– By Woodleighville resident, Stephanie
I’m here to talk to you today about something that is a very important topic to me, and that is advertising and its effects on child obesity. A few days ago I was looking through Newser, a website that covers stories from a bombing incident in Bagdad, to how fast the sea level is rising. But the story that immediately caught my attention was ‘Disney dumps junk food ads’ an article on how Disney Channel is banning all junk food ads on their station. They are hoping that this will help to narrow down child obesity, and are encouraging others to do the same. “Companies in a position to help with solutions to childhood obesity should do just that,” Disney chairman Robert Iger states. And Disney’s plan puts it far ahead of competitors. Now banning some junk food ads is a simple thing to do, so why is Disney channel the only channel who have accomplished this? It made me wonder why ordinary channels, are deliberately keeping these ads on; is it for money purposes, or for the reason that they just haven’t thought about advertising, and how it is contributing to child obesity.
Stopping all advertising of junk foods is very important, but for just one person to achieve this is quite un-realistic. So I plan to make my own survey and send it to kids, just younger than us to find out what they know about this important issue. And then these results off to a newspaper so everyone can see. Advertising specialists use many canny techniques to persuade or encourage their costumers to eat their product. Many fast food restaurants for example use bribes, in the form as toys, to persuade the consumers.
Child obesity is very common, and can be harmful to the child in many different ways. Low self-esteem, bullying and eating disorders are only some of the effects of child obesity. But there is also many medical disadvantages too, type 2 diabetes, being one of the most common. In fact child obesity is so common that twenty to twenty-five percent of children are considered overweight or obese and between 1985 and 1997 obesity in children doubled! But all though these are alarming results, childhood obesity can be narrowed down and everyone can help by simply encouraging TV channels to limit their fast food ads during children’s TV shows, or only eating the ‘sometimes’ food sometimes!
The Morris Ward Minutes 
Nicholas
The Three Food Critics
Our genius hour is about being good food critics. First we researched what a good food critic does when they go to a restaurant. We gathered our findings and came up with a survey that we could fill out while we were in the restaurant. After we have filled out our survey we will and write
a review of the restaurant and post it on our blog.
We decided to do this because we love food and we also love criticizing food but we are not very experienced and have never done it, that is why we wanted to learn about how we could become good critics, our intentions are to go to as many restaurants as we could without going broke and write a review and as we would rate more restaurants, we would become better and better food critics!
Richard went to Mommy Son, Andrew went to DDDn and Nick went to Subway! We each wrote reviews about our experiences and posted them on our blog!
We each rated our restaurant out of 5 according to our personal surveys that we filled out and used to rate and describe why we rated it this way!
We have created our own food blog called RanFood. This is where we will be posting our reviews about the restaurants we went to.
We were wondering if you could give us some constructive feedback. Here area few questions we were hoping you could answer.
1. What do you think we should be rating our food on?
2. Do you think we should use a blog to write our reviews or use another tool to write our reviews?
Nicholas
Here is a link to our food critics blog http://ranfood.blogspot.ca/
Brendan Y
Here is our progress so far on our Genius Hour projects. If possible could you please give feedback.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1vdoBaN0zRIoUYdnHjUyvxvOgGzR9j1z1Q68hX8fYIA8/edit
Griffon
I think it’s a very interesting idea Brendan,
I have a few questions about the bar code if you could answer them
Who, invented the bar code?
What was the Original purpose of it?
How exactly does it work?
Regards, Griffon
Jarrod V. , Johnny W. , Jadyn B. , Alayna Y.
This is our Genius Hour project. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1b4dFbpqCk3qnHVOJF9E4zG01fcKUV4hWRJtI2J42bYc/edit
Anisa
Genius hour topic:
Cameras; how do they work?
Summary:
When people use digital cameras they would usually focus more on the picture than the tool they use. We take technology for granted. Lots of people just think of cameras as point and click, but i want to know the technology behind it all. I want to show people the technology that is in the camera and how much it has developed through the years. I will be making a slideshow and a timeline to go with it to show the history and development. I will be comparing the best model of camera in 2012 to the first camera ever invented in the fifth century B.C.
Why i chose it:
I chose this topic because i have always wondered how cameras are capable of capturing
pictures and how it functions. I also want to see how developed the digital cameras have
become since it was first invented.
Progress:
As of right now i am finished my slideshow for my presentation. I am currently writing a
speech for it and afterwards I will get my project peer checked by my classmates. I will
probably be able to present maybe in a week.
Feedback:
Do my intentions seem clear
Is it interesting?
Should i add more detail?
Does my topic appeal to you?
Do you think my presentation will be 5-10 minutes long?
I hope that I get your feedback soon!
Allison
Dear Anisa,
Your intentions seem clear to me. From reading this, I knew exactly what you wanted to find out. The project seems interesting if it is the kind of thing your into. The development from cameras now to cameras back then would be massive.
More detail into what info you want to put into the slideshow would be nice.
Your topic is not one I would have chosen if I were doing the project, but it is one that seems interesting, something that I would want to know the details about.
I cannot say whether or not the presentation will be 5-10 minutes long. It depends on the amount of detail you put in.
Overall, good job and good luck.
Regards,
Allison
msmorris2012
It could be interesting to look at the impact the technology has had on how we (as consumers) consume photography?
I remember when I was growing up, to get a roll of film developed cost about $20, and you’d get about 30 photos printed. Out of those, maybe 5 would be ‘keepable’, so most people didn’t have many ‘precious’ photos.
Today, with digital cameras, we have the ability to edit on the camera, and with social media, don’t necessarily need to get them printed (we just throw them up on Facebook or Pinterest). I think, from these changes, photos feel a little less precious than they used to be. Although, changes in the way photography has been marketed (e.g. with Instagram) have made everyone a pro photographer!
Looking back over the history of the technology sounds very interesting!
Ms. Morris
Alice
This is my genius hour topic: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_VQbKih7YXzBfXSm3MWGIecKO4BKu5-QrfNI_QG6Gag/edit?login=1&overridemobile=true
Anaya and Grace
Anaya and Grace
The Truth about Chemotherapy
What is our project about?
Our project is about understanding chemotherapy, and figuring out how it works. As well as the process, how it benefits cancer, the side effects, what is cancer. We are hoping that our project will inform people about chemotherapy and how it works.
Why did it appeal to us?
This topic appealed to us because it fit with our criteria well. We had some trouble finding a topic that we both liked and that we meet the criteria. This topic was also interesting and a lot of people in our class were wondering about the same topic. However nobody else chose this topic.
Where are we right now?
Right now we are working on the PowerPoint that will explain chemotherapy. We are also about a couple days away for presenting to the class. But first we need to do peer feedback, and practice presenting it.
Feedback?
*Do you think our questions are explaining the topic well?
*Do you think our information is related to the topic/headings?
*Is presenting our information on a PowerPoint a good way to share our project?
*Is our information well organized, is it easy to understand?
Sydney T.
Genius Hour Project: Sydney, Olivia, Emily, Jessica
Why do people sneeze differently?
What is our project about?
Have you ever wondered why every sneeze sounds different? Well, that’s what our project is all about. Our project explains the effects of sneezes and how everyone sneezes differently. There is such a wide variety of different sneezes that not everyone knows about. Our project is going to answer several different questions regarding sneezes, such as, “What are the common causes of sneezing?”, “ How do surroundings change the sound of your sneeze” , “Why do people sneeze differently?” and “What happens inside your body when you sneeze?”. We have planned a video showing people how everyone sneezes differently in a variety of different surroundings. We are also using the editing software “iMovie”. It is our first time using iMovie so this will be a learning experience also and it will help our problem solving skills.
Why did our project appeal to us?
One day in class, we looked around and we heard and saw different people sneeze differently with a variety of sounds. We all wondered why and we have never heard an answer for this so we thought this would be a good project to work on. It would answer our question along the way and we hope it will answer our fellow classmates’ questions too. This is an everyday occurrence so it makes lots of people wonder why it actually happens. We think it is an interesting topic that everyone encounters on a daily basis.
Where are we at now?
We are almost done. We probably need around two more classes to work on our projects to polish them up and prepare for the presentation. We have the video made but we want to edit it a bit more and put some finishing touches so it will be perfect. It will be about 5 minutes long and we hope to catch the audiences’ attention.
Feedback:
We need some help with the presentation of the project. We have our voice in the video already but we are supposed to talk during the presentation so we have no idea how. Please give us some suggestions, advice, and feedback. Thank you.
Nasmin Florett
Hi Sydney,
My name is Nasmin and I have recently done a project quite similar to yours, we call it our Inspiration project. We had to choose a topic we were intersted in and then choose an action to raise awarness into this topic. Mine was Local Endangered animals you may have seen my speech, Endangered Animals: The Story Behind the Fluff.
I have always wondered why people sneeze and what makes us sneeze, what an interesting project to do! I have used iMovie a lot and it is a lot of fun also a really easy program to use. I would advise making a practice video just to get use to all the different effects iMovie provides.
Good Luck!
From,
Nasmin
Emily S, Maya C
SHARING GENIUS HOUR PROJECTS:
Expanding and improving upon the drop-off/pick-up & parking area zone
Hi, Emily and Maya here, and our Genius hour project is about improving the school’s drop-off/pick-up area along with adding more parking space. The reason for this project is that in the mornings and afterschool, there is a least a 10 minute wait in front of the school to be dropped off or picked up (for the students) by the parents waiting in a line –up in their cars. There is also very little parking space, and this is due to the fact that our school is made for about 1000 students, and currently, we have 1500 students, increasing the school’s desired population by a quarter the amount, and decreasing the amount of space for cars and pedestrians (children) to be able to arrive at school.
Our intentions are to expand the front lanes at the front entrance of the drop-off area, and to add another section for parking, so that the drop-off/pick up area will be more organized, as well as allowing students to arrive to school on time.
This project appealed to us from our own experience of being late or at risk of being late to class, as well as our peers. This is a problem throughout all the grades in our school that cannot be tolerated anymore. Teachers have gone so far as to no longer blame the traffic for the students’ lateness, but have taken to saying that the traffic in front of the school is inevitable, and should always be taken into consideration when coming to school. Do you also have problems with your school’s drop-off area, for example, no parking for cars or traffic in the mornings or afterschool?
For presenting our project we are going have a presentation on imovie (a program similar to powerpoint for making slideshows but it revolves more around video and audio) as well as a small speech that we will give during the video to stress out our points and explain information during the slideshow. For the imovie presentation we have interviewed parents, teachers, and students and asked them a few questions on their opinion of the school’s current drop off/pick up area and parking situation. We have gathered information from the students, but not yet from the teachers and parents. However, we already have the imovie and speeches all planned out, and we still would like to add in a map of our to-be-improved school drop off/pick up area as well as where we would have added in additional parking space.
So, in short, we currently have all of our information and planning finished, now we must finalize our good copies that we will present.
Genius hour in general is a free-reigned project that students can come up with independently. It can be about anything that they have an interest in or about something they would like to find out whether the teacher will give them an option, a theme, a smaller topic that they can choose an idea from, or they can brainstorm the idea on their own. This project allows students that want to learn about something (topic) that they have an interest in so they can learn about it through the process of completing the project.
After reading our intentions/motives/progress, is there anything that you’d like to comment about our presentation? Perhaps, things we should add in to improve and to pinpoint the details in our project all the more? Any feedback? Please let us know! 🙂
Thank you!
Sincerely,
Emily & Maya
the Firehawk Gazette
Kasey and Sapeeda
Hi our names are kasey and sapeeda and we are creating a Mac and cheese app. About our app: Well basically we are creating an apple app filled with tons of different Mac and cheese recipes we have 99 different recipes and came up with cool funky names for each and everyone of them. What made us think of this app? to this idea when our lovely teacher ms Lees declined our first idea we had to resort to this idea. When my helpful partner kasey thought then maybe we should make a funny joke app but that sounded like to much work so we both spent days thinking up a new idea when all of a sudden kasey thought maybe we should do a Mac and cheese app and that’s how the idea was born. Why did this idea appeal to us? This idea apealed to us because we both wanted to make an app and we both love Mac and cheese so we both loved the idea. What are the skills we are using? Well the skills we are using are our developing our tech skills and by creating this app we are also developing our technology skills what is the content of the app? The content of this app is that it has about 99-101 recipes all with very original funky names. Where are we at now? Right now we are in the midst of creating our app in fact we have almost finished creating our app it is called the Mac app. We also have created a twitter account @makappgirls and an email address@themakappgirls@gmail.com and please email us for any suggestion or more feed. Thank you for your time we hope to have our app up soon
Alice
My Genius Hour project: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_VQbKih7YXzBfXSm3MWGIecKO4BKu5-QrfNI_QG6Gag/edit
I await your response!