Movie Review: Spirited Away

Spirited Away is one of my favorite movies ever!! I saw it for the first time when I was about seven, and I have loved it ever since. 

The story follows Chihiro, who is moving to a new town with her parents. On their way there, they take a wrong turn and end up taking a "shortcut" to try and get to their new house. Instead, they end up at what seems to be an abandoned amusement park. 

Her parents' curiosity takes them into the amusement park where Chihiro reluctantly follows. After smelling some food, they decide to cross the small river bank and venture into the park. They come across a food stall that is filled to the brim with delicacies, but no attendants. Chihiro's parents decide to eat there, leaving Chihiro to wander around on her own. 

Chihiro then finds a bathhouse, which appears to be empty but up and running. Outside the bathhouse, she is startled by a boy who gives her some discomforting advice: leave before all the lights go on.

Chihiro seems to take his advice, of course, she could just be freaking out by the weirdness factor of it. Either way, she runs back to her parents. At this moment, the lights of the bathhouse are seen coming on behind her. When she arrives back to the food stall where she left her parents eating, she is astonished to see that they have been turned into pigs!

Chihiro runs out of what seems to be confusion. Eventually, she finds her way back to the river bank, which is now completely overflowing with water making it impossible to cross. She does so anyhow. 

Dragging herself out of the water, she sits on the bank of the river hoping that this was all a bad dream. She closes her eyes and wishes for it to just disappear. Just then, Haku (the boy who gave her the scary advice) finds her again and tells her that if she doesn't eat something from this world, that she'd literally disappear.

Following Haku's advice, again, she eats, which allows her to stay in the spirit world. Once C. eats and starts feeling better, Haku explains to her that she needs to get a job at the bathhouse in order to stay in the spirit world and save her parents. The rest of the movie is an awesome, highly visual story about how Chihiro saves her parents, positively affects the spirits in this world, and eventually finds out just exactly what she needed to learn…that home is where your heart is.

All in all, this is one of my favorite movies ever! Not only is it a great storyline, but the graphics are beautifully done and the characters are unique and interesting.

Photos :)

These are pictures that were taken in the backyard of our US home. The purpose of the assignment was to photograph objects or images that appeal to me. 

My Camera :D 

Isn't this a lovely camera? This classic Polaroid takes photos that can be instantly developed before your eyes. They're great additions to scrap books and other creative projects!

A beautiful flower that couldn't wait for Spring to bloom!

It's my shadow!!

A missing acorn mystery to be solved!

Blooms come in all shapes and sizes.

Beautiful, vibrant berries on a stick!

A hidden heart!

This looks like a secret entrance, doesn't it? It really makes you wonder if anything lives in there...

This is a picture of a tagged Oak Tree on our property.

This tag does not mean that the tree was born in 1736, it means that the tree is protected and that the owners need to take provisions to take good care of them.

SAT Essay: Do like people get along?

Think carefully about the issue presented in the following excerpt and the assignment below. Common sense tells us that people tend to get along better with those who are like them, who think and act as they do. Many people, however, get along very well with people who are very different from them and may prefer to associate with those whose views and actions are different from their own. In fact, some people even complain that they are bored and irritated by those who are too much like them.

ASSIGNMENT:


Do people tend to get along better with people who are very different from them or with those who are like them? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this issue. Support your position with reasoning and examples taken from your reading, studies, experience, or observations.

MY ESSAY:

People tend to get along better with like-minded people because they have more things in common. When you have things in common with someone else, it is easier to talk to them. This is often the building blocks of friendship.


One day at school, I met a girl with a Totoro backpack. Immediately, I knew she liked Manga and the film, My Neighbor Totoro. This was all I needed to start a conversation with her. By the end of our discussion, we knew we were destined to be friends. Had it not been for the fact that we had a love of Anime in common, I might not have spoken up and we might not have become friends.

On another occasion, I was attending a Youth Leadership Program and a girl came up to me because she said she liked my outfit. This started a conversation on fashion that eventually lead to other topics like school and blogging. Come to find out, she was also homeschooled and had a very successful blog on the Internet, which interested me because I was just getting ready to start mine.

While it may not be necessary to be friends with people who have other interests, it does make those initial awkward moments of introducing yourself easier to deal with.

SAT Essay: Is learning Its Own Reward?

Learning and doing are their own rewards. No external rewards are required. However, when external rewards are introduced—whether attention and praise from parents or prizes from teachers—these rewards influence kids a lot. Instead of reading books to find out about the world, kids read to win prizes. Kids produce work and projects for rewards, but are they interested in learning or in the prize???


ASSIGNMENT:


Is it wrong or harmful to motivate people to learn or achieve something by offering them rewards? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this issue. Support your position with reasoning and examples taken from your reading, studies, experience, or observations.

MY ESSAY:

Rewards can be a distraction from learning because it takes the focus off of the goal and puts it onto an object. When someone is hyper-focused on a reward, they are not as focused on the task at hand, which is learning and integrating new knowledge.

When you motivate learning with the proverbial "carrot on a stick", people begin behaving like pets. "Sit, Fido." Here's a treat. "Do your homework, Jenny." Here's a reward.

When you lose interest in learning, studying becomes boring instead of enjoyable. Reading feels like drudgery instead of being whisked away on an adventure in your own mind. Many kids think that school is boring and they're right! Traditional school is HORRIBLY boring because the focus is either on the grade or the prize, no where is the focus on the pride of learning something new. When we learn new things, we can apply them in other areas of our lives. In this way, learning should feel like opening up a magic box within yourself.

While some people argue that rewards are appropriate for short-term projects, experts say that the reality is different. Even for smaller projects, when the focus is taken off of the assignment and transferred to the reward, people lose interest, which diminishes the quality of their work. Rewards also stunt the creative side of people, it turns something fun into stress over whether or not you will be rewarded. When stress is on rewards and punishment, emphasis is never on learning.

If you are being rewarded with a prize instead of the thrill of learning, your punishment will be that you don't end up learning what you set-out to learn in the first place.

SAT Word of the Day: Artisan

Artisan

Manually skilled worker; craftsman as opposed to artist

Speciality bakers in Paris are referred to as Artisans, their pastries are always baked fresh the day they sell them.

Science on the Go :)

Traveling from place to place we cannot always take our science lab with us. Because of this....

Most of our science experiments end up happening in the kitchen, in the yard or garden, or even just outside of our window. 

The last science experiment I did involved moldy bread. I had to take the growth of the mold, and by the end of the experiment the bread looked like this. 

Gross right?

Since we cannot do every science experiment ourselves, we watch a lot of science videos, like the ones below. They are really fun to watch and I hope you enjoy them as much as my little brother and I did. :)

Speed Coloring :)

What Can Be Created Today?

Happy Monday!

Happy Monday!! 

Each week starts off with a Googling activity! Who am I kidding? Nearly every day starts off with my Googling something. Today, I thought I'd investigate some of Google's famed artwork. Here are some of my favorites! Feel free to write in and share yours!

HAVE A GREAT WEEK!