House

Name of Activity: House Project 


Supervisor: Mrs. Garner

Dates of activity: September 2013- June 2014 

Plan: We as a house group, we will plant seeds of various spiecies (Radishes, Rosmary, Thyme, Lemon Balm) and we will sell them when we feel they have grown to a mature age (hopefully by March or April). We will attach a recipe for each herb and decorate the pots, making them more valuable. Then we plan to use this money and buy actual bushes or hardwood shrubs to place on the white balcony outside about 5 classes. School beautification is our service goal in this project.


Diverged Plan:

    During the year we had several problems with our plants and our whole idea was scratched. We made a new plan to paint the inside of a relatively dim hallway with trees to prompt nature. On the trees we will put facts about the earth in general.


    In April, the PSG group at our school decide to give us money to buy the trees we initially wanted in our first plan. So will finished our 2nd plan by writing the phrases on the trees, then finish our 1st plan about school beautification by buying the trees and putting them on the deck. 

Planned Evidence: 

1st Plan)   We planted the seeds and we assigned different people each week to water the seeds. The seeds were looked after by me personally over the winter break and by cleaning staff. 

   When the seeds died we didn't have a source of money for the trees to put outside side but with the help of the PSG, half of our house will buy go to buy the trees on May 16th and place them on a balcony where, when you drive up, its almost the first things you see. This is coming later than expected and with money from the PSG Group but we eventually got it going and will accomplish our goal.

2nd Plan)   We painted the trees on the walls of the "Cave Cafe" and on May 16th we will finish the job by painting the rest of the phrases on the wall. Even though this is a side and temporary fix for the first plan, we are still going to go through with the project and complete it. 


Hours spent performing activity: 40 


Evidence Records: 

Some of our house members painting on the
trees in the "Cave Cafe"

Our trees, that we personally picked out, on our
way back to school from Baumaxx.

Here are some pictures from our various house projects.

Some of trees we painted in the "Cave Cafe".

REFLECTION:

     This first year of our House project was hard. Our group of 4 was disheveled and we should have had more organization and communication. We had strong, hopeful ideas in the beginning and, although we started a little late, had our plants up and going. If we could have kept up this process, we could have had our trees  complete by February, but because our plants died it was hard to continue but fortunately we did. I was hard to get going but once we did we finally got I all finished. On May 14th we bought 7 Cypresses, 7 35cm pots, 2 Large bags of soil and 7 Water collection plates. The next day, my partner and I personally potted the trees and placed them outside at the location. 

     With the painting job, it was a very good temporary replacement for what our end goal was, planting or placing trees around the school (Beautification). It turned out very nice and we all worked a group to finish the trees. This was also late but on May 14th, we finished it all up and wrote quotes and statistics on each tree. It turned out nice but we will have a select few to fix up the words. This project required 1.   Planning & Initiation because we had to design a project for the entire class and figure out what we could that would involve the whole group. Fortunately, we were able to find a suitable project. Next, we used the learning outcome 2. Development of New Skills, because we had to publicly present our ideas to the class, which was a hard task for us, and we learned to speak confidently in front of a crowd. 3. Increased Awareness of Strengths and Weaknesses was another Learning Outcome accomplished because I learned that it's hard for me to give orders to people, especially classmates, and that I need to become better at having people listen to me. Another learning outcome that was achieved was 4. Engagement with Global Issues because we were working around the idea of Global Awareness of deforestation and and human destruction. The entire project was focused around Global Issues and Public Awareness. Another Learning outcome asscoiated with this project was 5. Consideration of Ethics because we had to consider what exactly we should do raise the most awareness of the environmental problems and also using this media to make sure that the thing we were doing was truly helping the environment. For example, we tried not to u7se paper for anything during the project and when we were done with the plastic lining, we recycled everything.  Next, 6.  Undertaking New Challenges was another learning outcome that was involved. Because I'm personally not artistically inclined and I was in charge of the sketches for the wall, I had to learn some techniques from a fellow classmate on how to draw simple trees. This a new challenge for me because I was very shy about my drawings but I had to do it for the project so I did the best I could. One of the last Learning Outcomes was 7.  Commitment to Activities because we had to keep trying to make our project work even after our plants died. Luckily, we stayed committed to the job at hand and found a replacement plan, the continued on our original plan as well. Finally,  8. Collaboration with Others was the last Learning Outcome accomplished because throughout the whole processes, we had to figure out as a group how to continue our plan and keep our promise to our group that we would finish. Like before, I am hopeful for next year where I can show my leadership and help my group to complete our projects on time and to end on a good note. 

Activity: House

Supervisor: Mr. Dougherty, Mrs. Parks

Dates of Activity: September 2014- February 2015 

Plan: As a house group, we will go to a local Slovak school who doesn't speak any english and help the kids learn english by playing  english learning games with them and communicating with them. We will have several games set up for about 100 kids in the gym and in the classroom. In the gym we will play games like "Which Animal" where the leader stands in the middle of the square where the corners are people holding pictures of animals. The leader then says in English" Where is the Frog?" The kids then decide which animal is the frog and whoever gets the animal wrong has to sit down until there is just a few winner left. We will play games like this for about 2 hours with rotated groups. 

Planned Evidence: We went to the Harmonia School in Dubravka, Bratislava to help kids from 5-10 learn english. We separated into 5 different groups to tackle a certain game or activities that we were going to play. I was mainly the supervisor, going around to the different rooms and gyms to make sure everything was going good and helping out with the younger kids in my house to manage the children. The children were really excited to participate in the activities and kids in my group were also having a lot of fun playing with the kids and getting to know them. Although it was hard to find activities for the kids before hand, everything came into place when we were there and the kids really enjoyed it. 

Reflection: 

This year house project was difficult because of language barriers and a late start. Luckily, we made up for the late start by our persistence in trying to get a hold of the school we wanted to participate in with. We emailed several times and called several times until we finally reached someone who could speak with us. It was also hard because we had to set up the entire day for the kids and figure out what they should do to learn English and have fun. Also, because there were around 100 kids of 5 different age levels, it was difficult to figure out which activities they would actually be interested in. Despite the worrying, when we got there, the kids were mostly just excited that they were able to play and communicate with "big kids" in English. This project required the Learning Outcome 1. Planning & Initiation because we had to plan every activity for the kids and we had to be persistent in initiating the project with the school. The next Learning Outcome accomplished was 2.          Development of New Skills because we had to figure out how to direct around 100 kids efficiently and effectively. This aspect is also incorporated with the Learning Outcome 3. Increased Awareness of Strengths and Weaknesses because this was also a hard part for me. Because I had never had such a responsibility, it was hard to give orders and have people follow them. This also plays into 6. Undertaking New Challenges because of all the responsibility that I had. It was hard to handle the activities and the kids but I overcame  the difficulties and every one was happy. 7. Commitment to Activities is one of the last Learning Outcomes for this project. Throughout the year, the plans changed and we always needed to keep in contact with the school to make sure we could come back later and that our relationship with them was good by sending emails. 8. Collaboration with Others also is connected to this aspect because there was a language barrier between the school and myself, so I had to trust my group mates to correctly translate messages and send translated messages to the school. Overall, I feel like this project was a success and that their school greatly benefitted from our contributions.