THE PAST HALF OF THE SCHOOL YEAR

BY: JULIE

For the past half of the school year, I have learned new things and new skills. One of the new skills that that I have gained was in band. My band teacher, Mr.Housego, asked me if I would like to play the bass clarinet for one trimester. I wanted to have a go on it, and also wanted an experience, so I said 'yes'. The bass clarinet was challenging for me and I think that was a new skill I learned: how to play the bass clarinet and also, how to try something challenging. I also think that I picked a good choice of accepting Mr.Housego's suggestion.Now, I can play the bass clarinet better than when I first played it!

Another challenge I handled was the lockers and combinations. At first, I was not used to lockers and I couldn't open them very well. To make it more challenging, there were also P.E. and band lockers and I thought: 'Wow, I 'm never going to memorize all of these combinatins!' For the first week or so, I had to bring my planner which had my combinations written on it to everywhere. Then, I slowly got used to the lockers and I soon remembered every single combination and that really surprised me. Now I'm doing fine with my lockers, and for me, it's not a challenge anymore.

A skill I want to learn is in art. I want to learn how to do modeling with clay, which we will be learning. I really have fun in art because I can show my ideas, draw them, and do everything freely. I positively contributed to the 6th grade community by being a responsible student. From ISKL Melawati to ISKL Ampang was a great change for me and especially, we had much more responsibility. At first, all the responsibility I had was too heavy for me. However, as time flew by and I got used to being a middle school student, it wasn't a big, heavy bag anymore! I realized that it was just what I needed to do in my normal life, only a little more! I think that my responsibility is going to get heavier as I get older, but, I promised myself that I'll try my best.

I have set two goals for the new year and the next 6 months. One of them I really want to accomplish is mandarin. I am currently taking mandarin classes as an elective at school, and I enjoy them. I hope I'll get more and more better and by the time when it's the summer holidays again, that I'll be a lot better at mandarin than I am right now. I am planning to revise more at home that I am doing currently by using my mandarin notebook, or asking help from my tuition teacher. Another goal I want to accomplish is about Humanities. I want to become a better writer and reader. I believe that if I want to become a better writer, I have to become a better reader so that I can imagine more exciting stories to write. To accomplish this goal, I'm going to borrow more challenging books from the library and also ask friends and teachers and also my parents for writing advice. I think 2010 will be a wonderful school year!