticed I missed the important point in my life because I am so busy doing "boring" works. The most important thing is having fun! Feynment could do the works when he was in bad condition, because he found fun in his work. From now on, I am going to actually having fun and enjoy all the school works and college application.

Change of mind: The Writer

I don't like poems. Especially poems with many metaphors, symbolism, and so on. It gives me a headache. So when Mr.Allen gave us poetry reading assignment last week, I almost freaked out. John Updike, I didn't know exactly about him but I have heard about him before, so I started to read his poem first. Matisse, Vermeer, Cezanne...... The list of names (I assumed) seemed like some foreign language. I put the paper back into the folder where I took it out. Few days later, I realized the assignment was due tomorrow, so I started to take more serious about it. This time, I read "The Writer" by Richard Wilbur first.

The poem was apparently about a father worrying about his daughter because she didn't listen to him as he tried to give her advice and the suggestions. The first time I read I noticed the daughter was a writer, and I had this feeling that the father didn't want her to be a writer because it's hard to be a successful writer. I read about five times more and each time I re read it, I was more confused by the point which the author tried to make. But I enjoyed some of author's symbolism, like starling was the symbol of daughter and house was "thinking" as the daughter tried to write.

In the class, Mr.Allen introdued me to totally different view of this poem. Richard Wilbur used three metaphors to reveal the theme of the poem. The first metaphor is the daughter’s life compared to a ship’s voyage. Also metaphor "great cargo" was used to the daughter’s life struggles. And the father wished his daughter a “lucky passage”, like wishes sent to passengers on a ship about to set sail. These expressions show how a journey at sea is like the journey through life. How cool is that? This assignment changed my view of poetry.