Heros can be seen in real life and on the movie screen. After watching “The Lion King” there are similar qualities I see between Simba and Bill Gates. Simba has heroic qualities. He helped his pride of lions by protecting from the evil king, Scar. He had to kill Uncle Scar to help his pride get out of some really bad times. In real life, someone I look up to and admire is Bill Gates. Bill and Simba are similar because they both help those around them. Bill and his wife have created a foundation. This foundation promotes technology in poor countries. This technology gives vaccines, clean water, and they also give computers to poor countries. He has changed millions of lives for the better. He gave people many necessities that they lacked. In conclusion, Bill gates are very influential and helped many people.

I have traveled a lot in the 11 years of my life. I think I have traveled more than the average person my age. One reason I travel a lot is that I don’t live near family. Most of my family lives in Minnesota, California, Wisconsin and South Dakota.  We have a big family reunion every 5 years and the next one is in Idaho.  Idaho is a state I have never been to in my life. There are things to do in Idaho according to Visit Idaho. I have traveled to many of the states in the U.S. and I have traveled overseas. Traveling is fun. I like seeing different places, seeing different sites and meeting people of different cultures.

My Mom and Dad have taken me to many places like Mexico, Dominican Republic, and Jamaica. We stay at resorts where I meet kids from all over the world. I often play soccer with kids, even though we don’t speak the same language. My grandpa takes my mom, dad, aunts, uncles, and cousins on a big trip every 3 years. We have gone to Cancun, Mexico and Grand Bahama Island in the Bahamas. Both places are warm with beaches. The resorts have lots of pools and more food than you could imagine.  It is really fun having my cousins there. We play and eat together. We go to shows in the evening. This year we are going to the Moon Palace in Cancun.  Here is a picture of Cancun called Cancun Strand Luftbild from dronepicr on Flickr.

Some places I would like to one day see are Croatia, Grenada, and many countries in Europe.  There were a lot of hurricanes this year so many islands, like Puerto Rico and Cuba, need time to rebuild due to the horrible hurricane season so I wouldn’t visit there for awhile. Where should I travel next with my family? Any good suggestions?

Carter and I have recently made a major accomplishment! Our project is moving along. Our most recent and biggest accomplishment is that we got permission to go to a school and give lessons. This is big because without this permission our project would completely fail and we would fail 6th grade. We feel really good that we know for sure we can do this at the school.We emailed the principal and he quickly responded. He gave us permission and wanted to know how will it work.

So our goal for December is we will compose another email to him and the school contact that will describe the training and give the dates.  The tricky part will be to find the best time to do our training. If we are able to do it during the school day, more kids could attend. If we do it after school, our training will have fewer kids.

Happy by Franklin Hunting on Flickr

Christmas in South Korea is very similar to Christmas in America. Christmas is celebrated in South Korea more widely then any other asian country because 25% – 30% of the population is christian. There Christmas is a public holiday so people get the day off of work and school. Churches decorate themselves with lights and a bright red neon cross. Department stores put on huge displays especially in the capital city Seoul. People will decorate they’re houses with decorations and a Christmas tree.

Presents are exchanged usually presents are money. They have a Santa Claus and he wears red or blue. He also is called Santa Kolluso or Santa Grandfather. They eat a Christmas Cake(a sponge cake covered in cream.

On Christmas most of the country will be attending a massive church service. Families will meet together and have big meals. They put up their tree and decorations up on Christmas. If your a couple then it is treated like Valentines Day. Picture by kiki Park from Flickr

This is my daily routine. I wake up at 6:30 and I get in the car to go to school at 7:10. When I get to school I bring my trumpet to the band room to put it away until I play it. Then I wait in the gym until 7:30. Then I get to my locker and idiots are blocking my way and take their sweet time so I have like a minute to take everything out of my backpack and get everything I need for 1st period. So after waking up at 6:30 this is what I have to deal with. Like, do these people acknowledge that I exist?  Getting to my locker is like this picture from todschneider.com:

Then, in homeroom I do Rosetta Stone which is really boring. My 1st period is the most dreaded Math. Math is math, so not very fun and I also get like a lot of homework. After math, I have a locker “break” which I wouldn’t call it a break because it is only two minutes but, it is basically time for getting stuff for your next two periods. My 2nd period is science. I  would like to be challenged more in that class . Then, I have ELA (language arts) which is a class enjoy more than other classes because of 20% Project. After that, I have PBL and that class is one of my favorites because we get do actually do stuff like we investigating a crime scene and we do 20% projects in PBL. After that I  have social studies, which I were we copy down notes about different regions of the globe and watch videos on them. Then I have lunch which is fun because eating is fun. After that I have this thing called Advisory which is where I can do my homework and meet with teachers about my grades. Then I have band which is another favorite class because I love playing the trumpet. Then I have design and modeling. In that class we work on projects and think about the problem like an engineer. Then at 2:35 I get to leave! Yay!  Picture by Michael Haberman.

There are 178 days in the school year. Every time there is a snow day there will be a extra day. I always hope for lots of snow days anyway.  There are 5 terms. Every term I switch 7th period to a new class. I don’t get a lot of free time. I get two minutes every two periods. Thats basically all the free time I get. So that was my daily routine. 

My 20% project is teaching dyslexic kids coding.

When I reflect on my 20% project, I feel scared because the people are going to say no. I feel passionate because I like coding. I feel excited I get to do something in school that involves coding.

In November, our first goal is to start developing lesson plans.  The first action is to search online for websites that teach code.  We will use exercises provided by the websites.  The second action is that we will research whether we want buy equipment like raspberry pi, which is a mini-computer where you have to write your own programs to make it function.

The second goal in November is to get permission from the school to come in and teach code.  The action is that I will ask the teacher Cyd Rodriguez if we can come in and teach code to her class of 4th and 5th graders.

See my Visual Aide for more information.

I attended iD Tech camp this past summer at Xavier University. I started learning Java in July of this year. Instantly, I was hooked. I liked how I could create classes and combine the classes so I could run multiple programs at once. It was organized because you could put classes in packages which helped my OCD. 

Java is a computer language. Java is supposed to be for every type of program from games to business software. In fact, Most of the apps on your phone are created with Java. In Java there are these things called methods that can be used at any time during the program. A lot of what you do in Java uses methods like when making your code say something you will use a method like System.out.print( ) .  

image by Paul Heaberlin from Flickr

In the future, I want to attend more camps where I learn Java and other languages. I also want to learn on my own by going online to various sites that teach Java. Someday I might have a job programming so this is an important language to learn. This would be a ideal job for me.

Now, I know what your thinking right now a there is no Jedi King. Your right because I googled it and there is no Jedi King.  I made my avatar a Jedi King because I like science fiction like star wars(my favorite character is Yoda what is yours). It has curly hair because I have curly hair. It has a light saber and Jedi robes to make it look like a Jedi because I like science fiction as you know. It has a crown to make it a look like a king because if you say king before a name it makes it sound POWERFUL like King Nico. He is on a moon because I like space and space travel.

Here is a picture of my beautiful avatar. I used this to make it: Reasonably Clever