Below is my reflection for the journalism unit in language and literature class.
Page 7 of 12
Journalism plays an influential role in people’s opinions on a certain topic. In this unit, our class explored the key elements of a newspaper article by annotating good examples from the Scholastic News and Times magazine. During this unit, we learned the 5W’s and H, the point of views, and tone of writing the newspaper articles. After that, we wrote our own news article and put it together with other articles with different topics as our final project.
Below is my group news article, compare and contrast paragraphs of two articles, and annotations of two articles on the same topic.
Compare
Both “Texas Faces Massive Flooding” and “Catastrophe in the Gulf” are about the same topic. Their main purpose is to inform readers about the situation Hurricane Harvey caused at Texas. To reach their purpose, both articles used images, statistics, and estimations to give the audience a better idea about this issue. They used images retrieved from the actual place to let people have a better idea of what is actually happening. Statistics were provided from weather reports and scientific research. They also used quotes from important people such as Donald Trump and the Texas governor to let us know how the government is taking action. In their report, both articles start with a short sentence or paragraph about the main idea of their whole writing. It gives the 5Ws and H from the first part of the article, so people can get interested in their story to read on. Also, the audience both articles are aimed towards are kids. They provide definitions for terminologies and used easier word choices so the reader can understand. I also noticed that both articles ended with a quote about a hopeful thought from someone. I think this can reach the person of letting people become hopeful of what would happen next.
Contrast
Even though both articles are about the same topic, they wrote it in different ways. For the organization, the “Texas Faces Massive Flooding” used subtitles to organize their paragraphs into categories. This doesn’t only make it easier for readers to read, but also prevents the writer from jumping around topics in their writing. Both articles retrieved quotes from the Texas governor Greg Abbott and US president Donald Trump, but the “Catastrophe in the Gulf” kept the whole quote on the article, while the “Texas Faces Massive Flooding” cut out parts of the quote to only show the keywords. Only showing the keywords made their meaning more precise and prevented too much biased sources. Speaking of bias, “Catastrophe in the Gulf” specially mentioned a CNN reporter helping the people into safety, when there were so many helping cases to talk about. Even though the reporter didn’t mean to be biased, it made me think that this article is slightly biased towards the CNN.
Annotation
https://youtu.be/lhbYEmdtAME
In our swimming unit, we didn’t only spend time in the swimming pool, but we also learned about the names of muscles and bones, as well as the body movements. In this video, I incorporated the knowledge I learned in and out of the swimming pool during class by describing the muscle and bone movements for my freestyle arm stroke.
(Thanks Paula for filming my swimming video!)
This is my current event presentation about how evaporation has a possibility of becoming a new energy source.
Below is my reasoning to the question Mr. Buck gave us in class: Are Two Same Lines Parallel?
https://youtu.be/CvX0OxrxcUA
This is a video about the four types of conditional statements: conditional, converse, inverse, and contrapositive. In this video, we demonstrated what we learned by giving an example statement, writing it in the four different types of conditional statements and justifying each truth value.
In the past, we learned about reproduction from a giant view. We were taught to understand the functions of reproductive organs, and we were aware that sexual reproduction occurs when a sperm meets an egg. This year, our class looked at reproduction again but explored this subject from a more microscopic view. We focused on the two methods of cellular reproduction: mitosis and meiosis.
Mitosis occurs in body cell reproduction for eukaryotic cells, while prokaryotic cells can simply go through binary fission to make an identical copy of itself. As a cell goes through the interphase, prophase, metaphase, anaphase, telophase, and cytokinesis, it results into two identical cells with the same number of chromosomes and the same set of genes. Below are the procedures to mitosis:
Interphase: The interphase is the first stage of the eukaryotic cell cycle. In interphase G1, the cell grows bigger to prepare itself. In interphase S, the chromosomes in the cell duplicate itself so that the two cells end up to have the same number of chromosomes.
Prophase: The prophase is when mitosis begins. It is also the phase of a cell cycle where chromosomes become visible as they condense into rodlike structures.
Metaphase: The nuclear membrane dissolves and paired chromatids line up at the equator of the cell.
Anaphase: The sister chromatids separate to move to opposite sides of the cell as microtubules that come out from the centrioles attach onto the centromeres of the chromosomes.
Telophase: The microtubules pull the sister chromatids apart as a nuclear membrane forms around each set of chromosomes.
Cytokinesis: The cell pinches itself into two for the cells without cell walls. If the cell contains a cell wall, a cell plate forms between the two new cells.
In meiosis, the cell duplicates itself one time but divides itself two times. Meiosis occurs to produce sex cells. Sex cells (eggs or sperms) have half the number of chromosomes in body cells, which means they are haploid cells. For example, humans have 46 chromosomes in their body cells, but in their sex cells, there are only 23 unpaired chromosomes because two sex cells will eventually join together to create a zygote that has 46 paired chromosomes.
We learned these complicated methods of cellular reproduction by doing worksheets from the textbook and watching videos about this subject. I also found looking at the onion cell images interesting, but it would definitely make a better learning experience if we can examine onion cells through a real microscope. In the future, I hope we can have more class discussions and actual teaching instead of learning on our own.
Both mitosis and meiosis play an important role in cellular reproduction. Meiosis helps to create a new individual with genetic variability so that the organism has a higher chance to adapt to the changing environment. On the other hand, mitosis creates clones of the original cell to help an individual grow and develop. I think learning about mitosis and meiosis is fascinating since they are essential factors of keeping us alive and making each of us different.
Chimei Museum: Where To Go On Weekends
August 31, 2017
Claire Chung
On Saturday, August 26, the Chimei Museum is packed with visitors. Located in Rende District, Tainan, Taiwan, this museum has galleries for weapons, animals, instruments, and art. Non-Tainan residents spend the regular ticket price of NT$200 while residents of the city are able to get in free.People come here to learn, or simply to enjoy their time.
The Animal Gallery
In the animal gallery, each section represents a continent of the world. Through the glass window, the “world” beyond it is full of animal models with real animal skin. Each animal poses for their most natural action. “It is like a freeze frame for the wilderness in each continent!” said a visitor, “I have never seen such a sight.”
Renting Devices
Interactive computers were also provided beside each section. Visitors tap on different buttons on the screen to learn more about each animal. The museum also provides a voice navigation system for visitors to rent. For some more special artworks, people use the voice navigation to listen to a detailed introduction of the history of its production.
With the detailed collection of arts, music, animals, and weapons, the Chimei museum is a good place to go while being educated and having fun during the holidays.