Final DP Reflection

Creativity:

For creativity, I have improved and expanded my creativity over the past two years. The two services I have participated in are Deaf and Hearing Exchange, and Community Film. Both services challenged me creatively, I had to learn a new language for Deaf and Hearing Exchange, and I had to learn how to edit movies for Community Film and make my own movie. Making my own movie has allowed me to the third learning, outcome, of doing my own project. These two creativities have also helped me accomplish the second learning outcome, of undertaking new skills and as well the fifth learning outcome, especially in Community Film because we were a small group and everyone had to do their parts in order to succeed.

Action:

Over the past two years, I have joined 3 Saisa’s in 3 different sports, those being football, volleyball and basketball. Before this, I had done Saisa football from 8^th grade, but I had never done volleyball nor basketball. So, doing football in DP has demonstrated that I have accomplished the first learning outcome, of identifying my strengths and improving them. I have also learned new skills in basketball and volleyball, proving I have accomplished the second and fifth learning outcome. Also, since I have joined the Saisa football team from 8^th grade to 11^th grade, I think that this showed perseverance and shows I have accomplished the fourth learning outcome.

Service:

Over the past two years, and previously in the MYP, I have been changing services at every opportunity. I wanted to and I enjoyed trying new service to help me grow as a person, to learn new skills, new ways to help the world, and new ways to communicate with different people. In DP years, I have done Community Film and Deaf and Hearing Exchange, and in both, I felt like I have helped the community. These two services have somewhat help me accomplish the 6^th and 7^th learning outcome, of global awareness and the decisions I take.

 

Overall, in my 2 DP years, I am happy with the after-school activities that I have chosen as I enjoyed each of them, and I am happy with what I have been able to learn and accomplish.

Completed CAS project

For my CAS project, I decided to make a short promotional video for Hope for Kids. I had a good friend who was the leader of this service and this made it easier to communicate and come up with a plan and a goal. On a Thursday, I went to the center of this service, where they spend an hour or two with children who have cancer. Before going, I made a plan, and set objectives for what I wanted and needed to film. I thought about the different shots I needed and the different angles to promote the service. Before going, I had a discussion with the service leader about what they wanted this video to do, and what type of video they wanted to do. They told me that they wanted a short video, 30 seconds long that they can post on their social media. This gave me a direction as to what I had to accomplish.

Once I was at the service center, I started filming the different shots I needed. I took multiple shots to make sure I had the right and perfect footage. Once I was done filming, and I thought I had enough footage, I played with the kids. This was fun and nice, and since I had done this service in MYP, I had a good sense of how to interact with the kids.

I was given a deadline for when I had to complete my video, which was 2 weeks after I recorded the footage. I had a discussion with my Community Film group to make sure what I was going to edit and my goal would match that of our service. They agreed with my vision and allowed me to created my short promotional video

2 weeks after, I finished editing and gave the video to the service leader, and she liked it. I then asked for an evaluation of the video and if she could give me feedback. She said that generally the video was good, but she would have preferred it if I could have change the music behind it. I told her I could easily, and I changed it that day and gave it back to her

In general, I was happy with the whole process and the final product, I felt like I had learned a new skill, and I was able to demonstrate my knowledge by working on the whole video, mostly by myself.

Below is the link to the short promotional video that I made

 

Running for activity

This semester, I decided not to join SAISA football, as I wanted to focus on my studies, and I had already made the team 4 times. It was a difficult decision, but I think I made the right choice. Because I did not join football, I didn’t have a regular activity, and so I decided to start running. I was running two to three times a week, 3 km per session, on a treadmill. As a goal for this semester, I want to be able to start running outside, maybe around a track or through the city.

Learning Outcomes

This year, I have achieved a few learning outcomes, those being the first, second and fourth. The first two learning outcomes are about demonstrating a challenge being undertaken, and understanding my strengths and weaknesses to improve. This semester, I decided to stop playing SAISA football, and instead decided to do SAISA volleyball. This decision was made because I understood my strength, football, and i realized that volleyball is a weakness of mine, which I wanted to improve. Before training started, I had never played organized volleyball, and by the end of the 3 months of training, I could play volleyball well, and I made the traveling team. This shows that I have undertaken a challenge.

The fourth learning outcome is about showing commitment and perseverance with my service. This is the first service where I feel like I have an important role, where I can contribute with hard work and creativity. I have been to almost all service days, and I have taken it upon myself and the group to do work on non-service days. I enjoy this service as I am able to demonstrate creativity and this helps me more involved and committed to the service.

I have also been improving my other learning outcomes, but I have less proof for it, but I know that by the end of the semesters, I would have completed more learning outcomes and have proof for it.

CAS project: Service film

For my CAS project, i have decided to take one of the projects for my service. As a service, we try to post 1 quality video every two to three weeks, for different services. This can sometimes be difficult as filming and getting the right shots is difficult. For my project, i want to organize, plan, film, and edit a whole short movie. I have never produced a movie before and this will be my first time, so i do not have the right skills to be able to produce a quality movie. The planning and organization, and even the filming is something i can do, but the editing is something i will need help with. For the editing, i will ask my service leader for help and advice, but i will still be doing most of the editing. I have a vision for what i would like to do, and i also have a plan in my head with when and how i want to do it. On my next post, i will publish my planning document, with the dates and what i will be doing, and i will make sure i follow it.

Volleyball Tournament Reflection

Last week, I left to Chennai with the traveling team to play in the SAISA tournament. This was my second time in Chennai for a SAISA tournament and I really enjoyed it. At the start of the season, i wasn’t sure whether i would even make the traveling team, but i was lucky enough to play half of the playing time. In the end we came 6th out of 8, which I don’t really believe reflects our performance as we were competitive throughout the tournament. My favorite moment of the whole tournament was the third match, against ACS, a new team who was supposedly favorites to win the tournament. We won the first set and lost the second set so we went to the third. I was really disappointing not to have played the two sets. But on the third, the coach decided to play me, i came on when we were down 14-7, and first to 15, so we had to win 8 points without losing one, and we were able to pull it off, which really was amazing.

DP 2 Goals

This last year in DP, my goal is to keep learning and improving, and to keep trying new things. I’m happy with how well i was able to learn new sports and activities last year, and i want to continue doing so. Last year, i learned a new language, sign language and i learned a new sport, basketball. This year, I’m learning how to make films, and I’m learning how to play volleyball. Constantly learning and improving is related to the second learning outcome. This year, I will also be continuing football SAISA. So far, i have made the team in 9th, 10th and 11th grade, and i will be hoping to make it this year as well. I am also interested in taking a more leadership role in football, to be a role model. My main goal for football would be to get captaincy but this can be proven to be difficult as there are other candidates who have played as long as i have in OSC. This is related to the 1st, 4th and 3rd learning outcomes. For Community Film, my goal is to be able to learn a new skill, film making, while trying to help the community. Community film only started recently, and isn’t an established service, and i want to be able to try and help it become a more recognized service. A service that is really helping the community, to bring awareness to the people about different services. This is related to the 6th learning outcome.

SAISA Volleyball

At the start of the new year, I have decided to try out for the SAISA volleyball team. Just like SAISA basketball, i have decided to join the two SAISA’s as i am now one of the older students, and i need to step up to represent my school. So far, SAISA Volleyball has been great, out of the 2 sessions, i have been nominated for top 10 out of 22 players. Volleyball is  a sport that i have never played properly before, similar to basketball, i have never played organized volleyball. I know the basic skills to play volleyball, but i don’t know the tactics and the way the game should be played, similarly to SAISA basketball. Even though i am not very good yet, i am very keen on learning, and i know that when I am interested in something, i can learn very quickly. My goal for this SAISA is to be able to make the 10 out of 22 that make the traveling team, and depending on how quickly i can improve, i would like to be part of the first team.

End of Year Reflection DHE

Looking back on the DHE experience I’ve had over the past school year, i am very happy to have chosen DHE. I have learnt a lot, from learning sign language to interacting with locals. I was able to make new friends, and understand better the lifestyles of the local kids. I really enjoyed seeing the deaf kids every now and then, and play games or sports with them. Because of the communication barrier, it was sometimes difficult to be able to explain ourselves, but with time, we got to understand each other better. I really wished we could have been able to spend more time with them, but this was difficult due to the fact that they lived quite far.

Things i will do next time to improve my involvement in the service, are, too understand better sign language, to be more fluent with it. I also want to be more participant in the service, i want to try and become some sort of a leader, and help organize each session.

Last day of the year with the DHE kids.

#Ifane4President

Over the past 2 to 3 weeks, i have launched my presidential campaign. At the beginning of the year, i wasn’t planning to be running for president, but after thinking about it, i realized it might be a fun and good opportunity for me. It started off quite simple, i gathered some of my friends to start campaigning, to make posters and videos. My ideology, or thinking behind this presidential campaign was to take it lightheartedly, to try and really connect with the students instead of doing the traditional boring campaigns. In my past 7 years at OSC, the presidential campaigns have been exactly the same, and have been really boring. I wanted to make sure that people would laugh and connect with me when they saw my posters, i wanted them to remember it. This meant that my team and I had to be very creative with the campaigning.

Below shows two of the posters, the first one, i am climbing a tree with a fire extinguisher. This had no meaning behind it but was just so random and so weird that i felt like the students would laugh, or talk about it. Underneath the poster was, #Ifane4President. This was my slogan, it was shown everywhere around school. The second poster shows Nathan, the current president, tying my shoe laces. I thought that this could be a bit too disrespectful, but Nathan was fine with it, he even found it funny. And next to the poster it says, Even the Best Know When to Give Up. This became a big talking point it school, and it allowed people to spread the word and the message. Some people thought i was taking this presidential campaign as a joke, but i really wasn’t, but i guess with the choice of campaigning, i could understand why some people thought so.

4 people were running for president, 2 of them were once president and vice-president. Throughout my campaign, i went around asking people who they were going to vote for, and a majority of them said they were going to vote for me, this made me very confident.

The day came when i had to make a speech in front of the whole high school, i was nervous. I had never done something like this before, but i realized that most people in the audience supported me, and knew me well enough. In my speech, i talked about how i was different. That i’m not the typical student to run for president. But i told them that because i was different, i would really make a change in school, for my past 7 years in school, everyone did the same thing, but i was really ready to change things, since i wasn’t the typical student to run for president. At the end of the speech everyone applauded, and i felt proud.

The next day, the votes were in, and i tied with the current president, Nathan. I was so happy to found out that i basically won. The SGA teacher told us another vote was to be taken, but only with Nathan and I. We were than told that one of us had won, by 2 votes, but the SGA teacher said there was a technical problem, so another vote was to be taken. On the last vote i lost by 4. I didn’t mind too much because i knew Nathan would do a great job. Even though this meant i was vice-president, i didn’t want to keep the position. The reason i ran for president was to be able to bring new thinking, and really change things in school, but i felt that as a vice-president, i wouldn’t be able do as i had wished.