Conservation of Mass?

Ok. This week, all I can remember seriously learning was the conservation of mass, and a bit about alpha, beta, and gamma decay. And we talked a bit about nuclear fission and fusion. Then, the next thing I hear is that we have a Test on Monday! WHAT!? Oh no! What have we actually seriously learned. Gosh, I don't know what to do! Seriously, WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED? Well, wish me luck! :(

Spreading Sheets

It's my 9th week of school, and I learned how to make a spreadsheet on Google Docs. We did a lab about half lifes, flipping 100 pennies in three trials. Within 6 flips, we would end up with 1 or 2 pennies on tails. Amazing isn't it? After finding our data, we made our spreadsheets on Google Docs. That was a pain, because I had no idea how to use it! Thankfully I learned, and I made a really cool chart with the spreadsheet and it was cool! I hope I get to do more of it!

Electrons Galore!

Week Six of school, and we finally learn about ELECTRONS! Well, I learned that around a nucleus in an atom, is this huge electron cloud. Electrons float around in shells, and the outermost shell contains valence electrons that can be "given away" to other atoms. I have no idea what that means! We also got to play with dry ice, which was pretty cool. The dry ice in water made a whole ton of fog stuff, and it was really cold. When we put a bunch in an empty fish tank and blew bubbles in it, the bubbles just floated and didn't pop. That was crazy! We also blew up balloons and stuff, and did a whole bunch of other fun and weird stuff with it.

The DCD Meet was a BLAST! My first day, doing the 4x100 yard freestyle relay, 100 yard backstroke, and 100 yard butterfly, and the 50 yard freestyle. For the relay, I broke a minute for my split! That's the first time I've ever broken the 100 yard freestyle, but too bad it doesn't actually count. I dropped all my times, which was good! The next day, I did the 400 IM relay, doing the 100 butterfly leg, the 200 yard IM, the 100 yards breaststroke, and the 100 yard freestyle. I dropped my butterfly time by another half a second from the day before, even though it didn't count. Then, for the 200 IM, I did a fantastic job, getting FIRST in my heat, making a 2:28! I also won my heat for breastroke, and I think I could have gone faster, because I wasn't even tired. The 100 yard freestyle was crazy. I OFFICIALLY BROKE THE MINUTE, making a 58.5! That was a great meet for me!

Chemistry Week Five

Oh dear, a C + in my Chemistry Class!

I guess C for Chemistry?! OK, bad joke. Yea, that test I took on the third week, I was right when I said I did a bad job! A flat out 70% on that test. On top of that, I was so absorbed in taking my test, I didn't realize that I was supposed to turn in 50 points of papers till THIS Monday! YIKES! Well, I still got an 80% on that, since it was late and all. But hey, some score is better than no score! Swinging around to my 5th week of school, I better pull it up with next week's TEST!

Well, this week in Chemistry, I created a website an Element. The element I got was Radium. Lucky for me, I got an element I hardly know! Well, I learned a bit about it. Too bad there isn's a TON of information on it, since it's radioactive and all. Well, check it out here: http://sites.google.com/site/harrisonjkwan/

Oh, I really have to say this! Last Saturday, I met these Olympic swimmers at this event called Swim Champions. IT WAS SO FUN!! For all the swimmers out there: YOU SHOULD GO!! I got to see Matt Grevers, Ben Wildman-Tobriner, Ous Melloui, and Christine Magnuson. They were amazing, and I learned so much. It's great to know that these people started out as ordinary swimmers just like me! They were CRAZY fast! They'd dive in, and pop up a second later 3/4ths the way down from the pool. Man, I wish I could swim like that! Wouldn't that just be terrific!?

Well, the DCD meet's coming up. Its going to be great, since it'll be a chance to make my goal - all A times for every event! Tell you about it next week!

Chemistry Week Four!

We're coming around to our FOURTH week of school! Chemistry has been a CRAZY class! We just recently learned a song about Unit Conversion. We also made a video of it, and it's somewhere on YouTube! Its a great song, but the lyrics hasn't really gotten stuck in my head. So, too bad for me, I did a horrible job on my IsaTest.

Well, this week we've been learning about the Periodic Table of Elements, and all the patterns and properties of it. We also got to organize the table in our own way, but it ended up looking almost exactly like the current Table we have right now! Amazing isn't it!?

Well, I'm glad this week's over! It's been a long week! Tomorrow, I'm going to meet four Olympic swimmers in this event called "Swim Champions", and do all sorts of cool stuff with them! I can't wait! It'll be awesome!

Chemistry Week Three

Week Three! I'm proud to say that I can wake up for school now without feeling grumpy! That's really quite an achievement!

This week in chemistry, we took a lot of notes from our books. From our notes, we had to learn quite a bit of vocabulary! Well, to checkout all the work I have been doing so far, check out my google docs page at http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AXKpEbJT57SfZGZwdDVtaDNfMWZudHpuNGRo&hl=en . Well, after all those notes, we had to take a test on unit conversions! whoopee! I did a horrible job on that. My unit conversions need a lot of work! Showing the work is so hard. I hope that I will get to understand it soon. Oh, we also got a new seating arrangement. Its such a coincidence, how all the guys are on once side and the girls on the other. Hmm, I won
der why the class is set that way.....

Chemistry Class Week Two

Wow! I'm at the end of my second week of school, and it's going so slowly! In chemistry class, I have learned so much! We're starting to learn about matter. We did a lab where we tried to guess the weight of an object and measured it. I was way off! That was also pretty disastrous, since some of my lab buddies dropped the glass test tube. It created quite a mess... Another lab we did was turning an ordinary penny into a silver penny, then to a gold penny. That was pretty fun, because we got to use fire and burn the silver penny and turn it gold. I really love safely playing with fire. Another crazy thing in chemistry class is that our class is now split up into groups called metals and nonmetals. For some reason, and this was a "random" pick, all the guys are on one side (so I'm a metal), and the girls are on the other. What a coincidence ehh?

Oh, I have to add, I have been keeping up to my goals! On Monday and Tuesday, I cooked up some quesadillas for breakfast and for my swim buddies after practice. I also should tell you about this test set we all did. I didn't do too well, but our set was to swim twelve 100s on the minute forty, and get our best, worst, and average. My best was a 1:13, my worst being a 1:15 (which I only got once by the way), and my average was 1:14. It's a start, but I seriously wish I went faster!

Well, that was sorta my week. Wait up for next week!