Prize giving 2K17

Today was not only our last day of school for 2017, but it was also yr 7 & 8 prize giving. Today I was awarded two awards. The first award was for my involvement in performing arts, the award was call the performing arts award. I got this because I did a whole lot of performing arts this year. This year I did the Shakespeare Festival for the second time, I did the lion king musical, read about it Here, and I was also going to do the 48hour film festival but I couldn't because it was a family members birthday. Not only did I get a certificate, but I also got a trophy which will have my name engraved on it and put in a trophy cabinet. I am very proud of myself for getting this award because performing arts is my passion.

I also got another award, 1st in cooking. If i'm being honest, I don't think I am that good at cooking, but I am proud that I got this award. With this award I was given a set of measuring cups which will be handy in future cooking. I am so grateful for this award and I would like to give a big thank you to the people that gave it to me.

Here are some photos...

The day of the lion king musical performance! (aka my acting debut)

Thursday the 7th of November
Today was the day of our performance of the lion king musical. Over this 4 week journey, I was either learning lines or screaming out "I will be king"! I was given the honour of playing one of the main characters, Scar. Scar was the villain of the musical, plotting to kill his brother and nephew in order to become the king of pride rock.

Being the committed student I am, my day started with waking up at 4.30am in order to get my hair washed and dried, (since I was going to have it out all day). I had an amazing costume that suited not only me, but my character, Scar. It included a grey, choker top, full length leggings, chunky boots and a trench coat. When I arrived at school at 7:55am, I started to practice my lines, going over and over them, making sure that my voice was not only loud, but articulated. At 8:25 our school bell rang, signalling all students to get to their form classes. Since I was in a costume, I was eager to get form time over and done with. When I arrived to my form classroom, I was continuously pestered, all of the people in my class where saying "why are you wearing that?", or "oh my god, you look so good"!

After form time, all of the musical theatre group assembled in the auditorium and waited for Mrs Clark, Mrs Beer and Miss Richardson to approach. When they did we all got some feedback from the previous practice, most of my feedback was to talk slower and louder. Since I am the villain, I need to be able to gain all attention and be scary at the same time. I took all this feedback on board, focusing on my voice and facial expression. We were soon going to have a dress rehearsal/performance for 60 Hornby Primary children. The dress rehearsal went very well and we got some feedback at the end from our teachers. I didn't really get that much feedback.

It was now time to get into makeup. My makeup look was exactly how I pictured how it was going to look, bold brows, black lip and a scar running down the left side of my face. Thanks to Mrs Beer for doing my makeup. After everyone's makeup looks were completed we started to go over some key parts of the musical, such as the circle of life and me killing Mufasa.

Now it was time for the big show, I rarely get nervous so I was in the zone before stepping out on stage. Nathan was announcing our arrival on stage and our performance. I elegantly but scarily slinked on stage with the occasional growl at one of the audience members. I spent the whole musical on stage, just sitting casually in my cave looking regal. At some points of the musical I got a lot of "Ohhhs" and "Ahhhs" and the occasional "shot Nadia"! When I was talking, I attracted all attention and made sure that I was loud and enunciated enough. At the end of the musical, it was time for our bows, when it was my time to bow I got a lot of applause, signalling that I did very well and that I should be proud of myself. Funny thing though, at the part where I scare Zazu out of my cave, I think I scared him a bit too much because he fell back, causing the backdrop of the stage to fall with him!

After the musical performance, I got heaps of hugs from all of my friends. I was so proud of everyone in the performance for their stellar efforts to make sure that the musical was perfect. When I went to my classroom to look at everyone else's work, people were flooding me, telling me that I did a wonderful job. Even Mrs Gibson said that I should be an actress or star on Broadway! Lately I have also been approached by many teachers (some I haven't even met) within my school, congratulating me on my performance.

But the one person that I was really proud of was Jaime. Jaime was the person who did a whole solo all by herself while playing Rafiki, a wise old monkey at the start of the circle of life. At the start of our musical theatre journey, Jaime was doubting herself and her abilities, but during that performance, she let that all go. All of the worries seemed to vanish.

Overall there is mainly one thing I could change during my performance and that is talk slower. I think that if I talked slower, it would get the point across to the audience more. The part where I am plotting to kill Mufasa is definitely where I could've spoke more slowly.

I would just like to take this moment to thank all of the teachers who have supported me through this journey, mainly Mrs Clark, Mrs Beer and Miss Richardson. These three teachers have been supporting me from the start, encouraging me and explaining how to do things properly in order for the performance to be perfect. Again a massive thank you to all that have supported me through this journey. Hopefully I will be talking about this to an audience when I am a famous actress staring on Broadway or something similar.

Here is a photo from after the performance...

Ok, can we just take a minute to appreciate how downright awesome I look in this photo...
Photo credit- Jaime
(When I get them, I will post some photos of the performance)

A brush with death and a rebellious act, Narrative one

For our writing last week, we had to write a narrative from a list of prompts our teacher gave us.

Number 32 (a brush with death) I know this is pretty average but I like the way I used the cliffhanger at the

- Penelope is the daughter of a serial killer who terrorises everyday people. But one day, when Penelope brother is one of those people, Penelope does what she can to get vengeance for her brother.

Penelope has always been an outcast. Penitent about her life, Penelope hides in the shadows, unwanted and not thought about. Being the “brainy one” in school was always a disadvantage for Penelope, pupils were repeatedly pestering her about her ingenious mind. Not only was Penelope self-conscious of her mind, she was continuously bullied for her family.

Penelope was a placid 14 year old girl, only known to a miniscule amount of people. Petite and slender, Penelope cruises around casually, minding her own business. Her long, flowing strands of dirty-blonde hair curl down her back. Being not so fond of trends, Penelope dresses casually, T-shirt, Jersey and jeans. Casual; that’s one word to describe Penelope. Her long, dirty-blonde is always tied into a long ponytail at the nape of her neck (looking a bit like a tail protruding from her neck).

Penelope's father Malcolm Lewis was a convicted murderer on the run.  Always moving and changing his address. Malcolm was a mangy, sordid man with a cruddy ashen beard. His robust body made it easy for him to terrorise his victims. Styled with all black clothes, Malcolm strolled around at night and always found a victim. With his beady bloodshot eyes, a crooked nose and thin lilac lips he was sure to make anyone he approaches quiver with fear.  

Penelope has a brother called Lucas. The tender and compassionate Lucas never left his sister's side. Lucas refused to kill, that’s why Penelope was her father's favourite. Penelope never killed but she always carefully hones the curved blades of knives. When her father kills, Penelope writes the sufferers name on a wall. She loathes it when her father tortured and killed, the casualties are so helpless. They didn’t do anything to deserve that. Honing knives was particularly mundane but it kept Penelope occupied. Lucas was always watching her until they heard a voice wail... “let me go, I didn’t do anything, i’ll do anything you want just let me go”!  

One murky day, Penelope was honing the knives as usual. When Sonny toppled onto the floor…  with weakness in his eyes. Startled by this, Penelope fled to her older brothers aid. With a knife through Lucas’s heart, Penelope knew that he wouldn’t make it. “Help me Penelope”... When hearing those detrimental words, Penelope fell to her knees weeping. She noticed that there was something peculiar about the knife, it was her father's. The same one he used for his male kills. Penelope was determined to get vengeance for her brother.

Penelope sprinted down the stairs, looking for the one man who could have an explanation;Malcolm. Malcolm was in the kitchen. The faucet was on, the crystal-clear water cleansing what looked like blood off his hands. Penelope howled, “did you kill Lucas?”, “Yes yelled Malcolm”, without a single look of regret, Malcolm seemed to be contented to hear that Lucas actually died. “Tell me the truth, did you kill Lucas?” screamed Penelope. “Yes I did Penelope and I am proud” It was with that moment that Malcom ran into the knife... he ran into the knife ten times.

Costume ideas for Festival of the arts 2K17

Today I came up with a few costume ideas for my character for musical theatre. Here are some costume ideas that I have for my character Scar in the Lion King musical, I hope you like them...

Science of the arts 2K17

Aim:  I want find out what forces are acting on a dancer's body,  I also want to find out if dancing actually does improve brain power.

Research:  In a word, dance can improve brain power. Dancing opens up new neural pathways. Neural pathways are what basically create memories and process remembering things. The neurons are cells that take up and process information through the electrical and chemical signals. In order for human beings to be able to react to their environment, neurons attract stimuli which is a detectable change in the internal or external environment. For example, the burning of a finger at a candle flame, is transported by the ascending neurons to the central nervous system and in return, the descending neurons to stimulate the arm in order to remove the finger from the flame.  Dancing also improves blood flow to the brain causing you to remember things better and just improve brain power in general.

Forces and motion  The forces on dancers when they are dancing ballet...

- Gravity (downwards)

- Support from the floor (upwards)

- Friction from the floor (sideways)

(The frictions is the force that resists relative motion between two bodies in contact)

Spin forces

-  Angular velocity (how fast an object or person spins).

-  Rotational inertia (the inertia of a rotating object). An inertia is a property of matter when it remains at rest or in motion in the same straight line unless acted upon by some external force. To put it simply it's a tendency to not move or change.

-  Angular momentum is rotational inertia times angular velocity. If an object has a large angular momentum, it's hard to stop spinning.

Torque

- Torque is a measure of how much a force acting on an object causes that object to rotate.

- Essential for spinning, torque is very important in ballet because a torque determines balance.

- If your torque is greater than zero, then you’re angular momentum may change, causing you to fall over

What is balance?

- No total torque and no total force. No total force is needed so that momentum does not change.

- No total torque is required so that the angular momentum does not change.

Centre of gravity

- The centre of gravity of an object is that point at which the object will balance.

- The entire weight may be considered as concentrated at this point, hence the name.

- In order to stay balanced, the centre of gravity must remain directly above the area of contact with the floor.

- If the area is very small, it will be harder to balance. For example, a dancer on pointe.

How can a dancer keep in balance while dancing?

- What’s the trick that keeps the dancer balanced when they are turning?

- The rotation axis should not wobble around too much.

The relevant quantities of turns are

-  Angular velocity is how fast an object spins

-  Rotational inertia is the inertia of a rotating object

-  Angular momentum is rotational inertia times angular velocity

-  A change in angular momentum is equal to torque exerted on an object times the duration the torque was acting on.

Force

• When a dancer’s force is pushing upward from the floor to the foot,  it is acting on the same vertical line as the force of gravity pulling downwards and the force of friction pulling outward, it uses Newton's 3rd Law of Motion- "For every action, there is always an equal and opposite reaction."

Perriouete

• Pirouettes are a rotation where the dancer supports themself with one leg, while the other leg is in retire position.

How pirouettes are made

• A pirouette is made by having a preparation followed by a rotational force, or torque, exerted against the floor. the torque on the floor against the dancer causes angular acceleration.
• fifth position has a small distance between the feet, thus a larger amount of force is required to do a pirouette, while fourth position has a larger amount of space between the feet, so it requires less force to produce the same turn.

Arabesque

• The supported leg is vertical and the other is extended behind the ballerina. An arabesque has more inertia than retire position.

Plie

• To apply vertical force in an upward direction, out of the ground, a dancer bends her knees in a position called plie.

Grand Jete is an example of projectile motion

• A grand jete is an example of a jump combined with projectile motion (meaning it’s a travelling leap). It begins with an initial velocity which will decrease as the dancer rises into the air until it (the velocity) reaches zero. Zero velocity is the maximum height.

Friction

• Friction is the force that keeps us standing without slipping. Friction is a horizontal force pulling across the floor, while gravity pulls down into the floor and the dancers foot is pulling upward out of the floor. If your foot is stationary on the ground, a large horizontal frictional force is possible, but when the foot is moving, the potential force is much smaller. Friction is a ballerina's best friend.

The concept of jumps and leaps

• Accelerations and forces are a part of all jumps
• Gravity acts vertically downward on the body of mass (our body)
• You only remain motionless if there is a vertical supporting force to your weight
• To jump off the ground, the dancer has to exert a (downward) force greater than her weight.
• The height of a jump is based on the downward vertical distance where the force is put off.

Why are dancers hair in a bun?

•  While spinning, dancers use the technique of spotting to keep them in a strait line. An object in motion tends to stay in motion unless acted on by an unbalanced force. Dancers keep their hair in a bun because otherwise, while spinning, their hair whipping around their head acts as an unbalanced force.

Experiment/research plans 

Why do you spin slower when your arms are out then when they are in front of you? 
Would you spin faster with your arms out on lino or in on carpet, and which if these options would make you fall over first? 
How do dancers not get dizzy? 

How do dancers not get dizzy 
While spinning, a dancer uses the technique of spotting to keep them in a straight line. They find a spot on the wall to look at to make sure they do not get dizzy. The goal of spotting is to maintain constant orientation of the dancers head and eyes, to the possible extent. They do this is in order to prevent dizziness and enhance control. As the dancers turn, spotting is performed by turning the head and body at different rates. When the body rotates smoothly at a constant speed, the head moves much faster and then stops. The dancer will fix their eyes on a particular spot.  

Why do you spin slower when your arms are out then when they are in front of you?
When a dancer draws their arms and legs and a leg inward, they reduce the between the axis of rotation and some of their mass. This reduces their moment of inertia. Since the angular momentum is conserved, her rotational velocity must increase to be decreased. To put it simply, the total amount of things that are spinning in preserved. The further out something is in the spin, the more it continues to the angular momentum for it's speed. Hence when you bring your arms towards the centre, you spin faster. 

The Year 8 Attitude talk

On Monday, we had a guy called Phil come over to our school to talk about our attitudes towards ourselves. Phil comes from an organisation called attitude. Attitude is an organisation that is dedicated to helping young people gain skills that can help them through their adolescent years. I really liked having Phil talk to us because being a young person himself, he related to our problems. 

He first talked about being different. As a young person myself, I often find me comparing myself to other people, but Phil made us all know that we are all different. That no two people are the same. He explained that everyone has different genes and that we should all accept that. He made it really clear that we should all accept ourselves and others for who they are. 

After that he talked about what we want to be. He told us about changing ourselves for the better, he told us a story about this boy that his friend had talked to in jail. Phil's friend worked for attitude and taught some classes in a young teens jail. He meet these two young brothers who stole some things from a dairy and really hurt the dairy owner, but, one of the brothers wanted to change himself for the better, so he did. The next day, the brother was really good, he listened, he changed himself. He is now working towards arts degree in university! That story really inspired me to get rid of all my bad habits and change myself for the better. 

Next we talked about our individual personalities. Phil explained that there where four different types of personalities, the Beaver, the Otter, the Lion and the Golden Retriever. First of all, the Beaver. 

- The beaver is a person who likes to get everything perfect the first time, they are also very hardworking. Beavers are the type of people who are very detail orientated and like to get things right. 

- The next personality is a Otter. Now a Otter is an entertainer, they like everything to be fun, they get bored easily and they are very funny! Otters are the type of person that know how to make anything fun! They can turn the most boring thing into the most greatest thing you have ever done. 

- The Lion. The Lions are the leaders, the bossy ones, the ones who like things their way. Lions are very good directors, they know how to present an idea and pursued people into liking it. Lions are very bossy but they are good at what they do. 

- Last of all, the Golden Retriever. Also known as "the peace maker" Golden Retrievers like to make people happy. They are the people that you consider "too nice". They don't like saying no and they don't like to hurt peoples feelings.  

The animal that I think fits my personality perfectly is a Beaver. I think this because I am a perfectionist and I strive for perfection in everything I do, home or at school. All of my things are immaculately neat and tidy and they fit my standard. I am extremely organised and I have a list for everything. I always like to get everything right the first time and I hate it when I do not achieve. I always do things to the best of my ability. 

Overall I really liked being at the attitude talk because it inspired me to be a better person. I really hope that attitude come back to our school next year! If you have any feedback or questions please comment them down bellow.