In class today, We did a fun activity on writing Halloween scary story. In this activity, we first started with own story but with a limited time to write, and after a few minutes, we need to rotate our stories around for other friends to continue your story. It was so much fun, in the meantime, we were also being creative in writing those stories.
This is a Wordle that I created from my story:
In the past two months, we learned a lot of grammar and writing techniques in English literacy. The biggest part of Literacy for me was writing a narrative essay on the theme of “becoming of age.” I wrote about how coming out of my comfort zone and keep experiencing new things. You can read my narrative below:
I wish I could travel back in time. When I was younger, I felt weak and scared and preferred the safety of my comfort zone. I wish I could have changed myself and had the confidence to allow for new experiences. I wish I could have been better than who I am now.
I am a little kid who likes to play just like the other kids, but I was distinct of being shy and scared. I used to be that person who tried to hide in his comfort shell and scared of taking risks in any situations. I used to try to avoid any situations that involve talking to strangers. When I was in 2nd grade, a volunteer came into our class to spent her day with us, my classmates were introducing themselves to the volunteer and while my classmates were introducing themselves, I sneaked out, ran to the bathroom and waited until everyone finished. Moreover, I was always a shy student in the class. I don’t ask questions, also not answering any questions even though I knew the answers. I wouldn’t be so shy to answer or ask questions if my friends had stopped laughing at me when I try to ask or answer any questions.
My parents recognized the problem about me as well, they knew that I am a shy kid. One evening, when I was about to leave the dinner table, my father said a few words that stuck in my mind since then. He said “ It’s not bad to be laughed at, and you don’t have to be scared of anything because you are a strong kid. ” These words from my dad have changed my life and inspired me to live without regrets. When I go through fear, there was one thing that always came to my mind, my family. Whenever I think of them and the words from my dad, it is like a beacon that guides me through the dark and gets me to do things that I scared of doing.
In addition to my family, Liger changed my life. When I first came to Liger school, I saw the other kids, talking to each other and having fun. I was scared. I didn’t know those people. I talked to only one kid on my first day at Liger, and it was Chhoue. But after I saw the other kids having fun talking to each other, I was jealous. I wanted to be like them. After a few months observing the other kids, it encouraged me to be brave. I saw the other students stood up and answered questions, and talking to foreign teachers. I was really scared to talk to the teachers because my English was terrible, so I scared of people making fun of me when I talk, even though I knew that Liger’s students would not laugh at me. I talked to my family about these issues I had and my father keeps telling me the same things. “It’s not bad to be laughed at, and you don’t have to be scared of anything because you are a strong kid.” It was a tough night for me, I was promising myself and my family that I will go up to those foreign teachers and try to talk to them. On the next morning, I was so prepared. I came up with different lines such as: how are you? I am fine, thank you. Where are you going? etc. I walked to school with some of my friends and I wanted to be the brave one to go up and talk to the foreign teachers. I was really nervous so I messed up the words that I prepared and mumbled through the whole conversation, but the teacher was really nice she helped me corrected all those words. After the conversation, I felt like I just a billion dollar lottery. It was not hard and bad as I thought. I built my courage since then, I became less feared talking to the teachers.
Even though I got less scared talking to the teachers at Liger, I was still scared talking to strangers. It was my second year at Liger when I walked home a lot of friends were talking a Sharation at a place called DI. It was really strange because Liger never had a Sharation outside of school before. On the Sharation day, we were preparing our materials and loaded onto the bus. When we arrived at DI, everyone was busy setting up tables for their booth. Our teachers told us that it was not just a Sharation, it was also for students to talk to businessman and different people. I was shocked and my heart was beating faster the speed of light. I was nervous. I did not want to get out of my comfort zone. I did not want to talk to strangers. After 30 minutes into the event, there were tons of strange faces around me. I went and sit down behind my booth for the purpose of hiding from talking to those strangers. I looked around and saw my friends talking to strangers, I felt nervous for them but they seemed fine and they looked like they were having fun. Finally, I decided to go up and talk to a guy, and he was a foreigner. I talked to him and the whole conversation was me asking him questions and he telling me about his experience in his life. Soon, my friends joined me and I just get more comfortable. I learned about that guy, it was a breathtaking to experience talking to a person I did not know.
In the time that I turned 12 years old, till now I don’t even want to get out of my comfort zone. Even though I experienced through lots of things but sometimes I can’t do it and I’ll be better than who I am today if I did a lot of things that I was not good at. “You can only grow if you are willing to feel awkward and uncomfortable when you try something new,” Brian Tracy. Sometimes not getting out of things that I’m comfortable with doing and not try doing things that I’m not good at, limited my skills and also opportunities. Things could happen all the time. I was a shy person and I was not comfortable to go up to strangers and introduce myself and start conversations. Getting out of my comfort shell is part of who I am today, it is my becoming of age. It helped me grew confidence and became more mature by experiencing new things.
In this year, we are trying to speak English with accents. We are Cambodian, and English is our second language. Many people struggling with letter V and W. Most of Cambodian pronounce wocatioin instead of vocation. We are been practicing for about three months in our literacy class, and now we’re starting get use to it. Another letter that hard for me is the letter R. The sound of the letter R is nearly strange for Cambodian accents. There is a quote that say that “practice make perfect” but if we practice the wrong thing, it won’t make perfect, it will make habit. So we need to change how we pronounce words and practice in the right way.
Introduction
The elephant is the largest land animal in the world.In the past they went to wars and helped the warrior to fight with the enemy .The elephants are strong and big but they are gentle.The elephant are herbivores. The elephant are important for the environment and ecosystem.
History
In the past every king had to find at least one white elephant to improve his power . The of khmer empire the king use the elephant as their army and when their the big fight the elephant will go to fight with.For the normal fight the only one elephant will go with the commander.In the mid 11 century, king soriyak varman 2 buiding the angkor wat he use the elephant to pull the stone from kulen mountian and it easy for working with the elephant. In 12 century, king jayavarman 7 use it to build bayon he use it following king soriyak varman 2.
Ecosystem
The elephants are the key stone species. They help keep the biodiversity They were helping ecosystem by eating plants. They create gap in vegetation, They also allow plants to grow.They use their dung to spread seeds.They create pathway for other animal to travel or pass. They fertilizes the seeds giving new plants to grow. Some place the plant were die like savannah. If savannah doesn’t have elephant the plant die ,because no one eating big trees to control that from grow tall. Tree will block the sunlight that sending the photosynthesis to plant and the plant die.The antelope & grazer will disappear.The carnivores depend on the Antelope & grazers for food.If the antelope & grazer disappear they will very hungry and die. In the dry season the water is deep under the ground.The elephant use their tusks to dig a water hole for them and another animal to drink.The people did three thing to make the elephant away from their family. They loging the elephant in the circus or zoo.They farming (To farm it use a lot space they cut the forest to farm). They kill the elephant to get tusk for carving a sculpture.
General information
The elephants are the largest land animal in the world .They have two main groups, the african elephant and the asian elephant. The african elephant live in savannah and forest.All the elephant are herbivores they eat grasses, bark, twigs ,leaves ,fruit ,branch , large tree. They spend 18 hour a day to eat. The adult elephant eat 181.4 kg food a day. They drink 113.5-189.2 litres water a day.The trunk and tusks is use to communicating and pick up thing to eat. The female elephant pregnant for 2 years the baby that born can weigh up to 110 kilogram .
Life behaviour
The elephant lives in big herd with all age of the female elephant and young males. The female elephants live in the herd for their whole life , but the male elephant when it between 12 & 17 years old they will leave herd to live alone or in a small herd. The oldest female is called matriarch she is the leader of the elephant herd. She is the only female in the herd that have many experience, she know the geography around the herd and the ways to teach another female , that female will give her knowledge to young male elephant. She kept all the elephant safely together and protect them from getting hunger. She is the one who make all of the important decisions when they met the enemy she tell them when to charge and when to flee in the middle of endanger. She also teaches the female how to take care of their young. The elephant remember their relative forever if they alife. When the elephant is born they alway turn into a circle, flapping their ears and trumpet loudly for the birth. The female elephant has a really strong relationship that why all the elephant alway cellarbrate the birth. They turned injured calf. They kiss or wrap their trunks to show affection. They doesn’t have toy to play but they play game by throwing an object. When they die their relatives bury leaves twigs a year after death their member visit the bones+bmouth.
Physical feature
Trunk:
The trunk is the nose and the upper lip. It help to smell,eat,scratch, greet friend and threaten the enemy. Some time they use it to move or throw something and use it to shower or breathing when they swimming. The truck is 40,000 muscles but no bone and it talk and show feeling by that.
Mouth
The elephant back teeth is the size of the bricks. If you saw the elephant you will said that it has no teeth but if the elephant open their mouth you will see it.
Tusks:
The tusks are the overgrown teeth. another way they use it to carry and pull bark of the tree clear pathways dig the for the roots, water. They also use it to fight against the enemies and to impress the other animal. It can growth to 3 metre long.
Ears:
They fan the ears to cool down.The huge ears can hear far away,shoo the insect from biting the skin. They could show their feeling by that huge ear too!. It make them look bigger when they facing their enemies.
Skin:
The skin getting the sun burnt everyday and it suffer for insect to bites to protect their skin they rolling in the mud and make a dust shower.The water trapped in wrinkles to cool down.
Feet
Their feet have thick padding. The padding softens elephants heavy tread.
Comparing species
African elephants
This elephant is 3.04m tall for both male and female.The male weight up to 5981 kg. The ears cover shoulders. The flat back with a dip in the middle.They have long tusks on both males & females.The skin is more wrinkled and brownish – grey.The flat crown of head with on dent in the middle.
Asian elephants
This elephant can be 2.4m-3.04m tall.The male can weigh up to 4989 kg. The large ear don’t reach shoulders.They have rounded back. It is shorter Tusks only found on some male.The skin is less wrinkled grey – brown, with pink dot.
The crown of head has a dome shape with dent in the middle.
I go to a very unusual school. Our school is called the Liger Learning Center (LLC). It is located in Cambodia (Southeast Asia). Our goal that we need to accomplish is to change our country. We have been chosen to be in this school because we are unusual (smart). LLC gave 50 students a scholarship. Liger school had selected only 50 students out of more than ten thousands students in Cambodia. It is the first boarding school in Phnom Penh. Students at LLC learn two languages; English and Khmer. We have local teachers and overseas teachers. Our school spends a lot of time on explorations. Exploration is one of our school curriculum where we learn by exploring and researching. It a seven weeks long project. In explorations class we go out and explore the real world. In comparison, in the government schools the students just learn about theories, they never explore or practice their theories. I like my school so much because it gave me a scholarship and the opportunity to learn by exploring.
On Wednesday, 19, November was the amazing day for me because Liger got to play football with EastWest school. Every players were so excited. Before we left Liger we had a quick assembly about our study program. We done our assembly early because we needed to prepare our stuff. We left Liger at 3:00 oclock. On the bus I felt excited and nervous. When we arrived 3G (the place that for play football), every one shouted “ WoW!!!” because the field look amazing. Before we play we had a quick warm up. Our school teams were divided in four, two team were boys and two teams were girls. In boys team we divided A and B. My team was A team. We had 15 minutes practice suddenly our coach Jeff came and said that my team was the team to play first. My team came together and discussed how the game work. In my team there were six people played and a person substitute. Menghout was the goalkeeper, the defender were Maya and Somphors, the midfielder was Chhoeu and the striker were Vitou and myself. I like my teammate a lot. Before We played I called my teammate and had a quick talked about win and lost. I said if our team played hard and collaborate we will win if we not we will lost. The first round I scored one goal for my team. I was so excited. Every one look at me and cheered at me. After two minutes unexpectedly the East West team scored one goal back. My team felt a little bit upset with each other but it still okay. We kept played until finished the first half. When we finished the first round I called my group again and discussed how we going to play in second half. The second round had begun. In 2 minutes I scored another goal for my team and they were so excited and happy. We kept played until the second round was up and my team were so happy also the staff too. After my group finished I went to watched the girls played. The girls were scored a lot of goal. It was amazing. When We went back home Jeff bought the sandwiches for us its were so delicious. We arrived Liger about 6:00 oclock. My friends that they stayed at Liger asked me a lot of questions about the football. We arrived just on time to eat dinner. We had dinner with our friends and then we went home took a shower and relax. The football event was amazing if I have another chance like that again I will be very excited.
Since the first year until now my literacy skills has developed by a lot. The skills that I changed were spelling, past tense, plural, capitalization and reading. One of the sentences that I wrote was “yesterday I when to ican”. In this sentence there are three mistakes two of them were capitalization and one of them was spelling. My reading book changed by 15 levels from the first year. It (was) amazing to me because I thought that I wouldn’t move by this many levels. The past tense mistake that I did is “I go watch the circus.” I think it should be “I went to watch the circus”. My first year writing was really messy but now I try to make it more organized. Also my drawing looks so funny. Another sentence that I should use a better word is “One person stand and looked the one person was climbing on the rope.” In that sentence I should use the word another instead of the one person. Since the first years until now I made a lot of mistakes but that mistakes was my experience to me. So in the future I can change my mistakes.
