For my TALONSTalk, I researched how the pH of leaves could affect the water of BC wetlands. If you would like to watch it click the link below.
Have a good day!
How to be a Real Success
Relationship Rule number #2-Put energy into being likable:
Relationship rule number #2 is all about taking the time to make yourself more likeable to others. If people like you, they are much more likely to want to work with you. This skill is really about being able to form good relationships with the people around you. Being someone who is kind and friendly can help you make better connections with the people you work with. Having connections in your life is very important to being a successful person. I chose this principle because it is something that you can always improve on. You can always be taking steps to make yourself more likable to the people around you. Since it is the start of the year and I am meeting so many new people I think it is super important for me to be a likable person. I will be working with a lot of the new people I met this year, so I want to make them like working with me. This skill would be especially important for me during our leadership 10 class because we are always working in groups. During the planning of events, we must work closely to get every aspect of a trip done and I would want to feel like the people I am planning with are enjoying working with me. I think being a patient, organized and kind person will help me be more likable to the people I work with within our leadership class.
The Law of significance- One is too small a number to achieve greatness:
The Law of significance is about how important working together is. You cannot achieve anything without contributions from other people. This law is about remembering that it will always be way easier the more people can help. The law of significance can be applied to lots of different parts of your life. Whether it be working on a project at school, making a meal with your family or even doing things by yourself takes a whole team because of the materials you use and the place where you do it. I think this rule will help me at school and even at home because sometimes I try to do things by myself and end up failing terribly because it was just too much for one person. One way I want to apply this Law is by relying more on the class we have at school. Fellow peers are helpful when in the past I have had questions and I want to try going to them more when I get stuck. I also want to be someone that people feel they can come to for help if they get stuck because that is how a team works. I think this law is especially important during our trips because we must do extra teamwork to keep on schedule and communicate messages in a big group. I also want to make sure I am going to teachers for help when it comes to hard questions because they are a very important addition to our team at school.
Our attitude can turn our problems into blessings:
This principle was part of the ‘What I Have Learned About Our Attitude’ section and was one of three important principles. This one is about taking the problems that get thrown at you and instead of giving up, you grow from them or even create something even better. Solving problems is all about your attitude towards what you are working on. It’s so important to have grit so you can preserver through obstacles that you are bound to come across. When you are working towards a goal there will always be problems and a good leader isn’t someone who runs into fewer problems it is someone who is able to overcome them with a good attitude. I chose this one out of the three because I thought it was the one, I could improve on the most. Sometimes when I run into problems it will cause me to lose the momentum I have will working on tasks. This is something I would like to get good at this year because of how different things are going to be. For the TALONS program, we plan a lot of events, but our events will have to be changed to fit pandemic protocols. I think it is important for me to keep a positive attitude so that I can help us create ways to still have fun while being safe. One way I can keep a good attitude is to not dwell on the stuff we cannot do this year and think about all the interesting things we have done and are planning on doing.
The Law of Process- Leaders develop daily, not in a day:
The Law of the Process is about not expecting a sudden complete change but small changes that happen frequently. This law really focuses on working on making big changes over time not suddenly. It is not realistic to think that things can change overnight. You must take the time to work on your habits to make them better. Talking to people about what you are working towards or taking small actions to help you get there can help you reach your goal over time. I think this law will be good for me to focus on this year as work towards improving my work habits. The workloads this year is a lot more than it has been for me in the past, so I haven’t developed proper work habits yet. I know that I can’t suddenly get good at time management, but I want to work towards that as a goal. Some of the small actions I want to try to help myself towards my goal is to start keeping and organized agenda system and asking my parents for support while I am starting out. This law will especially help me during leadership because a lot of the work is more dependent now that we usually only meet once a week. It will be important for me to get better at using the time we aren’t in class in a productive way.
Ecological Footprint
THE PLAN
My Ecological Footprint:
My current ecological footprint is 7.20 hectares.
How does it compare to others?
After looking at my other classmates’ numbers I noticed that my score falls close to the middle. I am not doing the best because there are still lots of things that need improving but, I am not doing the worst because I have taken actions to reduce it in the past. People’s scores are all pretty different and I think this is because everyone has different opportunities to be environmentally friendly.
Ten Things to Change:
- Produce less garbage in a day
- Take shorter showers
- Wash clothes with cold water
- Flush the toilet only when needed
- Eat more organic foods
- Only wash clothes when necessary
- Eat less meat when possible
- Get more environmentally friendly cleaners
- Purchase more energy-saving lightbulbs
- Eat more foods that were grown in BC
Five Things Changed and How they were Changed:
- Reduce the amount of garbage produced by always bring a reusable drink container, masks and reusable bags. I can do this by keeping them in your bags so that you always have them with you.
- Take showers that are under ten minutes to help with water usage. Setting timers are not listening to music while in the shower could help me take shorter showers.
- Wash clothes in cold water to help with water usage. This one is easy I only must remember to change the settings on the washing machine when I am doing a load of laundry.
- Trying eating more organic foods when possible to help with the number of pollution chemicals. I will do this by trying to ask for more organic snacks if my parents ask and trying t eat less processed foods when there are other things in the house.
- Only wash clothes when they are dirty not every time you wear them to help with water usage. I will do this by making sure to hang up or put away clothes that haven’t gotten dirty so that they don’t get put in the wash. Also, just making sure I am checking to see if clothing really needs to be washed yet when I am putting it in my laundry basket.
Why?
I chose these ones because they were changes that were possible for me that would still make a change. I expect some of these won’t be as easy as others, but I know all of them are achievable for me right now. I wanted to focus a little bit on the water usage section because that was something that I could change by myself. Though I did have a high number in the food section that was something I couldn’t change as much because my parents choose what we eat. I also wanted to choose things that weren’t the easiest things to change so that they would help me start having better habits. For example, I was super used to having long showers but after trying to take shorter ones it will be easier to keep decreasing my shower time. Since I have lots that have that are focused around water usage, I think that part of my footprint will improve lots which is a good thing because it was one of my highest scores.
THE REFLECTION:
What was easy?
The easiest change for me was using cold water when I washed my clothes. This was a very simple change and it didn’t have any negative effect on me. All I had to do for this was to make sure I remembered to change the setting on the machine, so this was a very simple switch to help the environment. Another change that was easy for me was reducing my garbage created in a day. Since we are in a pandemic, I don’t go to many places, so I don’t have to worry about getting single-use plastic while I am out. For the places I do go like school I remembered to bring my reusable water bottle and would pack my lunch with reusable containers. The last change that I made that I found easy was only washing clothes when needed. I found that before I would wear a sweater once and then throw it in the laundry because I wasn’t thinking. I found that when I was thinking about it more, I would remember to hang them back up and I wasn’t doing laundry as much.
What was hard?
The hardest thing for me was trying to eat more organic foods. My family usually gets a mix of organic and non-organic food, so I couldn’t eat a completely organic diet during the two weeks. This was mainly hard because I don’t shop all for myself, but I mentioned it to my parents, and they bought more organic produce. It was also difficult because sometimes processed food can be more tempting when you are choosing a snack. The other change that I found more difficult was reducing shower time. One of my worst habits is taking showers that are much too long so this one was a bigger adjustment for me. I tried setting timers to help remind me when I should be finishing up in the shower which helped a bit. I found that listening to music in the shower made me want to stay in the shower longer, so I started showering without music as well. Something else I could have tried is taking showers that were a bit colder because that would likely make me not want to stay in as long. Though some parts of these changes were hard there are strategies I could use to make them a bit easier.
Obstacles:
One obstacle that I found with all the changes was memory. All the changes include having to remember to change a certain behaviour. For example, switching to washing my clothes with cold is a very easy thing to do but remembering to change it was a little more challenging. Some ways I overcame this obstacle was leaving reminders for myself. The best way for me to remember something is to write it down on the whiteboard in my room. Though I still did have trouble remembering all the new changes I was implementing.
What will I do in the future?
In the near future, I want to continue to reduce the garbage I produce in a day by trying to switch to products that are more ecofriendly. An example of that is bamboo toothbrushes because these are something I have been wanting to try and they would reduce my plastic consumption. Another thing to do in the present time is trying to buy more second-hand clothes. Something else that I would want to change in the future is spending less time on technology. I can’t really change that much right now because of online school but I do want to reduce the time spent on electronics after we are back to normal. Fast fashion is a big impact on the climate and buying second-hand clothing would help me not contribute. Something I want to do that would be a while from now is to stop eating meat. This is hard to do right now because I can’t really cook for myself and my family isn’t vegetarian. I think that once I am older and I do cook for myself I could move towards a vegetarian. This would be something simple that could really help with my ecological footprint.
Digital Footprint Assignment
1. How might your digital footprint affect your future opportunities? Give at least two examples.
Your digital footprint can affect your future in lots of different ways. One common thing your digital footprint could affect is your job opportunities. Companies want to hire people that make them look good. If you have a bad digital footprint people could find out and link you to the place you work. Companies might hire people based on having a good digital footprint. Your digital footprint could also affect your college or university admissions. Schools don’t want to accept students who use the internet in an inappropriate way.
2. Describe at least three strategies that you can use to keep your digital footprint appropriate and safe.
One way is being safe with who you talk to on the internet. People lie to each other on the internet all the time because it is not the same as talking in real life. Another thing is being mindful of what you post. There are lots of different resources to look at that help with deciding what to post and what not to. The main idea is to not post things that are hurtful to others because posts like that won’t cause anything positive. A final thing to think about is to make sure everything you use on the internet is credible. Whether that be websites you use or people you talk to it very easy for people to lie on the internet.
3. If you could go back in time, is there anything you would do differently online? Think of what type of advice you would pass on to your younger self or other students. How could you go about explaining it to them?
If I could go back in time I don’t think there is much I would change. I am on social media but I don’t post a lot of things and when I do I always think them through. The advice I would have for my younger self or just younger users, in general, is don’t trust people you don’t now. There are a bunch of people on the internet and not all of them use it in a positive way. Even when your just playing games online people can be mean or creepy. So, it is very important to stick to the safer parts of the internet with people that you can confirm they are who they say they are.