Retrospective Blog- Meral- AEP 9- Blog 1

Hello! Welcome back to another retrospective blog from me! The second term was filled with lots of new lessons and fun activities! Read on to learn more on what we have covered throughout the second half of 2nd term. Enjoy!

Word Games

I gathered the list of word games we played throughout the second half of the second term, which included Wordle, Hurdle, Griddle, Weaver, Phrazle, Anti-wordle, and Contexto. 

Wordle is one of my all time favorites due to its originality and the simplicity of its objective. In short, you get six chances to guess a five letter word. It definitely gets my brain working. Admittedly, Hurdle is one of the difficult ones! In this word-guessing game, you have eight tries to correctly guess a five-letter word. You will get hints about the number of correct letters after each guess. However it doesn’t mention the specific letters that are green and orange, rather just their quantity. Therefore, it is quite a process to figure out and would take a whole lot longer if we were to work on it individually. Thankfully, we all work together and admittedly, I do sometimes depend on my classmates for this one!

Weaver is a word game with an aim of reaching from the starting word to the ending word. You can only modify one letter in each word you enter from the word above it. This one was quite enjoyable to me and stimulating to the brain! Griddle resembles a miniature scrabble board in some ways. It's definitely for those long AEP classes, where we spend a lot of time figuring out how to score the highest point possible.

Next up is the newly introduced game of Phrazle where you aim to find a well-known proverb (like an idiom) based on the letters present. I found this one quite fun and would like to try it out again! Anti-wordle is another variation of Wordle that aims to avoid guessing the hidden word in as many tries as possible. If you guess a letter that's in the word, you must include it in all future guesses, and if you guess a letter in the right place, that letter must be in that spot from then on. It can get a little frustrating at times but it can be exciting too! Contexto is another word game that was newly introduced to AEP. I had heard about this game before and thought it would be a good addition to the endless list of word games, and I was right! For most of the time, the rounds we played were quick and successful.

Overall, word games are very significant in shaping AEP classes. I’m pretty sure we will be continuing on with word games and I’d like to keep it that way. Preparing mentally for the class with these games are definitely a great addition!

Planning

We had to have an AEP planner with the tasks and activities for the next meetings of 2nd Term before getting started. Therefore, we made an effort to make an AEP planner with the tasks and activities in Miro and included some fresh ideas while maintaining a somewhat organized board.

Personally, I find planning things as a great way to check on the specifics of tasks needed to be completed and checking my progress along the way as a motivating factor. It can sometimes be overlooked but really just writing out what you store in your mind and organizing it in a way that focuses on your main priorities is a great tactic to actually get the work done. Hence, Miss Disa gave us a 14-day challenge which I’ll be expanding further on my next blog for 3rd term!

DOGOnews

This term was filled with reading lots of articles as oral work. We each had chances to read a few sentences at a time and shared one fact every after one article. In this way, it was very cooperative and we had to actively read to ensure that we had understood the topic.

Whether it be articles of animals or those focused more on scientific facts, they were all intriguing and informative to me. One of the articles talked about debris formation from octopuses that were captured in an underwater camera. It gave some distinguished differences on the way the octopuses attacked in order to protect their personal space. Another story concerned a fish called Carrot that was discovered in Bluewater Lake and weighed about 67 pounds!

In another article, a dog and a parrot were characterized as "animal thieves" for robbing reporters. Quite a funny one! One that caught my interest was an extract on the phobia of the number 13. Overall, I had a great time learning a ton of fresh information about various topics from numerous DOGOnews articles.

Scrabble

Next up, as a class we played scrabble and it was girls versus boys. Throughout the second half of the term, we played a total of three times and with either my pair or the group I was in, we won in every one of them! So I'd say luck has been coming my way through second term. Gathering around the scrabble table on a rainy day with a classical background music playing can be very relaxing and peaceful. I hope we'll have more of scrabble this term.

Passive Tense and Causatives

Looking back at our grammar studies, we learnt about the Causatives and the Passive tense. With a  PowerPoint and two YouTube videos Miss Disa prepared, she gave us a presentation on the passive tense. It was incredibly informative! In order to avoid being overly direct about an act or claim to the subject and instead place the emphasis on the object that has been acted upon. The subject, object, and verb form make up a passive tense sentence. It was a very helpful topic.

After that, we continued with a fresh grammar lesson on Causatives. Miss Disa gave us another PowerPoint presentation, and then we took a short quiz! I think I did quite well. Next, Miss Disa introduced us to our project for second term where we had to create a presentation explaining the grammatical mistake in this sentence (in regard to causatives): “Help me with my homework.” We distributed the tasks for everyone to work on their part. The following week, we presented the PowerPoint, discussing our parts, one by one. Once we finished, Miss Disa gave us some further information to wrap up the lesson.

Revision for Exams

One thing I like about AEP are the revision periods where Miss Disa lets us prepare for upcoming exams. During the last week of second term, our final exams drew near. I can vividly remember practicing balancing equations for chemistry even though I was on the verge of nodding off because of the calming music playing in the background.

Conclusion

The second term had its ups and downs, but I believe we've all gone through it successfully. In AEP classes, we were able to learn about grammatical lessons to better construct our sentences in the English language. Additionally, two classmates made an entrance, namely Naboni and Leo. I learned lots of new facts from all the articles we read in DOGOnews. To sum up, this term for AEP classes was a well-accomplished one! That concludes the end of this blog. Thank you for reading and I'm hoping to see you in the next one!

Signing off,

Meral

Blog 3.1 Sayum

      Blog time! It's been a while hasn't it? I don't even know where to start. But let's go with the second half of second term. We are in the third term now.

      Alright, so if I remember correctly. Our first day in the second half of second term after the Christmas break was on the 4th of January. We did our planner for that half of the term then. I remember Miss told me to lead it and I had no idea what to do. But keeping the now finished science congress in mind we made a pretty successful planner. With less work the closer we were to the congress. And before I forget to mention, we have a new addition to the class and she joined on that same day. Naboni switched from ESL to AEP and is now part of our regular classes! Another person to help the girls team in scrabble. yay. they definitely needed the help to beat us. obviously.

      Anyway moving onto the 9th of January I remember we had our first oral for this school year. We obviously had to do it differently than from back when I was still online. We still used "DOGONEWS" though. Everyone took turns reading 2-3 sentences from whatever article we were currently on. Then afterwards when we finished the article. Miss would have all of us name one fact from the article we just read. Of course we aren't allowed to name a fact that was mentioned by someone else already. And after all that we'd move onto the next article and do the same thing. and we did this until the end of the period. Oral has to be my favorite thing to do during an AEP period. It's calm and relaxing. And you don't need to use your brain too much for it. Perfect for Mondays. I remember the first article we read was about octopi and how they threw debris at each other for some reasons I can't remember. All in all a very fun period.

    Moving on from the oral. The next meeting we did grammar. We reviewed the passive tense and finished it up. The period after that was a single on Monday and most of it was taken up by the morning assembly because we had this house sorting ceremony (with the houses from Harry Potter) for the science congress. We just played "Griddle" for the bit of the period we had left. Griddle is basically scrabble but your given a randomized set of letters and a randomized board. Then we have to try make words using those letters and try to get as many points as we can. The rules are basically the same as regular scrabble. Usually you'd just find one really good word that gives you most of your points and move it around the board for a long time to see what spot gives the most points. And another part of griddle is that once you've submitted your board thinking you did amazing. You go the leaderboards for the day and see that you did well but you were once again beaten by the legendary "ABV". A player that somehow, consistently, is on the top of the leaderboards. Every. Single. Time. You think you did well getting something around 600 points then you see that ABV somehow got 700+. 

    The next class after that we played scrabble for the whole double period. Boys versus Girls. The members of the team that won would each get 20 merits. I won't mention who won because I feel bad for the losing team. I think it's pretty obvious. It was obviously us. definitely. And the losing time still got a few pity merit points. The losing team told me. Yes. That's what happened. Anyway We also picked up a new warm up game. though we only played it once. It's called "Phrazle". It's basically wordle but instead of a word you have to guess an entire phrase. We also did another oral single period.

   We had our next Grammar lesson after that. It was about causatives. And this is important because our project was about causatives and verbs. It was all because when Miss asked Leo to give an example of  a sentence using the causative "help". His answer was "Help me with my homework.". But the problem with this sentence is that it turns the causative verb into an imperative. Because he's directly addressing someone and talking to them in first person. He's asking for something. And causatives are usually used in third person. For example "He helped me with my homework". Anyway, Leo's answer was a bit confusing so Miss asked us to make a presentation and explain why Leo's answer was wrong, the nature of verbs(if their job changes or not depending on the context, and about passive causatives. I had to do the conclusion of the presentation so I guess my part wasn't that hard. But that project really made my brain explode. Well, anything grammar related does that. We finished making the presentation and presented on the 6th of February. For the last few periods of AEP in the second term we just played scrabble and we were also given time to prepare for our finals and get any work done. I'd talk about the science congress but I'd rather not ._. . It's not really related to AEP anyway.

   Moving onto the 3rd term. Nothing much has happened. The only thing I guess I should talk about is our project this term. For our project this term Miss had a very different idea from what our normal projects are like. It's the 14 day productivity challenge. Basically everyday for 14 days, in the morning we were supposed to make a game plan for the day and then at the end of the day we were supposed to evaluate and review how well we followed our game plan for that day. Basically discuss the results. Every day we had to make a game plan, for example, even something as simple as be positive. We had to identify three times during the day where we would take something called an exercise snack. Something like simply standing up and stretching or walking around would count. We had to identify one bad habit that we had that would affect our productivity and put it under control. For me I banned myself from watching any youtube shorts from when I wake up to at least around 4pm. If I can just avoid it for the whole day. We also had to cut out one unhealthy snack/drink/food we ate a lot then replace it with something healthy like a fruit or water. For example, switching out a soft drink for more water. We were also asked to try and get 8 hours of sleep everyday. at least 7. We had to preform one act of kindness everyday. Something as simple as greeting someone or saying thank you. Even being kind to yourself would count. And lastly in the morning we had to identify one task we'd get done by the end of the day. Just anything. One task. It could be homework, chores, etc.. The hardest part about this is just remembering to post in the morning and later in the evening. I also missed a lot of days because I got sick recently. I still am, but it's  bearable enough for me to come to school. Anyway I think that'll be it for my blog I covered everything important I think? I have to get some other assignments done too now so that's it for now. woohoo!

Flashbacks - Chloe Lloveras - Blog 1 - T3 - AEP 9

 

Over the last two months of term 2, a whirlwind of events has happened! For the most part, the entire term felt more productive and enjoyable with the events being properly spaced out. We’ve gone through tons of word games, news articles, PowerPoints, grammar exercises, and, my personal favorite, “Scrabble” matches. But these tasks did not come without their challenges and rewards.

To name a few, let’s flashback to the beginning, January 4. This was the day when classes were resumed after a long and much needed Christmas break. Naturally, everyone was still tired from the season's festivities, so taking it easy was a must. 

The week started off with Leo, a former online classmate, coming to face-to-face classes and with everyone assigned to make the term planner. It included all of our tasks and game plan for the next few weeks until finals was to come, which was sooner than anticipated. This activity really helped us get a better grasp of how on track we were in the term. 

The next day, we started reading 3 different articles on “DOGONews” and played the occasional warm-up games. After reading texts about ginormous goldfishes and octopuses, we would each go around the table and state a fact we learned. This process went on for the entire session. I quite like spending our time doing this activity. It's very relaxing, but also educational at the same time. 

The following few weeks were filled with learning the passive tense more. It’s actually quite simple if you think about the example phrase, “The cat ate the mouse” to “The mouse was eaten (by the cat).” I do admit that, at first, it did take some brain power to wrap your head around, but once understood, it’s much easier.

To reward ourselves, Miss Disa allowed us to play “Scrabble,” girls versus boys edition. The girls thankfully won and received 20 merits each! Spoiler alert! Round 2 was coming soon. 

After a nice break, the next week was again filled with more grammar exercises, but this time it was about causatives, which are words that indicate a subject causing something/someone to do something. These words include: “let,” “make,” “get,” “help,” and “have.” Afterwards, we did a short pop quiz and were assigned a new term project. 

The project was to make a PowerPoint describing why the sentence “,Help me with my homework” is not an example of a causative. My part of the project was to explain the nature of verbs and how their meaning changes depending on the context. In my opinion, this project was more to my liking because I find actually talking about a topic to be more effective rather than writing it down. I guess you could say that speaking is one of my strong suits, so I had no complaints regarding these types of projects. 

The next few meetings we had went pretty much the same. Until only after about 2 sessions more did we finally present. Naturally, there was that rush of adrenaline and some nerves, but that slowly eased once I got on stage. Overall, I think we all did well in delivering out parts.

As a nice reward for all of our hard work, Miss Disa let us have a "Scrabble" rematch against the boys. Unfortunately for them, we won again with a 40-point word that put us in the lead: "spicer." Afterwards, we studied for the final exams that were the next day. Better luck next time, guys! 

To sum up term 2, I must admit that I really enjoyed it! I'm happy that we got to be productive in learning grammar, but also had fun with other activities. I think that's what sets this term apart the most: the efficient and effective planning that went through it beforehand. I believe that making a term planner was probably the best change we've had all year in AEP classes because of how evenly spaced out the workload was distributed. It really impacted the class in a positive way in my opinion. 

I think that if we continue on with this activity and make planning the term beforehand a habit, then we're more likely to succeed. Overall, this term was a really good one and I'm glad we got to end it happily and without that many frustrating moments. I can't believe that we've got only 1 more term to go! How time flies. I hope to look back on this in the future just like another...Flashback! 

leo leo leo leo leooooo 3.1

 Hello, Hello, Hello!

Today's another wonderful day for another wonderful blog! To start off this short blog, I'm going to be talking about my thoughts when it comes to the infamous AEP! So, beginning, let's move to the early days when I was just a teeny weeny person learning about this teeny weeny school. Everything had been new to me and I was only learning about everything so quickly that I at least adjusted more-or-less okay. Now, I'm more used to everything than what's to be done in past schools. 

But now that I've been fully immersed into the Fountain International School family, I've been able to do a lot of new things which I've never tried before. One of the things is, as we all heard of, AEP!! *dramatic music*

So here we have the countdown list for the top three things we've done in AEP before the third term:

Number three... GRAMMAR!

This year, we've learnt four things: the specifics of past tenses, passives, causatives and conditionals. Although we've learnt and used these in our daily lives, I found it interesting going through the specifics of it, especially since I disliked doing it in Chinese, it was more-or-less the same in English, just Chinese is a little less technical and more on practical use like if you're stranded in the island of Hainan and had no way to leave except for talking to a sailor who does not know English. 

Anyway, for past tenses, it was a little tedious since it was the common tenses which shouldn't seem so intricate, until you learn that it is. I've gotten the hang of it though, but I wonder what it was like learning it face-to-face...

Passives was quick and kind of a blur to me. Of course I know what it is and based on what we've learnt, it seems that I've already learnt what it is, so it was kind of simple for me, I just had to survive living with a half-awake brain in front of a computer screen.

After that, we moved on to causatives, and that caused me to move from Macau to the Philippines, woo! It was a blast having to learn about the new facilities and the areas that I had to run to every 50 or so minutes. In causatives, I did cause Ms. Disa's brain to crash, but that's okay! I think. But anyway, I've learnt a lot, especially the nuances in English and everything like that. From then on, I've understood that English is definitely not an easy language to get into.

And finally, conditionals! A work-in-progress. We'll get to that in a later blog.

Number two... PROJECTS!

So, starting off with the first project, the video presentation! I was assigned leader, and I did do leader! I think. It was mostly just hassling around doing my own parts while assigning others for other parts, but that's really all there was to it.

The next project was a poem! I said I was good at poems, but I hadn't had a good writer's mindset during the time... so it came out horribly. But I mean, at least I was able to write something! (writers block :<)

The most recent project we had was the causatives presentation, and I wasn't chosen for leader this time, yipee! But we finished it all with ease and smoothly (I think) presented it well to Ms. Disa, who I hope she learnt from an absolute brain-fry of a sentence!

Now, we have the game plan. It will be mentioned in the next blog!

And number one... GAMES!

We played lots of different games: wordle, hurdle, griddle, contexto, scrabble, whatever else we did, we played!

Hurdle is especially my favorite because it makes me feel smart, even though I am usually plucked-off of a mind whenever I do school first thing in the morning.

That's all! Thanks for a great day! Toodloo!

Blog 3.1 - 'So Much Has Happened, Yet It Has Not'

It's the second week of 3rd term, but the first class of AEP is today. On the first week of the third term, FIS held a science congress. Everyone except ABM and HUMSS students was busy, stressed, and nervous. I went around with the judges, watching every group's amazing experiments, they tried their best and I was very proud of each one of them! That is why grade 11 is left behind compared to all the other grades regarding AEP.

I would like to do a ride back to 2nd term and everything I have accomplished, am proud of, and I wasn't able to fulfill, starting with what I have learned and the lessons I have gained through it. 

In the first week of the second term, we planned out our planner for the term. As we did it as a class, I think it gave us a clearer understanding of what we had to get done, and later feel more motivated with a plan for the days ahead. 

The next week we proceeded with vocab, the topic being 'Different Kinds Of People'. I still remember that I was able to get done with a lot; of matching words with their definitions, an example is 'affable', let's say an affable person is one who is friendly, warm, and polite; a person who is easy to approach. Later on, we matched each one of our characteristics with the words we learned. I was able to see how my friends see me and everyone else, it was fun and practical to make use of the words we learned. 

In the third week, we used the same miro board and did a few more group works. Basically, we used the words we learned the previous week and placed them on the appropriate blank lines present in the sentences. Overall I'd say that learning these few words expanded the vocabulary part of my brain. I'm excited to learn new words next week😆. Additionally, we did personality tests, it was so much fun! I hadn't done one in a few years, so I was curious to see whether it would change, and to my surprise, It really did change. My result was an 'adventurer', I do not disagree with this one. 

In the next week, only me and Hanis were present in class, so we only played scrabble together with Miss Disa, It was so much fun, and our board looked quite nice. I personally find scrabble a great game to expand your vocabulary and improve your literacy skills. I also was curious to see google's opinion on this, so when I searched 'why is scrabble a good game' it said it improves your memory and I definitely need that so I am looking forward to more scrabble games!

We were given the time to do our poems the next week. I did a few phrases but ended up hating them, so I didn't continue. While everyone else was recording their reading of the poem. And unfortunately, I was too busy with exams that I ended up forgetting and not doing the project(poem).

In our last meeting for the second term, we did origami as a class, it was so much fun as well. I did a table, chair, and a star-like thing(I forgot what it is called). But yeah that was a great way to relieve at least a little stress from the exams.

Overall this term was odd. I still don't know why, but it felt like I wasn't able to achieve that much and my grade went down by a lot. But anyways...everything else was great. I was able to expand my vocabulary and learn a few interesting things. I am looking forward to the third term!

Thank you Miss Disa<3

AEP 11 - Term 3???

 

Time moves so fast, it's like watching a really fast super-car pass by before you cross the road, or watching a speedboat on the lake. It's Term 3 already and soon it'll be summer again. HOW FAST WAS THAT???!!!?!? I'm still on my 'floating' phase right now and haven't realize the pain I'm gonna go through this March. Midterms, As Level Exams in April so I for sure have to do A TON of studying, Sportsfest and everything else that might come my way. I'm already stressed out but at the same time I'm feeling alright as long as I'm still 'floating' and know what I'm doing. But in reality, I'm just procrastinating and using the 'floating' phase as my comfort zone. AEP has been chill, HOWEVERRR I didn't do my poem project and that was honestly a stupid mistake. I mean, on the due date, I fell asleep and woke up at exactly the due time, which was 6pm. So then I thought like 'Ah okay, nevermind then T-T' and ended up not doing it until today bashjhfjah I'm sorry Ms.Disa. 

Anyways, I'm still forever grateful that AEP allows me to zone out, chill, think about my school life (or personal life), reflect and do everything I can to escape the remaining stresses of other subjects. The game that we played today was kind of fun, me and Ayse guessed the word right and who would've thought that absdhajhfahf. Usually I just be shouting random, irrelevant words. Right now, as I'm sitting down writing this blog, not going to lie, I still feel a tad bit of pressure to get this done by 3pm but at the same time I'm having a pleasant time typing my thoughts out. 

Additionally, Ms.Disa had assigned a 14 Days Challenge to help us keep track and improve our daily lives. I guess that's also another good thing that's gonna help and slowly pulling me out from 'floating' around. This can also get rid of my bad habit which is PROCRASTINATION. Yesyes, really have to get that out of my system because all I know is that habit does nothing but make me lazy and more lazy to complete tasks. Whether it be long, repetitive tasks, or the small and simple ones. I hope I can get by with that and will improve my way of living, cheers to better lifestyle!!

Anis' AEP Diaries - Are We Still Doing Okay? - 3.0

 — monday 20/2/2023 

✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡˚*ੈ✩‧₊˚✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡˚*ੈ✩‧₊˚✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡˚*ੈ✩‧₊˚✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡˚*ੈ✩‧₊˚✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡˚*ੈ✩‧₊˚*ੈ✩‧₊˚✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡˚*ੈ✩‧₊

Somehow rather, starting a new year but ending a school year in which both are happening at the same time doesn’t sit right with me. Maybe it’s because I’m still in denial about the fact that I have been in the Philippines for a good 3 years now and frankly enough, the system works differently in Malaysia. Usually, every new year starts with a new school year. Basically an enormous fresh start for everything. But, we roll.

A rollercoaster ride. Simple three words to encapsulate AEP within the past two terms.

If I look back at our last term, it was quite slow. Not just for me, but also for the rest of the class. We were very much not on track with what we should’ve done, not catching up with deadlines, half awake in classes. But my theory is that the term was considered to be super packed with having such important events almost every week. AEP is also constantly skipped as other things tend to find themselves more prioritized. 

One thing that really resonated with me in the last term is how we approach our topic of “Different Kinds of People”. It’s not just about learning new vocabularies but we also managed to apply it in real time by describing our classmates with the words. Specifically in one of the classes, we did a personality test and had a little sharing circle session which I really enjoyed. It’s quite fun seeing how technology nowadays could somewhat have an idea of who you are even though they don’t know you as a person, and still get some accurate information out. 

For our upcoming challenge, I’m preparing myself - both mentally and physically - to not just get through it on autopilot mode, but to do it meaningfully. The task assigned revolves around consistency, discipline and self-discovery and it is known as the 14-day-challenge. To be completely honest, I’m quite terrified to get on this challenge as I’ve been in a horrible slump where I lost all my perception on time. But, deep down, I’m sure that this is lightweight! 

My main aims are to make sure that I approach this challenge with the right mindset and holistically. Sometimes, when I see an opportunity that aligns with myself, I tend to go to a whole different tangent of making it a little bit too ambitious. Eventually, that always leads me to the same outcome of being lazy and giving up. Well, it’s human nature to get a little bit excited sometimes. 

I think there are tons of bad habits that will reveal themselves throughout these 14 days. I plan to ensure that I take care of myself well, not just physically but also mentally. I would want to eat more healthy foods/ snacks, get good sleep, clear out my mind with unnecessary thoughts and assess myself as a person. It’s time! I know big changes are coming especially in the month of July. 

That would be it for now! I’m one to use my words in wishing that things go well. But we’ll see how it goes when I get my hands on this blog again. 

Cheers!

✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡˚*ੈ✩‧₊˚✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡˚*ੈ✩‧₊˚✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡˚*ੈ✩‧₊˚✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡˚*ੈ✩‧₊˚✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡˚*ੈ✩‧₊˚*ੈ✩‧₊˚✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡˚*ੈ✩‧₊

Hanis' AEP Diaries : ep 4

 Welcome back to my diary series! It's been a long time since we've- I mean I've talked about what's popping in AEP classes 2023. So far, the least I could say is that the classes are a mess. Technically the class is not the problem but the way how things always somehow lands on days we have AEP classes, it kinda disrupts the overall plan we did to help guide us through the maze of time. AEP for this year have their own sweet and sour moments. I can smile while looking back at all the stuffs we did last year. 

First term is the best term. Everything was so chill and going through smoothly. Even though many were still adjusting to the new normal and face-to-face classes, it was the most peaceful term in comparison to the other two terms. I could see the class doing well and enjoying themselves. We did a lot too actually. We tackled two vocabulary topics which are crime & punishment and issues facing young people. We were very productive. New year's luck I guess 

Then came term two. This is where everything started going downhill. I think I went through a series of disastrous events during this period. It was because of the Science Congress 2023. This event took a major role in determining my grade in all science and math subjects. I couldn't really focus and regular classes and what more AEP classes. I went through a mindset that just wants to get everything done. I just want everything to stop. To top it of, I had a conflict with my classmates. Because of a simple misunderstanding, we grew very distant like we were strangers. My confidence dropped to the lowest level. I isolated myself from people while having this 'mask' on saying "I'm fine".

That term was truly something. I don't know how I got through it but I'm just glad I did. Was it the best term? No. But is it gonna change if I still dwell on it? No. So I have to keep going. I still have so much stuff on my plate that I have to keep on eating before it goes bad. No use crying over spilt milk. I seriously took a whole day to reflect on where it went wrong. This coming third term, I will be trying my best to not let history repeat itself. 

Third term just started and to be honest, it went of shore already. We missed our first class and didn't have a direct destination. Today was our first class and it started with this blog. Jokes aside, I love writing blogs. To get in the mood to write something is kinda hard but for me, once I get into it, I can find a way to stop. I just let my fingers take the lead and type out what's in my mind. 

I'm very looking forward to the 14 challenge. I hope I could get started with some new habits and throw those bad ones out of the window. I'm not really someone who plans out my day because I'm more of a go with the flow type of person. However, I do want to take this project seriously and if it goes well, it might even become a good habit for me! I get benefits and I've got nothing to lose. 

I have conveyed my inner honest thoughts about what I think about AEP class so far. So yeaah! That's what I think. I hope I can stay happy and healthy throughout the remaining months of 2023 school year. ＼⁠(⁠^⁠o⁠^⁠)⁠／

Blog 3.1 - first blog of term 3 !!

 To start off, we finally finished term 2!! There were so many projects near the end of the term, and it felt like it was never going to end, but it did! I'm so proud of everyone for getting through it all.

Being honest here, I felt like each AEP class I had was an escape from other ongoing classes and projects. Since there wasn't much planned for term 2 AEP, I feel like I got to relax and have fun in class.

Scrolling through all the padlet submissions, I noticed that we played a lot of games during term 2. I especially had fun in the competitive game where the girls went against the boys in two games of griddle wordle. The girls won both rounds !! ^^ we got to do origami afterwards and the boys had to do exercise.

Speaking of origami, our project for term 2 was entirely origami! This was my favourite AEP project so far. I got to make a peacock and a shark! They were both challenging to make but I had fun making them nonetheless.

Other than that, there isn't much else to add onto. I really enjoyed AEP for term 2, amd I can't wait for what's ahead in term 3 !! :DD

Blog 3.1 - “Our last term already?!!”

 Just started a new term this week! I can’t believe that it is already our last term of this school year. It feels as if we had just had our first AEP lesson last week, crazy how fast time really goes. 

We had just finished our finals and can I say, that was the most stressful finals I’ve had in a long time. As unhealthy as it is, I got like 3-4 hours of sleep during the 3 days of finals but I’m happy that I studied for it earlier on so maybe it was the procrastination that kept me awake. To add on to that, we had our stem congress so it was quite an exhausting feeling to have to study for finals AND make sure that our STEM preparations were ready as it was a part of our score on our final paper for all STEM subjects.

In AEP, I enjoyed the 2nd term a lot as it felt very productive yet we did take some time to relax and work on things that were a bit slow paced. Right before the finals, we learnt a few things on describing processes and in that lesson, we had to describe the process of producing chocolate. During the oral exercise, I struggled a bit on connecting my words and the different steps so I should start improving more on that other than just writing it down. For the project, we decided to do the same thing we did in the first term(I think) and it was…ORIGAMI! I love making origami in AEP as Ms Disa has these really pretty origami papers that she bought online. It was a very calm project and I really appreciate these types of lessons as it gives your mind and body a short yet rewarding break. My favourite one was the whale that I made :)) 

Today, we have worked on our planner for the rest of the half-term and we have decided to work more on reviewing the topics that we have learnt from the previous terms. There’s a new project called “Ms Disa’s 14 Day Challenge”! It was time that we all changed our bad habits into better and more beneficial ones so we are tasked to answer and create our own solutions to the questions that were given by Ms Disa in a padlet she made. It usually takes at least 30 days to build a habit but instead, we are going for 14 days and I think this is a really good way for me to keep track of maybe sleep schedules, any work that I have to finish, the food/drinks that I am taking in and even any exercises that I should be doing. Right now, I have taken the challenge to get at least 8+ hours of sleep a day and surprisingly, I have just managed to sleep at 9pm, leaving me with 9 hours of sleep. I’ll try my best to continue in doing that. One of the habits that I want to improve on is reading more books, I have realised that I am using too much time on my phone and leaving all the books that I have bought hanging. I want to at least read 3-4 chapters each day and of course, increasing intake of water. 

I look forward to see what this term is going to be like and hoping that it flows better than the previous one :))

Blog 3.1

Yesterday was the first AEP lesson of term 3. In that lesson, we were introduced to "Ms Disa's 14 DAY productivity challenge" which aims to get us into better habits in school and at home. In that lesson, we made a pre-challenge prep which basically is a list of what we promise to do.

Every morning for 14 days we will write a game plan for the day, this can be something that we will accomplish by the end of that day. At the end of that day, we will give ourselves a score out of 10. 10 of course meaning that we accomplished our gameplan fully while a 1 or a 0 would mean we did not get it done.

Another thing we had to do for the productivity challenge was assign times for exercise snacks. Exercise snacks are little exercises that can be as little as getting up and touching your toes. We assigned 3 times in the day for exercise snacks but are not limited to only 3 times a day. All this is for us to get used to having a healthy lifestyle but also to sticking to a routine. We made a promise to ourselves and now we have to stick to it, I think this is something we need to learn more about because I myself struggle with it.

Ms Disa explained that there is a line where good things become unhealthy, it's called toxic positivity. She explained that in many Asian cultures working yourself to death is viewed as a good thing. Overworking one's self can physically change a person because their mental health and physical health are linked together. This really is something that they don't teach in school and, in fact, I think the opposite is true. We're given tasks and as long as we finish them there isn't an issue. This makes students only care about the end product rather than caring for the actual process itself which is where the learning happens.

Look at last the last 2 weeks for example, we had an English play due, a physics project due, science congress panel defence due, and then finals. In the span of 2 weeks, we had months of work due and also present. Admittedly, we were behind on some tasks like our panel defence. Our paper which we had to present was only completed and printed out a few days prior to the presentation. They only worry about the final product rather than the process.

Ms Disa on the other hand will be checking on us every day. We'll lose points every day if we don't do what we set out to do and gain points if we do it well. 

yea

blog term 3 FAHADDDDDDDDDDDD

Yesterday was the first day of term 3 and miss explained to us the 14-day challenge she made for us to be more productive. She made a list of tasks we had to do every day in order to get effective or better at something. One of the tasks was to write a game plan for the day in which we made a goal we wished to achieve throughout the day, this can include running up and down the stairs for 5 minutes during breaks or simply being nice to your siblings and classmates, and the best part was that the goal could be not related to school and in my opinion, it makes everything easier since we can think outside of school.

Another task miss told us to do throughout the 2-week period is to have 3 exercise snacks every day which we have to have 3 exercise snacks a day, an exercise snack is not the snack you're probably thinking of but you can think of it like that but instead of eating it, you exercise. It's like you when eating fruits throughout the day but for this, you replace food with exercise. This could be any exercise that could benefit you physically in any way.

Another task miss told us we have to do is to get rid of 1 bad habit that causes us to be less productive throughout our day. This could include any tasks which make you lazy and cause you to procrastinate all your work. Miss disa also told us to do 1 act of kindness every day. this could be anything to someone or even to yourself.

Miss Disa also taught us how toxic productivity is harmful to your body, it's where you work yourself to death to get a good output and result. These often lead to mental and physical damage to your body. She also explained that in many Asian cultures,working yourself to death is often a good thing because you'll be viewed as hard-working. Many of us just want to finish an activity or complete one of our assignments, no one really wants to learn and enjoy the process, they just want it done with and this is something which is not looked at by schools and other workplaces.

Blog 3.1 Views on the 14 day challenge ¬‿¬

 Planning. Always planning. I always have been big on planning, always organize so you have things not all over the place. It is fun that is called a challenge. It is more of a plan for me but a shared one to inspire others maybe?

I actually needed another push to finally decide on changing rather return to the old me again. I guess when you push yourself too much, your brain decides that the complete opposite is good for you. In that case, do not follow "your rules". I had quite a lot actually. They could be done while having fun but smart me chose otherwise🤩. So stupid cuz now going back is taking so much energy. Sleeping exactly at 12am was one for example. I used to be super strict about them too. It felt like I had a glass shield to be honest. ( It kinda sounds sorrowful like my other blogs, sorry TwT)

Currently, this challenge is bringing back the determination to be determined. Wow we will feel the feeling of happiness of accomplishing the things you did not really want again. Nothing much on how I'm gonna do it, I will do it someway. Here my feelings about it again very exciting. 

I fell asleep before 10:30 apparently so there is that, going pretty strong. 

AEP Blog #3.1 “A ghibli surprise”

 

Oddly enough, my title seems super irrelevant to AEP. You might be wondering why the title mentions animation despite AEP blog titles having the reputation of being something deep or just literally related to something we did in class today. 

Good day fellow readers! Welcome back to your daily dose of Ayesha’s blog. We are now entering the final stretch, the last school term and perhaps the term where people try to make the most outstanding memories as possible. 

I found myself constantly being surrounded by Ghibli these few weeks, people around me have been watching movies made by the studio a lot more than usual. Ive been rehearing the soundtrack I was once obsessed with, and now getting obsessed over it again ( It was a month ago.. I suppose its a monthly thing now). Ghibli is an animation studio that gives animation both disney-like and the usual 2d standards that commercial anime provides — back in the 90s. With the precisely painted backgrounds, frame by frame animation done in paper and the home-like environment such studio provides. I doubt you didn’t hear about it before, its one of Japan’s most known animation studios not to mention the movies that leave a permanent mark on anyone’s hearts. 

Although it has been a while since Ive thoroughly rewatched a Studio Ghibli movie, scenes from those movies still replay in my mind.I like finding ways to romanticize my existence and the varying background music playing in the back of my head really helps a lot.  

With the pleasant surprise of nostalgia, I fear the sluggishness that comes afterwards. 

So, just yesterday Ms Disa introduced her “14-day challenge” a challenge that aims for you to create a to-do list everyday to prepare for the following day. I am someone who has lost track of time since the past two weeks because of many big projects and assignments. Although it seems like another task to me, I am more than happy to see how much Ms Disa is willing to help us and is able to see what we really need right now. Its a form of reassurance I didn’t know I needed. Despite missing the first day, it gave me a head smack for tomorrow. This week is just full of checking exams so I am a little woozy and tired. I doubt I’ll ever be fully proud of my grades but I just hope I don’t get low marks. 

Today, we planned with each other our plan for this term. It gave me a wakeup call on how this school year hasn’t ended yet, but rather how it’s the last chapter for a while. Why not give it your best shot?

With this blog being annoyingly short ( due to my inability to write like I used to.. It will come soon, just a few more days.) I hope to see you in a more, complete and coherent blog. Salutations, dear reader! 

Blog 2.3 - First blog of the year - Jan 18, 2023

 Hello everyone! Welcome to my first blog of the school year. I hope this year will be an amazing year in which we all can improve ourselves!

PS: This is sort of a late upload, as I just realized I never actually posted it and it just stayed in my drafts.

To start the year off, we have new students in AEP! i'm really glad our AEP class is growing! The classroom definitely is more lively. We also have a new plant friend with us. Her name is Alice. She replaced Alan in the classroom who is currently at Miss home. AEP lessons are always so fun as they always feel so comfortable and feel like a place where we can all openly express ourselves. I love how in each of our classes, we always learn an important life lesson from Miss Disa. 

Looking back at the past year, we did alot of analysing and writing essays which has definitely improved my ability to write essays. Another thing which has always been fun in AEP was the projects like the frog jumping contest! I hope we can do more origami as it is always fun and a stress reliever.

I am also looking forward to all the warm up games we play in AEP. I think they are definitely one of the highlights of our classes. It allows us to work cooperatively as a class through communication. It also allows us to learn new words that we never knew were even words. 

I am really excited to see what Miss has in store for us. I definitely hope we can all learn new things that allows us to improve ourselves and become better people.

Ayse - Retrospective Blog

Since I came back from a two-week break, I can't get back on track. Honestly, I haven't been able to get myself physically and mentally fully prepared yet since the school year started. Additionally, I have joined badminton, volleyball, and table tennis varsity teams. So now I have 3 to 4 days of training after school. Don't misunderstand, I am not complaining about it, I signed up myself for this and am actually having fun, but it is also draining my energy by a lot.

Today is Monday, and it is our third meeting in AEP since the break. In the first week of our meeting, we completed our semester planner as a class. We were told to place our ideas on a micro board.

Before I started complaining about how my speech went, I should say that it was a unique experience. I experienced the same level of nervousness that you would have before giving a speech in front of a huge crowd. I've never been very fond of giving presentations, let alone speeches. We had to discuss problems that young people face, and we had to pick our own topics. My topic was how school affects young people these days. It was one thing to prepare the speech, but it is quite another to present and speak. I was stuttering and constantly being in a movement showing how anxious I was.  I don't really know how to handle it, but I make an effort every time to remain cool and get through the anxious feeling. Though I wouldn't say that it really works. Nevertheless, I was able to complete my speech in success and as well as everyone else in the class!

Next is the Miro board! This is probably the most fun I have had in AEP classes. The reason for this is we all get to collaboratively do assessments and learn new words at the same time, And it's not just some random words. 

 

Hanis' AEP Diaries : ep 3

 Welcome back to 2023!!

A splendid year, yes it was. Words cannot describe how fast time passes. With just a blink, 2023 is here...Happy new year to everyone reading. I hope your new year resolutions are still hanging on. You still have 11 months to go. 

It's been a while since I've last blogged. Probably months actually XD. I like the idea of spending the time and rewinding these tiny clips inside my head, recalling every tiny moments that happend throughput this year.

AEP classes goes by the name. You would think that "Oh we could have free time today" but no. There are no free time in Ms Disa's vocabulary. The moment 'free time' is mentioned, more works awaits you. Don't worry though. It's not nearly as scary as it sounds. With Ms Disa teaching you, small moments become important as we all work together to achieve our motives. 

Enough with chit chat--back to the real world. The same ol' routine we have is still here. Opening class we start with wordle. There's so many types of wordle. Griddle, wafer, hurdle and much more. All fall under the same name but each one has its own challenges. 

We started off this year with planning our AEP schedule. This might seem like a petty task but organising places to put your stuff really works! I now have an idea what our upcoming lessons will be like. It is really more systematic. It makes me look forward to what I'm about to do for the next class.

We continued learning about vocabs. I love the current theme we have that is Different People's Personalities. I voted for this theme because is sounds like a cute topic to learn about. Turns out I was right! I really enjoy the activities we did. 

For some reason I found it difficult to describe myself, while it is relatively easy to describe others. I think I just exposed myself of not knowing my own personalities. I really like the mbti personality test we did. My result were an INFJ-T. It's one of the rarest mbti of the human population. I agree at some parts and disagree at some parts.