For the past few weeks in English class, we have been working on a Memory Book project where we collect many of our main memories. Here it is.

Zohar – Memory Book by zohar.staretz

We have been learning about and creating a tiny house for the past month in Social Studies. A tiny house is something pretty self-explanatory it’s a small-sized house that ranges between 100 and 400 feet. 

Some advantages of living in a tiny home that I was able to think of were:

•  Cost – Many people struggle with expenses (mainly quarantine), and tiny homes provide lower expenses than a regular-sized home would cost.
• Portability – Making a tiny home into a portable can be easy. Many people who enjoy travelling and exploring choose the option of owning a tiny home.
• Customization – With a tiny house you have more options of customizing your house like you would want to. Adding specific material that you might not be able to add in a regular-sized home. 

I also thought of a few disadvantages, for example:

• Difficulty of Entertainment – Being able to entertain guests is a difficult task in a tiny house. Not as many opportunities for entertainment as in a regular-sized home. The main source of entertainment would be outdoors nature.
• Limited Storage – A smaller-sized home means a smaller amount of storage. Many tiny homeowners have to be creative with storage areas, for example, the stairs, some make their stairs drawers for storage areas.
• More Chores – Living in a tiny house adds a few extra responsibilities than you might have in a regular-sized home, for example, emptying a composting toilet.

These advantages/disadvantages are also reasons why tiny houses are becoming more popular. But the main reason is the cost of the house. Many people are looking for a more affordable option when it comes to owning a home.

Greenhouse gases are gases that contribute to the greenhouse effect by absorbing infrared radiation, for example:

• Carbon Dioxide
• Methane
• Chlorofluorocarbons

Tiny homes spread less gasses because they use less energy than a regular-sized home.

A carbon footprint is the total amount of greenhouse gases (including carbon dioxide and methane) generated by our actions. We use carbon footprint mainly to measure the effects of global climate change. My carbon footprint measures around 16.3 tons. Your footprint includes emissions from a variety of sources, for example, your daily commute, the food you eat, the clothes you buy, everything you throw away etc.

After viewing many options of resources for my flooring and roofing reclaimed wood was my final decision. Reclaimed wood is processed wood retrieved from its original application for purposes of subsequent use. Wood is very known to be a durable and sustainable natural resource which is exactly what I wanted for my tiny house. Reclaimed wood is a great option for tiny houses.

For the math portion, we learnt about scales, budgeting, calculating the area of shapes and so much more. 

We also learned how to create the following:

• Floor plan

• One-point perspective

• Budget calculations
• Elevation

Lastly, I would like to reflect on this project. I’d start by saying that I was surprised about how much I learnt throughout the entire process. Going into the project I was thinking that I would know everything and that the project would be very easy, let’s just say I was wrong.

If I were to do this project again I would have a few more questions:

• How big of an impact does your carbon footprint have?
• What is the better option – renting or owning? (statistics)
• What are the best strategies to come up with decisions for your home? (Materials, rent/own, etc,)

I think I did handle this project pretty well. If I were to do the project ever again I would try to be more responsible and organized when it comes to productivity and time management. Looking back on how I worked I think I worked very hard on both the math and social studies sections. I’m most proud of my floor plan that I worked very hard on. I also want to say that there were many struggles throughout the process, the main struggle was answering some of the questions in the social studies section. Many of the questions were difficult for me to answer.

That’s it for my blog post.

Thank you for reading!

For this year’s Innovation Day project the grade 7 instructions were to pick an animal you would like to build a house\shelter for. Follow each one of the design thinking steps and eventually present a presentation in front of Classmates, Parents, Teachers and Judges. My chosen animal was the Red Wattle Hog which I eventually built a Greenhouse shelter for using CoSpaces Edu a site that allows students to create 3D designs and code. 

Here are a few pictures that I believe summarize my whole project:

I very much enjoyed this year’s project. I was proud of many things, for example, the amount of coding I did (65 lines of code), how my board turned out (Picture above), my pitch and so much more. I’m very thankful for Mr. Ray who guided all of middle school throughout the process. This was my second innovation day ever and I still feel like there’s so much to learn. One of the things I would’ve wanted to maybe have more time on was the practicing of the presentation.  I felt very nervous/anxious when presenting in front of others, even though I think the final result was pretty good. I learnt many things not only about structures but also about myself.  I definitely learned that I enjoy working in a quiet space.

That’s it! Hope you enjoyed another BLOG POST!

THANK YOU!

ֿֿ.במהלך השבוע האחרון בשיעור עברית כל תלמיד בכיתה הכין מציאות מדומה של אחת המקומות של למדנו על בעזרת הספר ״מגדל אור״

.האפשרויות היו : אילת, שדה בוקר, ים המלח, מצדה,מערות קומראן והנגב

.אני בחרתי באילת ומלמטה תוכלו לראות את המציאות המדומה שהכנתי

En classe de français avec Madame sylvie il y a environ 3 semaines nous avons fait un comix en utilisant MakeBeliefs.com. Le comix était à propos de tout ce que nous voulions qu’il soit. Après, nous l’avons présenté en classe. Voici un lien vers mon comix.

https://makebeliefscomix.com/Comix/#send

בשבועיים הראשונים של שיעור עברית עבדנו על פרוייקט של ד״ר סוס “אם יוצאים מגיעים למקומות נפלאים״

הנה המצגת שהכנתי במהלך שיעור עברית

In the last semester in Jewish Studies I’ve learned about the responsibilities of a Bar/Bat Mitzvah. This i  a very important topic to study. As a Jewish girl who is about to Celebrate her Bat Mitzvah I’ve learned a lot of important topics that I should know for my Bat Mitzvah for example Tefillin, Talit, Tzitzit and Tekhelet and all these important topics have a purpose. The main purpose of Tefillin and Talit is to connect to Hashem while praying. The Tzitzit’s purpose is to remember Hashem and his commandments (613 mitzvot). One thing I found intresting about Tefillin was the very specific way to wrap it around your arm, hand and head.

Thank you for reading
– Zohar