Fracking

Fracking is a very serious environmental problem. Fracking started in the 1860's as a huge future problem when liquid was first used to stimulate shallow, hard rock wells in the ground. In the 1930's people tried to inject a non explosive in the ground to stimulate a well which would force gas and oil to the surface. In 1949, a company called Halliburton became the first company to use hydraulic fracturing to extract natural gas. Fracking started many years ago and has become a big problem that many people did not see coming.

Fracking is even a problem to drinking water and our environment. Fracking uses heavy amounts of fresh water filled with chemicals to get the gas and oil out of the ground. Most of the time none of that water is reused but just left in the ground. Since 1949, when hydraulic fracking was started it has been releasing huge amounts of pollution into the air! One day, if fracking continues due to all of the pollution it creates our air could possible become hazardous to breathe. Since the early days of fracking it has caused mini earthquakes to occur that have even damaged homes! Fracking causes many environmental problems and should be stopped.

Sources: http://www.alive.com/articles/view/23262/fracking_in_canada

http://youngpetro.org/2013/05/06/the-pros-and-cons-of-fracking/

 

http://www.sciencedump.com/content/pros-and-cons-fracking-infographic

 

Paragraph on Recent book I Have Been Reading

Recently I have read the book "Hunger Games Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins." In this book there are many teenagers but the main character is a teenage girl named Katniss Everdeen. She is a normal teenage girl but she lives in the future and has to hunt for animals to eat because she is poor and lives in a place where most people are poor. I think she is different from most teenagers because she poaches animals and has to fight to the death in an arena. I think this book is a little unrealistic but anything could happen in the future.

MIss Representation blog post 2

Last week, I watched a movie called "Miss Representation,", it was about how women are mistreated, discriminated, unequal to men, and described as less than a man everyday in almost every situation. During this movie there where many examples of how women are discriminated and mistreated in things like movies, tv shows, and magazines. Examples are video games like Grand Theft Auto or Saints Row, People Magazine, the show "Two Broke Girls" and almost every movie pg 13 or higher rating that involves women. The biggest example was television where girls where forced to have surgeries to make them more "beautiful" and they where photo shopped to look unrealistically beautiful. That made other girls in real life think that they would have to live up to those standards or they aren't beautiful.
 Here is a link to some news on this topic http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-24522060
My final point is that women are discriminated, mistreated, and treated as lesser people than men for basically no reason and it is wrong. None of these things happen to men, and women deserve the same treatment as men. Nobody deserves to be treated in the same way the women in the movie are treated so I think that we have to change how we act.

"Miss Representation" (Tyson and Jade)

We recently watched a movie called "Miss Representation". It is about the equality of women in the media and how they are discriminated against and expected to reach unreachable beauty in order to matter. We also did some notes about what we think during the movie.
These are my notes/ examples of Irony in the film:

The girls look at a photo shopped person and think they can’t be beautiful but in real life that person isn't that beautiful they just had been photo shopped.
Girls think they aren’t beautiful unless they are skinny but realistically being too skinny can cause health issues.
Most movies aren’t about women even some chick flicks.
Some people view women as objects in media but realistically there is much more to women. Women are forced to have surgeries for beauty but they are already beautiful. People think women can’t lead because they aren't equal but women are equal in every way.

This movie was about the equality of women.  Personally  I thought that this movie supported the equality of women, describing why they are equal to men. It used  irony because in the media they where making girls have beautification surgeries to be on television. Definition of irony: An outcome of events contrary to what was, or might have been, expected. Irony is used to get the filmmaker's prospective across because it showed the bad ways women are abused and treated in real life around the USA.

 The point of the filmmaker is that women are mistreated in the media and in most ways are never equal to men and that they should be treated the same and have the same rights.

Lego Gun Project

click here for my presentation video That is my presentation for my lego gun passion project! Thanks for watching!

Garden Expirament Project By Tyson

Melons By Tyson And Zach

For our class garden project we will be planting and growing melons, hopefully successfully for our school garden that we are restarting.

Starting Melons by Tyson

Melons should

 

be started inside in a Container near the window where they can get as much sun as possible. They should be transplanted into a garden outside or in a greenhouse  by the end of May or beginning of June.

The best zone for growing melons is zone 4.

Soil and nutrients by Tyson

You need warm (about 20 degrees Celsius), well-drained soil. Add dolomite lime and compost or well-rotted manure to the bed and ½-1 cup of complete organic fertilizer beneath each transplant.

for the best growth your plant should get lots of sun and be watered amply every day.

What kind of container to use (and inside greenhouse or outside)

To successfully grow melons You should start to plant melons indoors in a container in mid April. For best results in growing melons in a container you have to select an icebox or midget variety box.

The melons should be transplanted into a garden outside or in a greenhouse by the end of May or beginning of June.

Pests, Diseases and how to treat them

There are many pests with melons and here are some examples and how to treat them.

Melons are prone to aphids which can be washed off easily with a soapy solution.

Cucumber beetles can cause problems, they transfer a bacterial wilt from every plant the are on as they eat the leaves. The wilt will cause the plants to wilt and die, destroying the crop, there isn't a cure that is known and the solution is to remove and destroy the infected plants as soon as possible.

Powdery Mildew and Downey Mildew can affect melons which will cause leaves to wither and die, it usually doesn't kill your plant but may limit the crop. In case of a severe infestation the crop can be sprayed with a suitable chemical. The best prevention is to use a resistant seed stock.

Anthracnose can occur and can be recognised by a brown spot that goes steadily black and the centre falls out. The fruit can be poor and distorted. Remove the plant as soon as possible and destroy it. There are fungicides that can be used but the results are mixed. Get good seed because some can carry the disease.

Fusarium can affect the roots but it mainly happens to older plants, remove the plants and use resistant seed and rotate the crop as the seed can stay in the ground. Crop rotation or the change of soil in a greenhouse application will remove a lot of the disease and pest problems.

info from: http://www.gyoveg.com/melon-pests-and-diseases.html

and: http://www.westcoastseeds.com/how-to-grow/vegetable-seeds/Melons/

and: Art Knapp plantland home and garden.
Link for Art Knapp Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/artknappspg

 link for picture: http://www.humeseeds.com/melncool.htm



Link for picture: http://homeguides.sfgate.com/varieties-persian-melons-51930.html

Link for video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LYypS32utu0

Water by, Zach

When the melons are growing, they have to get watered lots and have to get lots of sunshine.

Their roots are delicate and require high nutrition and lots of water.

something i have not learned

I have not learned how to do a backflip before but I think it would be pretty cool.
I can do front flips pretty good but would want to learn about doing backflips.
Last time I tried to do a backflip was on my trampoline and I landed on my neck pretty hard and it hurt lots but I was ok.
I have friends that can backflip and they have told me it is easier than a front flip but I don't think so.

Introductary Blog Post

I have some goals for my learning throughout high-school I would like to learn Spanish because I have Cuban heritage and I love to travel to tropical places where they speak Spanish.
I would also like to learn about pretty much anything I could learn about mainly science because I'm thinking I might want to be a marine biologist when I grow up.

I am in this choice learning program called the NLC and in this program we have these very cool things called cross circular competencies.

Cross circular competencies are something we use to show how we have used things like critical thinking, problem solving, and communication.

I'm hoping to make this blog into a wall to show all of my work throughout my years in high-school.