In one of the BOLTs that I am in right now called Mouse Trap Challenge I, along with my teammates, Ricky and Maison, made a mouse trap powered car. First we took apart a bike tire to get the metal axel out of it because it would be nice and smooth. We then made the chassis out of two pieces of wood and drilled holes for the axels. Our wheels were made of CD's because they had holes in the middle and wrapped them in duct tape for traction. We then attached the axels, wheels, and mouse trap to the chassis. We tied a string to the back axel and the other side to the mouse trap. When we wrapped the string around the axel and set off the trap the axel would spin the wheels and it would move. At the moment, it did not go far at all, we knew we could make it better so we got rid of unnecessary weight. we trashed the chassis and the back axel, the two things that took the most time to make. We replaces the wood with cardboard and the back axel with a smooth, sanded down pencil. During testing the wheels spun without moving the car, there was not enough traction. We covered the wheels with clay and that made it so much better. After the string would unwind it would rewind the other way until it stopped, we fixed this by using a longer string. we lengthened the mouse trap with an extension to make it so that the string traveled further, giving it more torque. We replaced the string with fishing line because it lasted longer and survived more tests. I finished it with a gnarly paint job, using sharpies and after testing many many times we had our finished product. Our car traveled over seven meters giving us the winning distance and a first place metal.
I was asked by one of my teachers to reflect on my blog so I am going to start from the beginning. In April was the birth of this blog, I selected publish for the first time and my blog took its first breath. It was a really fast start, I worked on this site for hours upon hours to make sure that it was not only informing of everything I have done since my freshman year but also I wanted it to be as anesthetically pleasing as possible. When I first show my baby off to the rest of mosaic it got a round of applaud by everyone but the people who were jealous of its beauty. I can still remember they're faces, the faces of envy like they had just won a participation award and I'm walking out with the first prize trophy. Over the summer I had forgotten the importance of this blog, I had forgotten the memories that we had together and I pushed it away. When school started up again I realized my mistake immediately, I begged for forgiveness. I was brought to tears when it said that we could be together again and I could not be more happy. I started working on it immediately because I will never lose my blog again. Recently my blog has improved immensely. I am adding reflection entries often and I have updated my archives, on display, and my splash page so now they match what I'm doing this year. I even got a compliment from my advisement teacher. Mrs. Lang (Chloupek) said, "Your portfolio looks great!" My blog and I are happy to be together again we will never part.
Team Fiya has been working hard on the new album that should come out in about two weeks. We have two remastered songs one rewritten song and four brand new songs lined up for this new album. We also have a new marketing crew who are going to sell the cds so we an start making a business out of this.
Right now I am continuing my inquiry block that I started the first week of school. My question is, What causes people to be materialistic and what does materialism lead to? So far I have a bit of research that can be accessed in the 2016-2017 section of my archives. I am also participating in two bolts. First, I am working with Mrs. Lang on a BOLT called back to the future, so far in this BOLT we have started to study different scientific discoveries from the past. I am also in a BOLT with Mr. Justice called Vegas Baby!!! So far we have played craps, today is our first face to face meeting.
Upcycling is the act of using items that no one else will use to create something of value. My friends Branigan, Ethan, and I used a bunch of random things to make a lamp.
This year we have two new ways to earn credit: Inquiry blocks and BOLTs. Inquiry blocks are similar to something we did my freshman year where we take a question, refine it and then find out everything you can about it. I like this because I can learn about whatever interests me. Something I don't like about it is that it is required and I'd rather spend my time doing other things like story writing, poem writing, and filming. Bolts are like a mini course where we learn different things in more of a traditional way. The point of this is to help kids that are lacking credits in one area get credit in one specific area. I think that I will do a math and a humanities BOLT but nothing else because I dislike traditional school with a passion.
Ethan and I presented a power point titled Doing What You Love With Who You Love. Our first slide was deleted and I was in charge of the first slide and it wasn't there and I looked at Ethan and he told me to just go with it. I ended up presenting all of the slides that Ethan practiced for and vice versa.
By the end of the year a good stopping point for me would be to finish my research of a turbine engine, a ram jet, and a scram jet. After that, starting next year I will be looking into planes and jets that I can base my design off of.
Today I have been working on my blog to improve it. I had to adjust it in a few places because I am Changing it into a portfolio of all of the work I have done in Mosaic. I have been adding projects from last year and old ones from this year.
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ReflectionAuthorBryce Tenney
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