LAST BLOG EVER!!! :( Post 100!

Hello everyone, as you may know from the title, this is the  last blog from the School Cave. I have been at homeschool for 3 years, and I will start college in February yay... (nervous face) This is the 100th post and seems like good place to stop :) I have thought back through the three years and I have come up with my top 20 moments of Homeschooling. Well here ya go 

TOP 20 COUNTDOWN:

20. SOUTH ISLAND TRIPOMUNDO: This is me in front of Fox Glacier.

19. GETTING MORE CONFIDENT AT MATHS: I am no longer afraid of maths and actually really like statistics.

18. GETTING A MAP OF THE WORLD AND A TIMELINE OF HISTORY IN MY HEAD: I can now identify where and when things are and happen and this makes me a better traveler. And if I ever want to be a pilot I'm ready.

17. GEOLOGY AND ROCK HUNTING: This is me at The Pinnacles. I understand the Earth now ... it is all so clear!

16. LEARNING TO SWIM WELL: Has made me feel more confident in the water and able to jump off the docks in Samoa.

15. READING NOVELS ALOUD AND HAVING READING DAYS: We read 1000s of books and Mum did a great job of reading so many series aloud. Artemis Fowl, Barnaby Grimes, Airborn, Beak of the Moon, The Dragonkeeper, Airman, etc. etc. etc.

14. BUILDING THE FLYING FOX: This took 3 terms and was an awesome project.

13. STUDYING ZOOLOGY: I learned so much about bears, whales, the Galapagos Islands, dogs, and special thanks to my favourite narrator, David Attenborough, and his documentaries.

12. TEACHING MUM ABOUT MINECRAFT: This was a very tough experience but I think she understands me better. And symmetry is important!!!

11. LEARNING ABOUT ARCHERY: This day we went to the park and shot zombies (balloons).

10. WELLINGTON DAYS: The city was our classroom and we ruled it like kings!

9. BEAR NIGHT: This was so much fun sharing all the projects about bears with Dad and creating the special Bear Night Menu.

8. TINKERING: This is me in Carlucci Land, thinking about tinkering. Looking for parts and making new things was one of the ways I found to express my creativity.

7. GARDENING AND LANDSCAPING: I learned to make my ideas and plans be real. The ferns and cactus and vegetables and flowers and the Dragon Garden and the tire planters - I love getting my hands in the dirt. And digging holes!

6. COOKING: Eating stuff that you have freshly made is delicious. And I discovered curry and got brave about tasting new things.

5. CARTOONING AND DRAWING DESIGN PLANS: This is another way I've learned to express my ideas and show what's in my head.

4. THE TRIP TO THE STEAMPUNK FESTIVAL IN OAMARU: Best camp ever- top hats, Mythbusters, Jucy Van, awesome creations, fun people and a yellow eyed penguin!

3. LEARNING WITH MY DOG EVERYDAY: Homeschool was also a great thing for Bam because she got to be with us all day most days. I love having her around. She listened to the novels, followed me in the garden and worked well in small groups!

2. TRIP TO CANADAAAAAA: I went to Canada for 6 weeks with my mum and my sister. I saw so much and will always remember visiting the Farm , losing the camera in Bay of Fundy, and getting my Papa's top hat.

1.5. THE BLOG: Writing this has meant that I can share what I do with my family and friends and lots of other people I've never met. The statistics are really cool because I've had hits from all over the world.

1.0. FREEDOM: The School Cave has meant that I can be myself, learn about things I'm passionate about, and be free to eat noodles in bed, while doing research on the ipad. I might miss this but I think college will be an adventure, even for a year... or two.

Last blog of the term!

Hey guys I hope you have had a great term, or couple of months if your part of the old people crew.

I am sorry about the absence of blog posts this term and the truth is I just haven't got back into doing them lately but im sure that will change next term because we leave this term at 99 blog posts, So I'm planning on doing something special and adding a few new polls and such as well as adding maybe some pictures and stuff :D so im pretty excited for next term. Hehe thats a lot of the word term in that paragraph lol.

One of my all time favourite movies

Soooo... Umm I dont really know what to say about this term besides its been. AMAZING AND FUN and lazy hehe eating popcorn everyday. It was really cool finishing our book series called Airborn about a young airship aviator called Mat Cruz based in Victorian times but there were airships and steam-punk technology. I find that studying film has given me a greater perception of what goes on in the background and backstage and as well as how much work has to be in a film before it actually goes to the the theaters and that you also have to be very rich if you want to individually want to produce a film because you have to accept that your film might be really crap and then you lose a lot of money and I mean A LOT of money. Basically its a gambling game over your creativity.
Well here's some pictures of our term but there isn't any of us doing movie stuff sadly :(

the team for the Douglas Villa Tournament

My re-design of the cover for Airborn

And also Papa if you're reading this, Get better soon dude I hope you dont get too sick. Heaps of love The-O  Thats the last blog this term so see ya later everyone :D

My sister Moana and her boyfriend Shaun at the ball

40 MOVIES LATER :D

Helloooo followers, Anyone there? Sorry for taking such a long break from the blog, we have been watching heaps of movies 40 in 7 weeks to be exactly on the dot. This has been the most exhausting study ever, First off we have to drive down to the movie store which takes out 15 minutes of our day, and then we have to put the the movie in the dvd player and then make some popcorn and some drinks and place our butts on the couch. AND THEN ( my teacher is cruel lady ) we have to chew popcorn for hours on end SHOCKING. Ill be so glad to get back to real school! Umm, yeah right.

But while we have been watching movies the clones have taken an interest, and started their own production company, They haven't been able to hire a screen writer so they just reenacted all their favorite movies. We sent in a sneaky spy and captured these images.

BLAH BLAH IS GIBBERISH FOR ALL THIS STUFF. I won a sportsmanship award for being a great sportsman, I guess. Well the reason I won this award was because I helped my coach out at practice and did not get cocky after winning 11 out of 11 games which is pretty good record to be honest. I feel that team was really awesome at the games and we did really well with passing and shooting and scoring my team was awesome. we opened the the season with a 5-0 win and I scored a amazing left footed goal straight across the goal face and the goalie wasn't expecting a left footed shot so I wrong sided him it AWSHUM :D . well here is some pictures with me and my medals and a soccer ball I got from my uncle Miles he is an awesome dude.





Oh and a special treat Bam was being very cute so I

decided to take some pictures so here ya go. This is The-O signing off see ya later guys.

ITS ALIVEEEEEE!!!!!

Soo sorry about last week (and the missing blog) mum and I have been watching movies so much it's not funny.. well maybe it is if you are watching spoofs and comedies.

But we have been studying Frankenstein. You know the one: That man who's made out of other men and goes on a rampage killing family members of Viktor Frankenstein? Yea good you know who I'm talking about. Well we decided to watch three of the Frankenstein films: Young Frankenstein (a spoof from 1974), the 1931 Frankenstein (B&W) and the newer one from 1994 called Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. But the story of Frankenstein is  200 years old it was written in 1813 by Mary Shelley and it is considered to be the first book that was a science fiction story!. so when we watched this movie, we did some research and found that there were 5 parts that were censored in the 1931 film. One of most amazing ones was a part when the creature becomes alive and Viktor says "It's ALIVE! Now I know what it fells like to be God" They kept the It's ALIVE part and the rest was banned from the film from 1931 to 1999 because Americans considered it so horrible it was considered blasphemy. I decided to get some pictures to compare the directors and make up artists' interpretations of the Creature!

Robert DeNiro in 1994 (do you recognise him as the dad from Meet the Fockers?)

 Peter Boyle in 1974 (do you recognise him from Everyone loves Raymond?)

Boris Karloff in 1931 (do you just recognise him?)

Yesterday I stayed a whole day at Kuranui College for open day and, I LOVED IT. It was awesome we did different classes science, cooking, English, dance (was rubbish at it), and ART. My favorite class was Science the teacher was really enthusiastic and made me want to study even more! We had to figure out the PH of different chemicals and use the universal answer to which makes the chemicals change different colours and then we had to match the colours on the charts that he gave us! It was awesome and he taught us the difference between bases and acids. So basically if a bee stings you it puts a vast amount of bases under skin and erodes it away, but if you put vinegar on it which is an acid it attacks the base and makes it hurt less. Two things I will miss about homeschool is the freedom of being able to do what you to and study the things you like, and most of all I'll miss Bam my dog and her snoring.

An interesting link I had sent to me from Mum, where does she find this stuff???, was a bunch of photos of faces in everyday objects. This got me thinking about taking the camera out and going for a walk and seeing if I can find some. So if you find any faces in objects send them to me at my email, and I will post what I find and what you find. The link is http://www.boredpanda.com/objects-with-faces/

So now I'm moving on from studying sci-fi films to studying fantasy films. Toodles The-O

Cinematastic

Hi everybody and welcome back to the School Cave for Term 3.

This term I am up to my eyeballs in movies... I am doing film study and investigating GENRE (say it like this with a french accent: ZAAAHN RAH) This means that I have a good reason to eat popcorn everyday and watch movies. Yeah that's school....

This is definitely ☆☆☆☆☆. Star Wars is the best movie in the world (well 6 movies) and I have loved this since I was about 7. I think I could be Chewbacca (a small one).

Seriously I am investigating science fiction especially and so far have come up with about 8 sub-genres and I am also writing some pitches for new movies and thinking about how movies are connected to each other. Like I am comparing Star Wars and Lord of the Rings.

The best Sci-Fi Comedy: just so funny especially when Paul appears naked on the dashboard. I give it ☆☆☆☆☆

So to get into this, I started this week by watching lots of different movies: Paul, Sunshine, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Cloverfield, Titan-AE, Young Guns, and next week I'm watching Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy, Apollo 13, Nine, and what ever else I can fit in. I LOVE MOVIES! Star Wars is my all time favourite and Dad and I have watched the whole 2 trilogies lots of times.

This was a new one, a save the Earth sci-fi. It has 2 different endings. I rate it ☆☆☆☆

What I think so far about Science Fiction: I love the creativity of the technology and gadgets, I love the idea of the Robot companion, and the alien sort freaks me out, especially the real ALIEN, I like how directors and writers and makeup people can create such a variety of creatures and make them so believable. I think science fiction helps us undertsand some big ideas about being human and the impact we have on the world. But also how we can create amazing things with our minds and hands.

This is an alien invasion movie and uses a hand held camera- caution shaky and dizzy. Did you know that if you watch the ending scene closely you can spot the alien splashing down into the ocean in the background in the top right corner of the screen. I give it ☆☆☆☆

So this term I'm gonna rate movies for you and I hope you can suggest some movies I should watch. See you at the movies The-O.

I think there is a sub-genre that I call medical/cloning sort of like Frankenstein where the characters get their biology changed. This movie explains how the Planet of the Apes started so it's a prequel. The actor Andy Sircus who did Gollum is the main character Caesar and he does it in a motion capture suit. The digital work was done here in NZ by Weta Workshop. I rate this ☆☆☆☆☆.

Polar steampunk whales Last post of term 2

This is the last blog post of term 2. I can't believe it's only 6 months until I go to college Yay - I guess.

This has been a great term, PROBABLY THE BEST. My highlights of the term are


1: Having a whole bunch of fun with my mum 
2: Steampunk Festival
3:NEW SOCCER SEASON (we have won all of our games so far I think that's 7-8 maybe)
4: EVERYTHING...

Ever since we came back from the Antarctic-centre in Christchurch we have been studying the poles and watching documentaries about the early explorers and looking at whales and PENGUINS (adorable lil guys) waddling around. But I decided to make a challenge for my self and draw Steampunk whales. I have drawn three already but I'm planning on doing more maybe 6 more here is a picture of the three I have drawn.

As I said I am planning on doing more. I might even give the penguins a go. OH THERE'S STEAMPUNK EVERYWHERE IN MY HEAD I CANT GET IT OUT hehehe.

We were in Wellington on Monday and Despicable me 2 was coming out and there was all of these little cardboard cutouts of the minions and we decided we would get Bam a companion. So mum walks right up to one and goes "Yoink" and we walked back to the car and got Bam a new best friend. My mum is ingenious and a bit of a thief.














I hope everyone has an awesome mid winter break unless you are in the northern hemisphere and then I know you are having a good time at the beach (Mum is going to PEI for 2 weeks- jealous!). I will be back on the Cave blog at the end of July.

Toodles The - O