Online Afterlife

It's morbid topic time! What happens to our online profiles when we die?  This question hasn't been thought about much in the past or present, but as Facebook becomes more prominent than a photo album people need to figure out what they want to do with their precious memories when they die. Your Internet self could technically live on forever, and this decision needs to be made by the person themselves.
   That could even become a new section in the will. Whether a facebook should be destroyed or memorialized may be a big decision soon. Another option is to have your family continue your social network. I think the deceased should have the decision and if they want to put thier family in control that is fine. Basically, there is no right way to deal with your online accounts after death, you just need to respect the deseased's wishes.

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http://www.educreations.com/lesson/view/romney-vs-obama/2499196/?s=MqWd7V&ref=app

Google 20% 2.0

Yay! Another 20% project! Sadly, there will be no butterflies this year. But there will be animal ears! I present to you...............................complete with dots for effect...................................the best google 20% project since google released their version of sliced bread.............................................
THE ANIMAL EAR PROJECT
The animal ear project is a documentary. I am going to interview people on their views on individuality, then ask them to walk down the hallway wearing animal ears and see how that changes their view.  I will need my video camera and a small variety of animal ears. The only problem I foresee is the possibility that no one will feel comfortable wearing animal ears Around school. Since for some reason there is no individuality class I think I'll just talk to Ms. Mystrena if I need help because she's an individual too.

Chris Langan

Chris Langan is one of the smartest men in America. He works on the theory of the universe and other mysteries of the world. Yet he is relatively unknown, and not particularly rich. But is he successful? I personally would say that he is very successful, he lives happily on a ranch with his wife and works on his theories. Other people might disagree with me, though. Chris isn't rich or famous. He never finished college and didn't go to an ivy league school. When he was on a game show, 1vs. 100, he didn't win the million. I, however, don't believe that success is about perfection. If you're rich or famous, that's great for you but success doesn't revolve around it. Success is all about being happy and satisfied with your life, and I believe Chris Langan has achieves that.

The kindergarten debate

      When I was 5 years old, I went to kindergarten. I made friends and learned social skills.  I didn't really learn much else. I could already read and count to 1000. I mostly just sat there or helped the other kids. I am born in May. If the world went the way Malcolm Gladwell wanted it to I would be stupid because I am one of the youngest people in my grade.
     So basically I believe that Malcolm Gladwell is flat out wrong. He probably noticed a correlation when looking at the roster, then went on a mad hunt for other sports teams that followed that theory. There are so many teams that he would have eventually found one that supported his theory. His whole book could be filled with complete fraud.
     According to the New York Times article "Delay Kindergarten at your Child's Peril" you shouldn't delay kindergarten because your child will be smarter if he or she is in school and learning instead of sitting at home for an extra year. Gladwell stated that if you delay kindergarten your child will be the oldest and therefore will be treated as the oldest, being offered more opportunities. I personally have never heard of a teacher treating a child differently because he or she is the oldest.
    So to sum up, Gladwell really has no solid evidence supporting his theories, which make no sense. Therefore, I do not agree with him on the kindergarten debate, and am skeptical about this whole book.

All about being gifted (and a little talented)

       I guess I'm gifted. I get pretty good grades and big parts in plays. I take g+t. Which is a big perk. Stuff has always been easy. I can do a paper that would take some people days in a couple of hours. I only have to study in history and sometimes science. I can discover patterns really easily and continue them. It's just natural.
        Being gifted isn't all that great though. Some people who don't know me see me as just smart or a good actress or whatever. This really isn't true. I'm shy around strangers but if I have a friend with me I'm loud and fun and maybe considered obnoxious in some people's minds. Also, people (and parents) tend to have very high expectations for me (or people related to me) and when I can't achieve something they become disappointed ( or angry). There's also that little bit about being alienated from the rest of  society by an invisible brick wall ( don't worry you just need an invisible sledgehammer) that they leave out in the brochure.
      Now a lot of people have some assumptions about gifted people that are completely and utterly, flat out wrong. So it's myth buster time. All these myths are from this website. Ha ha just kidding They are from the National Association for Gifted Children's website.
     My first myth is that if a child doesn't get all A's they aren't gifted. First of all, I get B's all the time and I'm sure many other gifted students also do. Secondly, being gifted isn't all about academics. It's also about other talents you may have and being a well-rounded, creative person who can make a difference in the world.
My second myth is that gifted children are stereotypical nerds, complete with a dry personality and pocket protectors. Though I hate to admit that these do exist and that I've met some, I am happy to report that none are in our g+t. In fact, the one stereotypical nerd I know didn't pass the test to get into Rogate or g+t. I believe this was because he was too academically focused to get the creative answers needed for the patterns test.
      My final myth is that AP courses are the same as g+t. This is the most incorrect myth in this blog post and probably the most incorrect myth on the NAGC website, if not the whole Internet. AP or Honors courses are advanced, difficult courses that many gifted students are in, but it is comepletly different from g+t. Gifted and Talented focuses more on the individual student and their own unique accomplishments.
     So there you have it, a lot of important stuff you need to know about being gifted.
(p.s. does anyone else find it ironic that the blogspot spellchecker doesn't recognize "blog" as a real word?)

First Post

My name is Sam and I'm in 9th grade. This isn't really my first post but it is my first post for the school year. My 10 favorite things are my dog, my friends, my oil pastels, my television, the internet, theatre, this class, random stuff, and doing nothing. My 10 least favorite things are rules, work, homework, haters, other people in general, when the spellcheck is wrong, gym class, when they don't understand what "I'm having an asthma attack" means in gym class (and no I can't keep running), uncomfortable chairs, and peanut butter. The highlight of my summer was my trip to Canada. I am looking forward to the 20% project, of course and learning more about the iPads.

Last blog post of the school year

Rogate was probably the most fun class I have ever taken. My favorite part of the class was the 20% project. I got to raise butterflies for this, which was really cool. My favorite lesson was the one we did kitschy art, which I found very interesting. My favorite unit was the one on civics. I found it really informative. My favorite project was the kitschy art project. In this class we could have used the blogs more effectively. We could have done journal posts and for fun posts. I Am taking gifted and talented next year which I am excited again. The thing I will miss most about middle school is air conditioning. I will also miss being the oldest grade in the school. I am worried about how much time we will have to get across the school to the other buildings. Also I want more information on how much homework I will have. Over the summer I plan to go to summer camp, Canada, and Kiersten's house. Well Good Bye for the summer.

Kickstart!

Kickstart is an extremely cool website. If you have an awesome idea and you need money to produce it. You can sign up and people will give money to you. If I had $500 on that site I would give my money to a few different projects. I would give $300 to a project that really interests me. That would be the Trackl3t bracelet. This bracelet is a bracelet that you pass on from person to person. It has a website that you go on and record your adventures with the bracelet. Then people who have it in the future can see where it's been. I would give $150 to Remee. Remee is a mask that allows you to have lucid dreams. I would give to Remee because I had a lucid dream once and it was really cool. I wish I could do it again because when I had it I didn't know what it was so I didn't do anything cool. I would pledge $50 to Makey Makey, which looks so super cool, but it already has enough money. Basically, you can turn anything into computer controls. So you could have an alphabet soup keyboard. That would be fun.

Crowrdsourcing through Cleverbot

Crowdsourcing is the act of taking information from a large group of people. Instead of doing it yourself. A prime example of this is Cleverbot! Cleverbot is an online robot. You can log on to Cleverbot and have a conversation with it. Cleverbot saves the information you tell it and uses it in future conversations. To learn more click here. This is an example of crowdsourcing because it uses information you give it to have conversations.

Google 20%

The Google 20% project is a brilliant idea. It is when we just pick a project and go. We can explore our interests and figure out what we like and dislike. Here is an article explaining the 20% project

Wastelands

Wastelands is one of the coolest documentaries I've ever watched. It's about the pickers at Jardim Garmacho, a landfill in Rio de Janeiro. In the beginning of the film it was interesting and while the interest remained the film slowly got sadder and sadder.
   The main focus of the film was a man named Vik Muniz who made portraits of many of the pickers out of garbage to raise money for them. He auctioned off one piece in London for $50,000 US dollars. Vik also gave them a new sense of what they can accomplish and what they can do with their lives.
   Many of the people interviewed said they were proud to work at the landfill. It was easy for them to get sucked up in robbery, drug dealing, prostitution, or some other dishonest job. They felt working in the landfill, even though it was frowned upon by society, was a much more responsible choice. This is good choice. They can work their way out of a landfill but once you start one of those jobs you can’t get out easily.
   I realized after watching this film that I produce a lot of garbage. I might recycle less though. These people make money on taking the recyclables out of the garbage. I’ll give them more business.
   Vik Muniz could do this for almost any area in the world. He could do Iraq or Afghanistan. Or just an American Ghetto

Photo Challenge #5

Theme: Texture
This a close- up of my window. That's all.

Photo Challenge #4

Theme: Looking In

This is the outside of my house looking into the inside. I decided to be incredibly smart and stand outside in the snow wearing a miniskirt to get this picture so you better appreciate it's beauty.

Photo Challenge #3

Theme: Colors

So I thought most of my pictures wern't abstract or creative or beautiful enough so I thought really hard about what the prettiest colorful thing is. My idea was a rainbow but there are rarely any rainbows and it wasn't raining so I had to think of something else. Then when I got home there was a rainbow on my wall from the light going through the decrotive glass on our front door. I was like "Yes!" and I got my camera and took a picture of it. I tried to edit it to make it even cooler but I failed so I just used the origanal picture. The End

Photo Challenge #2

Theme: Underneath

This is my dog Daisy, who thinks she is human. I found her in my bedroom under the covers like this and since I had my camera with me, and this is supposed to be a real moment (I'm not allowed to pose my dog) I figured it would be perfect. Daisy looks guilty because she's technically not supposed to be on the bed, but we've given up trying to tell her that.

Photo Challenge #1

Theme: Cold

This thermometer is located outside my house. I had the idea of taking a picture of the thermometer but then I realized it wasn't cold enough. I had a brilliant stroke of genius and put my thermometer in the freezer for 15 minutes. By the time I got it screwed into place and took the picture the little red line had risen from 0 degrees to 20 degrees. I also kinda broke the top off of the thermometer but no one needs to know that.

Photo Essays are AMAZING

I am currently being required to choose a photo essay and write about it. I'll be doing that in this blog post. Another rule was to not pick the first one we saw. I broke that rule because I reeeally liked the first one I saw. Here it is. Please feel free to view it to your heart's desire. So the photo essay I picked is about the Hariban Snow and Ice Festival in Hariban, China. This festival takes place in very cold weather. This one was in -18 Celsius. That is extremely cold. I think that all the statues, expecially at night were so beautiful and magical that I would have hardly noticed the freezing cold weather.

Life in a Day

One day, July 24 2010, the world was doing the same things we do everyday, going to work, getting married, and celebrating life. Only on this particular day 800,000 regular people carried around video cameras and documented the day. All the submissions were sent to Youtube and compiled into a movie that shows every aspect of daily life. Many of the scenes were gory and some were exciting and interesting but the most memorable of these scenes is none of the above. To me the most memorable scene of the movie was a young women getting ready by herself then calling her overseas husband on Skype. The scenes that I found were the most happy were the shortest. They were short clips of people dancing and singing. The scenes I found the saddest were the ones that involved the gory, fighting side of life. Sadly, this negativly horrible side of humanity is the one that I saw the most throughout the film.
Another theme throughout the movie was juxtapositions. The one that I noticed the most was happening during my most remembered scene. During the young woman's morning a voice over played about her husband in Afghanastan. The scene sometimes was punctured with clips showing the good side of Afghanastan.
In all I thought the movie covered a lot. It showed all sides of any situation, but I'm not sure I would recommend it to a friend. It doesn't seem like a movie most of my friends would enjoy, but thier loss.

TIME Magazine's Top 100 People of 2011

I really don't feel like writing about a full 100 mini articles about a bunch of people I don't care that much about. After tons and tons of consideration I picked the 3 that I found the most influencial.
1) Mark Zuckerberg- He was person of the year for one thing. You may not know this but he also invented a little website called FACEBOOK! Facebook has started a revolution. Without Mark Zuckerberg all those middle eastern countries would still be in dictatorships. THANKS MARK! Click for his article
2) Oprah- I mean who hasn't heard of Oprah? She runs the worlds most popular daytime talk show, now has her own TV channel, and works with tons of charitys. Of course, on top of all that she probably has enough money to rent out Australia and a long lost sister sob story. Click for her article
3) John Lasseter- I didn't know who John Lasseter was until about 1 minute ago but, he's the guy who runs Pixer. Without him the world would be without cute animated movies that no one really wants to see but we do anyway and most of the time we like them (except for Cars2 that SUCKED). This guy gives us movies that remind us what it's like to be a little kid again. Click for his article