Module One
Math and Science, October 27, 2007
My experiences with math and science are fairly good ones. I have had a decent if lacking education from middle school due to the fact that for my 7th and 8th year I did not have a teacher for those two classes for a good three to four months. I am now taking Honors Earth Science and Honors Algebra 2, and I have excellent teachers for both of those classes. I enjoy both of classes, science a bit more than math due to the fact that in science you get to do more hands on things. I look forward to more classes of each.
First Day, October 27, 2007
My first day Shodor was an eventful one, to say the least. It is extremely interesting due to the fact that it feels less like going to a class and more like attending a workshop for a business. It's the first day and already we have started in to things like HTML, as you can see from this page. I look forward to more of this, because already they have me hooked into what we're going to be doing.
Graphics, November 17, 2007
The Saturday on the 17th was really fun, since we started using graphics design programs. The first program we used was Inkscape, which had a lot of tools that involved geometric design. You could make anything from an outlined rectangle to some kind of weird star with forty two points. The second program we used, which was my favorite, was GimpShop. GimpShop is a like a basic version of Photoshop. It has a lot of features that deal with photo editing, and a lot of possibilities to create pictures that are just plain silly.
CSS, December 8, 2007
This Saturday we got to learn CSS (Cascading Style Sheets). CSS is helpful in HTML as it allows you to make your page look better without cluttering up your design page. CSS also makes your page look a lot cooler. Some examples of what we did are changing text color, making them react to the mouse, and making links change when clicked.
Workday, December 22, 2007
The 22nd was a pretty cool day. We were clearing up any wrong ideas about CSS and formatting, and learning a few new things as well. We learned a few more formatting techniques, and even some Javascript. The rest of the day was spent working on our CSS challenge and group site. It was a very productive day.
Module Two
Agentsheets, January 19, 2008
On the 19th, we started working with Agent Sheets. Agent Sheets is a program that runs simulations of how an individual acts with others in a group. We used the set up of a group of healthy people and one sick person. It modeled the movement of the people, and showed when they got sick. It was really interesting, because we then learned how to make people that cured the sick, people that never got sick, and people who made other people disappear. It was really fun to use.
New Projects, February 2, 2008
The 2nd was a workday of sorts. We had new projects and assignments. It was fun though because we got to work with Agentsheets more, and we have a new AMC assignment, and that's fun too. We went over the new Agentsheet assignment, and people fixed any problems they had.
Net Logo, February 16, 2008
Today we started working with a new programs called NetLogo. NetLogo is a lot like AgentSheets. but it is more coding based, and the agents are not called agents. They are called turtles. We made a simple model that made turtles change colors when they touched other turtles. After the lesson, we had group website presentations. The websites were all very interesting and different. It was interesting to watch.
Net Logo Continued, March 1, 2008
Today we continued our work on the NetLogo simulations. We refined our sickness model, and added doctors and quarantine areas. After we finished up our sickness model, we started our work on the new group project. We could choose from two different types of simulations and we could use AgentSheets or NetLogo for either of them. We have new people in the groups, and a lot of work to do.
Work Day, March 15, 2008
Today we worked on our Module II assignments. A lot of people had back up work that they needed to finish so today was a great day to tie up any loose ends work-wise. We had to toil away on any work we had available since we didn't have a lesson.
Presentations, April 12th, 2008
We didn't do much today due to the fact that we had to present our NetLogo presentations. We had an hour or so to work when we came in to finish the presentations but that was pretty much it for the day. I did not present that day due to the fact that my partner was not there and thus I could not go.
Module Three
First and Only Day with Excel, March 26, 2008
Today we started working with semi-simulations in Microsoft Excel. Excel can graph numbers, but if you put sliders in it, it becomes an interactive graph. It is really cool to watch the numbers and graphs change when you slide the little bars around. After that we had the rest of the time to work on anything we hadn't finished.
Vensim Tutorial, May 10, 2008
Today we had a very interesting tutorial in the program called Vensim. Vensim is a modeling program in which you can lay out your variables in a flow-chart like, and connect them to interact. We made a simple model showing the interaction between healthy and sick people, and it was really intriguing to see how everything worked.
Final Saturday, May 31, 2008
Today was a work day for us to finish up everything in our modules. We will have more time in the next weeks, but this was our last Saturday officially. I just worked on my Vensim, and made sure I was up to date on all of my other work.
Summer Week 1, July 7-11, 2008
This week we covered PHP. PHP is really amazing in its' versatility, and what you can use it for. It is also compatible with HTML, and they work together well. We also covered mySQL, and it was also really interesting in is database functions. We finally covered some advanced NetLogo lessons, and those were really fun to do.
Summer Week 2, July 14-18, 2008
This week we covered SysAdmin and AMC. SysAdmin was really interesting, because it used Linux to basically manage your computer. It was a bit complex in concepts, but easy in implementation. It was really useful to learn. The other subject we covered this week was AMC. It wasn't as new and interesting as SysAdmin, but we covered a lot of ground in reviewing and renewing our knowledge of certain subjects.
Summer Week 3, July 21-25, 2008
The two things we covered this week were Java and WebMO. Java was fun to learn, but it was a bit complex to learn at first. It was easy to pick up after the first lesson because it worked a lot like some of the other coding we have done. The other thing we learned was WebMO. WebMO was basically a program where you put together molecules. It was really fun to use because there were a whole bunch of different molecules to make. There were thousands of different molecules to make, and we only got to cover a few, but it was still fun
Summer Week 4, July 28 - August 1, 2008
We covered another two new lessons this week, SysAdmin 2, a sequel to our lesson two weeks ago, and Math and Verbal 2. SysAdmin 2 was really fun because we basically got to set up our own server and put stuff on it. That was really cool, because our group actually had control of a server. For Math and Verbal 2 we covered some new math topics. We got to find the compactness of state districts using special functions. We also got to right discussions for some activities on Interactivate.
Summer Week 5, August 4 - 8, 2008
This week we didn't have lessons, instead we had projects. Our project was a library database we had to edit in PHP and HTML. We got to learn quite a few new things about PHP and mySQL because of it. It was pretty exciting because it built on our previous knowledge of the subjects. But there was a whole lot of new, advanced stuff we had to do as well.
Week 6, August 11 - 15, 2008
This week was a lot like last week, as we were still working on our final projects. We also got to learn a lot more about user interfaces in websites. We ended up using a lot of buttons, drop down menus, and checkboxes. It was really neat to see how all of the coding for those objects worked. We also got to learn a lot about validating. All in all it was big learning experience through the entire project.
