The Bake Sale

Today was our bake sale for SOI. Jade and I worked it, and we sold mostly all of the brownies we had and some of the muffins. However, we didn't sell a lot of tea, which was kind of disapointing. All together we made around 25 dollars, which is pretty good though. Last bake sale we made 30. Maybe we will have another one soon.

Planning at SOI

Today at SOI, we talked about our bake sale tomorrow, which I will be volunteering along with Jade. We also discussed possible plans for a senior party that we might be throwing at the end of the year after mock exams, which I think will help me to meet my learning goals, because I will have to help plan a lot of things for the entire senior class, as well as putting myself out there with advertisements and things. Hopefully the bake sale is a success, I will talk about it tomorrow.

Another meeting at SOI

Today, we finished up the final part of the movie, which was basically a summary of the other parts. I think watching this movie sort of fits with learning outcome 6- engaging with issues of global importance. It really opened my views towards the processing of food, which is globally important. Food gets shipping thousands of miles before it reaches our grocery store, and nobdoy really realizes it. People can get extremely sick if they eat the wrong food, which is something that people should be aware of globally.



We also discussed our next bake sale, which I volunteered for, which helps me to meet learning goal 3, because I am engaging in the activities and planning them. I am taking initiative by volunteering, because I am the only one who volunteered to work at the bake sale. The other three people are bringing in baked goods.



The bake sale is a week from today, so we will see how it goes.

SOI

On Tuesday, we continued to watch the movie, which was very moving. In the movie, there was a mother of a child who had died from eating meat which had been contaminated. This sort of made me think a lot about the food industry, and my actions regarding choices of food. I don't think that I will stop eating meat, but I definitely am going to consider where it has been before I eat it.

Also, only three other people showed up for this meeting, which I think shows my commitment to the group.

There's not much to blog about the movie...

Food Inc, SOI

Today in SOI we began watching a movie, "Food Inc." This movie is basically all about the parts of food which we did not know about. One part that really took me by surprise was the way in which they keep chickens, from the day that they are born. It took me a lot of effort to eat chicken after that. I don't really know what else to say in this entry, because all we did was watch a movie. It did provoke uncomfortable emotions. I will continue to write about the movie when we finish watching it on Thursday.

SOI survey.

Today in SOI, we filled out a form as to what we would like to be doing in the upcoming weeks, and basically for the rest of the year. The first part of the survey consisted of us picking from three movies which we wanted to watch in the next meetings. Then, there was an option about volunteering for bake-sales to sell things, or to bake, and finally the final question was about when we wanted our food festival to be. I gave my input as to which I would like, which I think is helping me to further reach my learning outcomes, as well as my personal goals of contributing to the group. I volunteered to sell things at the bake sales, so that I can be a very active member of the SOI group, while also putting myself out there in the school.

SOI

So, we had our weekly meeting again and nobody has finished their poster except for me. I feel that this shows my commitment to the group, which is ultimately helping me to meet my learning outcomes. Jade gave us the period to continue working on our posters, so I decided to help another group with theirs because they seemed to be confused as to how to set it up. All in all, nothing really got accomplished this group, but I do think I am showing my dedication to the group because I have shown up for every meeting and I've gotten things done when they were due. I think I am one of th eonly people who has shown up to every meeting, and I know I am the only person who has taken responsibility in getting the poster done. After vacation we are planning on watching a documentary, possibly "Food, Inc." and we might be planning for some more bake sales to continue raising money. I hope the posters work out, and I can't wait to see them hung around the school when everyone else has completed theirs.

SOI.... I finally finished my poster!

Today, at SOI, we didn't really do much. I was the only person who had finished my poster, and Jade loved it so she showed it to the group as a template. I think this is showing me completing my goals, because I am actually putting effort forth in the group, which is good. I have noticed that the size of the group is dwindling, but I hope that everyone else gets their posters done soon. I might volunteer to do another one if nobody else turns theirs in by next week, but we will see.

More Poster Stuff at SOI

Today, only four people came to SOI, so we basically decided to just discuss our posters and start working on them. We came up with the idea for Marissa, Brianna and my poster, to get a picture of a dragon and knight fighting with a carrot, or something creative, because our poster is on organic myths. We started looking at poster templates, and I think we have decided on one. During the week I am going to try to get my poster completely done so that they can be hung up around the school, and we can start spreading awareness. Although it was kind of unsuccessful that almost nobody showed up to SOI today, we still got a decent amount done for only four people being there. I feel committed that I was one of the four people as well.

Poster Planning at SOI

Today, we discussed our ideas for posters, because we have decided that we are all going to make special organic posters to hang around the school, giving details about the organic lifestyle and such things. I am going to be working with Marissa making one about "organic myths." We decided that we should make the posters on computers, and we will send them to Jade, who is going to print them out as very large posters. This way they will stand out more than the empty pieces of paper floating around on our school walls. I will be researching organic myths so that on Monday during our food festival, we can all discuss these things.

Real Planning at SOI

Today at SOI we talked about how on Monday only one person who had signed up to do a bake sale actually brought things in for the bake sale. I think this taught us a bit of a lesson, and showed us how important every member of the group is. I think from now on we will be able to collaborate more effectively, and we are going to send out reminders for when we have bake sales. We also decided to only have bake sales on Fridays for now, but in the future we want to try and maybe take over the school's office bake sales and make everything organic.

The Monday before thanksgiving we are planning to have an international organic food feast, as a pre run for a food feast we are planning during mid-terms. This feast is only going to be the SOI people, but every single member is designated to bring in something. I hope we collaborate and make this work.

SOI

Today, not too many people showed up to SOI, but we discussed some issues which we found out about. Apparently the school has decided bake sales are unhealthy, so we have decided to come up with an alternative bake sale approach, selling fruits, and hummus, and other sorts of things. I will be working the bake sale next Friday. We also decided that we should make awareness posters, and we were divided up into groups of three people to do this. We have to come up with ideas for our posters by the next meeting, and then we will move on to making the actual poster itself. I am excited to get doing this, because my ideas will begin to be expressed.

A Day of Planning for SOI

Today during SOI we had a meeting to discuss what we wanted to do for the future year, like what our goals would be. We decided that it would depend on how much money that we make throughout the year. If we make enough money, we want to plant an organic vegetable garden in the spring, and we also want to replenish the school with healthier eating options for snacks. We plan on having bake sales every Monday and Friday, and I volunteered to work them on Friday, which I think is good because it will help me meet my learning outcomes, by putting myself out there more. We also discussed that we want to have an organic food feast, where everyone can either bring a dish, or pay five dollars at the door. We plan on doing this someday at the end of midterms, so that everyone has something to look forward to during the week of midterms. We might also do one of these "test runs" right before thanksgiving break to see how things go. We have a bake sale next Friday during break, so I will post back and see how things go.

First Day of Spanish Tutoring

Today, I met with Chris to tutor him in Spanish. He had previously told me that he was awful at Spanish, and that there was no way that I could help him. However, when we met, I was amazed at how good he was. I mean, he wasn't perfect, but he definitely was better than I had thought. We reviewed for a quiz that he was having the following day, on verb tenses. It seemed as though he was getting the hang of it pretty well, and I think that I benefited from it as well because it was very good review for me. When I talked to him today, he had told me that the quiz was easy, and that he thought he did good. So I feel pretty accomplished. We also had time to do a worksheet that he was struggling with; I think that this will be a good year for tutoring him, and I think we will both benefit.

SOI bake sale WOO!!!

Today during break SOI held its first bake sale/ tea sale, and surprisingly it did very well. I worked the sale along with some other SOI members. I thought it was really cool how many people actually came and bought things from us, even though Mrs. Todoroff was still selling things in the office. I think that by doing this bake sale I also became more apart of the school, which is something I don't normally do. I had to speak up, and help out, which is something I usually struggle with.

SOI planning day

Today we opened our SOI meeting by reading an article from the newspaper about organic farming and it's effects. I think that this article actually informed me of a lot of things that I kind of already knew, but wasn't so sure of. The article was basically about a study conducted on children, comparing children who ate organic foods versus non-organic foods. It was found that the non-organic foods had a lot more toxic elements in them, which were harmful to the children. The organic foods didn't have any.

We then discussed our plan for a bake-sale type thing, and we set the date to be Wednesday. Everyone worked together as a group to compromise what they could contribute to this sale, and we decided that something we would sell would be organic tea. I volunteered to work the bake sale, because I think that this will help me to get more out there, rather than just staying behind the scenes and donating food. I am looking forward to our first bake sale of the year, and I hope it is a success.

The First Day of SOI

Today was the first meeting of SOI. IT was basically made up all all seniors, and one junior or sophomore. We discussed oru goals for the year, and what events we would like to plan in order to raise money for independent organic farming. We also discussed trying to raise awareness of living organically by maybe having "organic pot-lucks" during lunch sometimes, where anyone is welcome to come and try out organic foods. We talked about a bunch of different sales that could happen at break, and how we might raise money to make these things happen. There is going to be a short meeting every week during lunch, where we can just check in with eachother and read a newspaper article that one of us brings in. The rest of the group is going to rely on us doing what we want and working together as a group to raise money. I'm definitely excited.

My Last Day at the MSPCA

Today was my last day at the MSPCA, and I feel like I have accomplished a lot while I was here. I definitely have opened up my views towards animals, and I am able to see and understand their need for love. Also, durin the course of my time at the MSPCA I have endured getting dirty, which I usually hate completely. But while I'm here, I realize that I need to get dirty in order to get the job done, and that is what I did every day at the MSPCA; I honestly didn't mind it either.

Today, I cleaned the cat room as usual, and I finished early, which made me feel acoomplished, because I usually finish at the last minute. I think my partner and I really worked well together to make the room perfect, in a reasonable amount of time (about 3.5 hours instead of 4.) I'm glad that I took the oppurtunity to volunteer here, and I think that I might come back in the future, as something to do for fun.

Progress At The MSPCA

Today was another day at the MSPCA. I worked with the girl who I had showed what to do last week, and we made a lot of progress working as a team. I improved a bit, as I transfered almost every single cat, even after I got scratched by one. There was one cat who was new, who was very shy and didn't want to be touched, so instead of taking her out of her cage, I left her there, and worked around her. Although I was a bit nervous of what she was going to do, I continued doing it and realized she wasn't going to hurt me. I think that I have definitely been gaining a lot fromt his experience at the MSPCA, and I am meeting my goals. I'm definitely stepping out there and doing things I wouldn't typically do, and I'm actually having fun doing it. I'm really glad I chose this as something to do, and I can't believe I actually benefitted from it. I thought it was just going to be some sort of thing that I would dread going to every week; but its not that at all. I'm gonna miss it when I don't come back anymore. I wonder how my next week will go. I hope I can say that I compeltely acheived my goals.

Leadership at the MSPCA

Today was an amazing day, progress-wise, at the MSPCA. A new lady came in, and I got the priveledge of training her and showing her what to do in the cat room. It was so wonderful, she was a rally sweet woman, and we got along very well. I felt as though I had to take a lot of responsibility in my duties, and complete them correctly. She asked me questions about what to do, and I was the one who had to answer them. It was kind of neat because I remember when I used to be the one asking questions.

We cleaned the cat room, like usual, and I took a lot of responsibility with the cats. I did the majority of the transfering, and I was proud of myself. There was even one cat which I managed to transfer, which I never would have before. I used to be afraid of this cat because she was very timid and would always claw people. But I did it, and I didn't get clawed.

I feel as though I am definitely growing and developing new skills by working at the MSPCA, and I'm glad. I'm going to msis it when it's over...

I won't be able to work at the MSPCA the next two weeks, because of college visits, however, I plan on going back on August 21, and I hope that I still have as much confidence as I did this week.