Year 10 Writing Portfolio

The "Game of Cards" ESSAY  

Introduction 

The story “A Game of Cards''by Wiiti Ihimaera is about a woman called “Nani Miro” that loves to play card games and she was the kuia of their family(Kuia of a family is the person who runs the family or a leader that everyone looks up to). The mokopuna(grandchildren)always went to Nani Miros house to play card games, especially on Saturdays. As much as Nani Miro loved them and liked enjoying time with them, it wouldn't take her too long to get sick of them. If there was one character that I could relate to from the story it would be Nani Miro. The reason I chose Nani Miro is that she was always trying to have fun and laugh even before her last few breaths and she was super competitive. 

Body paragraph 1

One reason why it was important that I was able to relate to Nani Miro is that she was always trying to enjoy her life by spending time with her family by playing cards and she was always trying to have fun. “Nani was lying very still. Then she looked up, saw Mos leletit and whispered to her ‘Maka... Maka tiko bum ... I want a game of cards”.We see this in the text when Nani Miro wants to play cards just before her few last breaths, This shows that Nani Miro is not scared of death to she doesn't worry much and she just wants to enjoy and spend some more time and play her favorite card games with her family before she leaves this earth. This made me understand the real purpose of life which is being happy and how important having a laugh with friends and family are and this made me- -realize that we shouldn't be scared of death and we should just always try to be as happy as we can till we are alive. This is important because you should always do what you love and do whatever makes you happy and you shouldn't care what other people say or think because it's your life and you deserve to be happy and enjoy your life.

Body paragraph 2

The other reason that I chose Nani Miro as a person that I could relate to was that she is highly competitive and she always wants to be the leader or that she always wants to win even if it's just a little friendly game.”Eee you cheat, Miro! I already have two aces in my hand and there are only four in the game and how come you have three? ” We see this in the text when Nani Miro cheats while they are playing a card game and when she gets caught and she refuses it. This shows that Nani Miro wants to be the winner so badly that she even cheats to win and it also shows how competitive Nani Miro is. This made me realize that we shouldn't give up on things when it gets hard and that cheating is not the right way to win, we should try to win by trying hard and trying our best instead of cheating. This is important because cheating is not a really fair way to win something and that we should avoid cheating no matter how important winning is two you.

Body paragraph 3

The last reason why I chose Nani Miro is that she loved her family and friends and she loved spending time with them. We see this in the story when her grandchildren were going to her house every Saturday to play cards with their grandmother and when just before she died she still wanted to play card games with her family and to spend some time with her family before she leaves them forever. This shows the importance of our family and how important it is to always keep your family together and happy and to spend as much time as you can with them. This made me understand how valuable our family and friends are because they were the people that introduced us to this world and they taught us social skills when we needed them, Family means that you have someone that sticks with you when you need them or someone who is always there for you and always helps you when you need their help. It's also important that you do the same when your family or friends need you and it's important that you show as much respect and love that they show you. 

Conclusion 

In conclusion, in the story of “ A Game of Cards” by Wiiti Ihimaera, The character Nani Miro made me understand the importance of family and how important it is to spend time with them, And that we should always try to enjoy life even the little things, and that we shouldn't take life so seriously. Of all of these ideas, the most important is that we should always try to be happy and enjoy life with people that we love Because life is too short to worry about stufFor example caring about what people say about you and you shouldn't care what people think about you because it's your life and you should do whatever that makes you happy, And enjoy life with people that you love and care about.

The Creative Writing

The Flying house 

As I gazed up to the sky I saw a Tiny house swimming around the sky and I was like ‘Wow’. The clouds were nearly touching the roof of the house. For a moment I thought I was dreaming but after I rubbed my eyes and pinched myself I believed that it is real and its actually a house floating with clouds around the sky. The house had 4 windows and a door and one of the windows was so Little. Through the Tiniest window, you could see something shiny as a star but I couldn’t tell what it was. While I was thinking about how a house can just fly and swim in the air, I heard a bird singing and I looked around and I still couldn’t see the bird till I Took a peek at the house. The bird was colourful as a rainbow and I just couldn’t stop looking and listening to it. I stared at the bird for a long time till his friends came and he just flew with them and left the house to float by itself.

It seemed like The house belongs to a woman, a women that love art. Because I could tell by the graffiti around the whole house. And wet clothes were hanging from the balcony.







During the time that the house was going higher and higher in peace, it started to get rainy and windier. The gorgeous blue sky turned to a dark and scary black and the wind was pushing the house away from me. At that moment I was nervous and scared and at the same time, I had to do something to help the house from getting destroyed. The house started to fly and move quicker and quicker than I thought it would fly and I tried to run faster to follow the house but Suddenly the house got a stroke by strong and powerful lightning. The house got ruined in pieces. I was shocked I couldn’t believe what I just saw. I felt bad for the Tiny house but at the same time, I was Sad. I looked up to the sky and saw a door on fire falling on me. I start screaming and It was about to hit me that I heard my mum saying Wake up Hasan, Wake up you are always later for school.

ESOL Reflection

 

What was the best lesson and why?

Probably the best lesson was yesterday's lesson because after the test we had free time which I enjoyed a lot.

What did you enjoy doing and why?

I enjoyed the test yesterday because it was so easy and simple.

What was one task you were proud of and why?

I was proud of my ESSAY that I did the other week because I wrote as many words as I was supposed to write and I really liked my ESSAY.

What is something you could do differently/better next time?

I was late to class a few times and I will try to change that next term by being on time for my classes.

Pre reading questions

 

Author witi ihimaera 

1-Where is he from?  he is from New Zealand. 

How many of his works have been adapted into films?

2- what does yellow break road mean for you? have u heard of this expression before/

No, I haven't.

3- what do you predict this story will be about, based on the title?

about someone following a yellow road or something.

Yellow brick road post-reading questions

1- why does the narrator believe they are moving to wellington?

Well, the boy thinks they are moving for money but the dad moves for a better life.

2-On page 1, what big difference between Waituhi and wellington does the narrator mention?

MONEY and a lot of people.

3-On page 3, we find out that dad told uncle sam they were moving to wellington because...?

he wants his children to grow up with everything to have a good life and a better future.

4-How does the narrators attitude towards moving change once they draw nearer to the city?

when they get closer the way they think changes and they will think it might not be the way they thought it will be.

5-Emerald city, yellow brick road, flying monkeys, scarecrow, tinman and cowardly lion, are all allusions to what famous book? why do you think the author made this comparison?

Speeding past the school

 Aim: 

See how many cars are speeding past school

Method:  1-measure distance ... power pole ---> power pole= 50m

               2- Time how long it takes a car to travel this distance.

   -"flag" person indicate when a car passes their pole

   -"Timer" person starts when the flag person raises the flag and stops it when the car passes the pole.

   -" Writer" person writes down the time.

3-collect 10 times

4-calculate speed in m/s and then convert to km/hr

Speed	Car 1	Car 2	Car 3	Car 4	Car 5	Car 6	Car 7	Car 8	Car 9	Car 10	Average
Time (s)	2.55	2.89	2.39	3.12	2.15	2.74	2.85	2.89	3.38	3.39	2.83
m s-1	19.6	17.3	20.9	16	23.3	18.2	17.5	17.3	14.8	14.7	17.7
km hr-1	70.6	62.3	75.2	57.6	83.8	65.5	63	62.2	53.2	52.9	63

5-Are there any speeders?

yes

Conclusion:

In conclusion, the principal's hypothesis was correct(that the cars were going fast and over the speed limit) The Average speed was 63km per hour which the speed limit is 50km. We even noticed a car that was going 83.8km per hour.

6- What was the average speed of the cars you measured?

63km per hour

7- Should the principal be worried about speeding on this road?

yes

English assignment(short film)

 In the last few weeks, we have been trying to make a similar story movie to the Merchant of Venice, And our story is about two best friends finding a treasure map and when they try to follow the map and get the treasure, two other friends try to steal it from the other two friends that found it first and sadly one of them dies in the movie. 

We did a few additional film techniques but mostly we used close up and midshot in our movie.

Finding the best places to film our movie was challenging and getting all the footage on time and making the movie was super challenging because we only had two periods to film. What I would do differently is this, I would change the story a bit and make it longer by adding more short scenes to the movie and what else I would change is the ending, I would end the movie in a really interesting way.

Here is the movie: 

Christchurch Rubbish

 

In the past few days in social studies, we have been learning how to manage using rubbish and recycling trash.

1- What % of Rubbish causes a recycling track to be dumped?

10% of rubbish.

2- What is going into people recycle bin?

• Glass bottles
• cans 
• plastic bottles 
• paper
  
• cardboard
• And etc

3-what is the current penalties if you put the wrong rubbish In the wrong bin? and do you agree with that?

They will take your bin away and to get it back you have to pay $97.65, And YES.

News article

 

The news article

This week in social studies we watched some videos about Trashing our planet and plastic pollution and how it affects the future earth. And Also We have been studying how we can save the planet and the ocean. We can Stop this by not littering and not using plastic because 10% of all plastics go into the ocean and kill sea animals. We have also been using a happy to broadcast site, which is a news site and what makes it different is that it only shares positive news. For example, Mr beast( A YouTuber) planted 20 million trees. And research shows that the mere sight of an indoor plant can reduce stress and anxiety and improves your sense of well being.

What's a Garbage pouch? Garbage patches are large areas of the ocean where litter, fishing gear, and other debris - known as marine debris - collects. One in the Indian Ocean, two in the Atlantic Ocean, and two in the Pacific Ocean. Garbage patches of varying sizes are located in each gyre.

We have also been studying plastic pollution and how it affects the ocean, and we are also learning about how to stop this. Plastic pollution has become one of the most pressing environmental issues, as the rapidly increasing production of disposable plastic products overwhelms the world’s ability to deal with them. Plastic pollution is most visible in developing Asian and African nations, where garbage collection systems are often inefficient or nonexistent. But the developed world, especially in countries with low recycling rates, also has trouble properly collecting discarded plastics. Plastic trash has become so ubiquitous it has prompted efforts to write a global treaty negotiated by the United Nations.

Action	Why did this happen?	Effects?
Littering	People being lazy	Places become messy, rubbish goes into the ocean.
Daily use of plastics	People use plastic for living.	It will go to the ocean and kills animals
Provide an example of government control	When fast foods stopped using plastic straws and shops stopped using plastic bags.	And after that we are not littering as much as we used to litter and that helped a lot.
Provide a positive example of social action	Some People are using cans for water instead of plastic water bottles.	Plastic bottles have survived in the ocean for 150 million years, and if people stop using water bottles it will help a lot.
Tonnes of rubbish being dumped in the ocean	I think people don't really know how worse the world's going to get if we keep throwing rubbish in the ocean.	It will kill sea animals such as: Sea turtles, whales, fish and alot more. And 10% of rubbish goes to the ocean.

The Solution

Littering	Try not to use plastic or throw it in the rubbish bin.
Daily uses of plastic	Try to use non-plastic stuff for example instead of using plastic water bottles use cans.
What government can do	Make a limit for using plastic
Positive example	In NZ in 2018 plastic bags got banned and now people are using other bags for groceries.
Tonnes of rubbish being dumped in the ocean	It kills sea animals so we have to stop throwing rubbish in the ocean instead burn them, DO WHATEVER BUT NOT THROW IT IN THE OCEAN.