Science 12 students were asked to submit a portfolio and a reflection of the semester. I gave them some guiding questions. This student gave me permission to post some of his reflection.
Quote that stuck with you?
“Wonder whilst you wander.” This quote stuck with me because I think it is a great motto to live by, and that I will be wandering my entire life and that I should never forget to wonder.
What did you learn in Science 12?
- Science things I learned:
- Lenses
- Mirrors
- Color
- Biology of the human brain
- Electronics
- Heat
- Computer science (a bit)
- Non-science things I learned
- I learned about graphic design through the design process of making business cards
- I learned about business modelling through making business canvases
- I learned about carpentry through building three bee hives from scratch
- I learned about the biggest problems in our world through our stats day
- I learned about public speaking and English through having to write pitches and presentations
- I learned about bee keeping through our efforts and mentors
- I learned about the dynamics of teamwork and how to be a better leader through our project
- I learned
Do you feel you have been a real person? How does that make you feel? Is it different from other classes?
I feel like I was more of a real person in this class. I was doing real work, of all different fields and not simply taking notes and making Bristol board presentations that end up in the garbage afterwards. It made me feel good to do real work, and work towards fixing a world problem instead of just learning about it. I decided to tackle to problem of bee decline. It was a cool aspect of my education, where my learning benefited the business and potentially the bees. It was cool knowing that the learning I did would for sure be benefiting my future self; knowing a business plan, and how to cooperate with others will help my future self, which I sometimes question when learning how to do logarithmic differentiation of an equation with more functions than fingers I have. Never in science 12 did I ever feel that my learning was not beneficial for my future self.
Did you feel you had freedom? What was it like?
Yes, I felt we very much had freedom. It was awesome! We could move our tests around and do the work as we wanted. A day was busy with a calculus test or so on, we had the freedom to use science 12 class time to study and such as needed. Having freedom allowed us to follow what we wanted; someone was learning about trees and the environment, I was learning about bees, electronics, and carpentry, while someone else was learning about personal health through fitness, etc. Having the freedom made the class the exception to my other classes, when it should be the standard.
