Eddie's Blog

This week was the final Friday to work on our twenty percent project. We still have Monday the 19th to work on it. On Monday, I am going to do the rest of my writing and write my speech for my presentation. This week there was only one obstacle for my writing trifold this week. The obstacle was concerning the ship Desmonda, in which I tried to find the registration papers for and I eventually did. The reason I tried to find the registration papers for Desmonda is because I wanted to find the facts directly from the source so I did some digging in the British Royal Archives and found the records of when she was built, who built her, and when and why she sank. There where no changes to my method but I plan to write my speech with bullet points and each bullet point will have the subject(s) on the line and then I will talk about the subjects from my memory.

My top three favorite memories from this school year were hard choices, but if I had to pick only three, it would be the following memories. My first memory is in my 4/5 class and it was when I started working on my 20% Project which was about roughly five weeks ago. The reason I was so excited was because you could pick anything that you wanted to work on and I chose shipwrecks of the world. My second memory is when I performed at my drama class’ showcase. My role was a guard who got killed within the first fifteen seconds. The reason I like this memory so much is because me dying made people laugh and that made me feel good. My final memory is when I was in PE and I was playing softball and I hit an absolute tank! It went so far that I ended up getting a home run! I liked this memory because it felt amazing to hit that homer.

This week I started working on my tri-fold for the presentation on May 16th. I am doing two trifolds because my map is to big for just one trifold alone. For my second trifold, that is going to be the trifold with the writing on it. The writing is going to consist of ship names, some information about ships, and why they sank. My goal for next week is to have at least most or all the writing done and if I get the writing done on my trifold, I will start on the art for the trifold and I will try to decorate the trifold that has the map on it with some nautical stuff such as drawings of compasses, ships, fish, anchors, and rope. For the decorations on the trifold with the writing, I want to decorate it with the writing being on scrolls and I will also have some quills on the corners to give it that old feel.

A woman that has made a major impact on my life is my mom. There are many reasons for why my mom has made a major impact on my life and if I was to count each one, I would have to invent a new number! I’ll start in the beginning. The date, July 1st, my mom has brought me into this world and because of that, I am eternally grateful for her. Throughout my life, my mom has been an inspiring role model and a great child raiser. One of my favorite qualities about her is that she is tough as nails and can always crack a good joke. A example of her being tough as nails was when I was 5 1/2 and my parents had just divorced and she has raised me as a single mother and we have worked through some rough times together and her determination and love for me has never wavered. And it is for that I truly love her. Happy Mother’s Day, Mom! Love you!

For this month I have chosen for my rad reading The Battle for Skandia by John Flanagan. The book is 294 pages long and has many interesting turn of events.

Far from home after escaping slavery in Skandia, Will and Evelyn’s plans to return are spoiled when Evelyn is taking captive. Will employs a Ranger training to locate his friend but find himself fatally outnumbered. Halt and Horace make a last-minute rescue, but the reunion is cut short by the discovery of the Skandia borders have been breached by the Temujai army with Arulen in their sights.

My favorite character is Horace because he likes the simplicity in life. Evidence of this is on page 265 and he says, “Complicated plans are your thing.” This shows that he prefers the simple things such as plans. My favorite quote from the book is on page 194, and the text states, “Don’t let bad winds stray you from your path.” This quote is meaningful to me because of its meaning. The quote means don’t let things derive you from.  your goals.

 

The fourth week of our 20 Percent Project work was a pretty calm and relaxing week because I had no struggles and I made a singular adjustment. The adjustment was that I had to stop using ships from my journal because I had tagged the ones that I was able to tag because I had finished my journal pages. The accomplishment this week was finishing tagging all ships that I had room on my map to tag in my list of shipwrecks in my seemingly endless, orange, and college ruled journal. This week the kids around me were not as annoying as last week so I was able to meet my goal of finishing off my journal. My goal for this week is to research and write down each set of coordinates, the ship name, and the day it sank. I will only write down ship names from the nineteenth century and before.

This week was very chill with only minor changes and I made no adjustments to my method. I was able to reach my goal of mapping 6-8 ships this week. One struggle I did have this week was concerning the tags of which I was writing the ship names on and then I would stick onto the map. The struggle was that they would get stuck together and it would be near impossible to get them off and parted from each other because the sticky part is very sticky so getting them apart is like getting two flat lego pieces separated with no fingernails. Another struggle was kids around me were a little annoying but I made sure to just tune them out by talking to myself about the map and positions of ships and what angle and position I should put the tags on so that they would not block other tags in the future weeks of the project.

This week was full of accomplishments and a few struggles. Two of the accomplishments I had this week was that I was able to meet my goal of mapping 8 ships. The second achievement was that I found a better method as to finding where the shipwrecks were. I found a website called Shipwreck World and it had an interactive map of ships and all I had to do was click on a pin and see if the name matched one off my listed down ship names. If it did, I would place the tag in reference to where it was on the websites map. The struggle I had this week was that too many shipwrecks were near Tierra Del Fuego, otherwise known as The Land of Fire. The ships that were too close to Tierra Del Fuego were ARA General Belgrano and Duchess of Albany. Overall, this week was a productive week.

My favorite room of all time is in my uncles house. The room is hidden by a door that hides a secret entrance which is a reason I love this room. The door looks like a vertical rectangle but it has an arch on the top. It is built out of either dark oak or rich mahogany. The door has 4 or 5 shelves each one having a set of books and one of the shelves has one of his three Emmy awards. I don’t remember how to open the door since I haven’t been to this house in about a year. The door opens to a spiral staircase that leads down to a whole separate part of a house that includes a bedroom with a queen bed and two night tables on each side, kitchen with marble countertops and hanging lamps, a wood table with about 5 seats, and a half-bathroom. On the end-tables, there are wireless chargers and the TV remote for the 65 inch OLED TV facing the bed. This is my favorite room because it is like a hideaway where you could find inner peace. This is why this room is my favorite.

This starting week was filled with accomplishments and its fair share of struggles. For my project I chose to make shipwrecks around the world because as a young child I have always had a fascination with then water and anything that floats. I was able to map 4-6 ships but some of them I could not map because of the following reasons. First, they were too close to islands and the tags would cover up the land. Second, the tag would be too close to other tags so it would cover the other tag(s) up. Thirdly, the wreck would be in a lake so the tag would be too big for the lake and the label would cover up labels, islands, or parts of the mainland. I fixed this by deciding to not put the tags in that spot and cross them off the list so I would not confuse them with other ships I have not done to save progress. Next Friday, I will pick up with my current ships mapped and try to at least map 6 to 8 ships.