Blood

Welcome to another post on my blog. I am sharing my completed task for Biology - Medical Science. The third part of Medical Science is Blood. I hope you like it.

References:

https://www.webmd.com/heart/anatomy-picture-of-blood#1

Vorderman, Carol. Help Your Kids with Science: A Unique Step-by-Step Visual Guide. DK, 21 May 2012.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQWlcSp9Sls

Challenges Chart

Welcome to another post on my blog. Today, I finished my independent activity for the Wonder Film Study in English. In that activity, I had to select four lead characters and create a Challenges Chart, using the following headings:

• Characters Name
• A Challenge faced by the character
• How the character reacted
• What is shows us about the character

Reflection

What am I learning?

I am learning to write challenges that lead characters in Wonder faced.

How does this work show my learning?

This shows my learning by putting information about each character.

What am I wondering?

Nothing

Muscles and Joints

Welcome to another post on my blog. For Biology, we are looking at Medical Science after finishing Nutrition and Digestion. The second part of Medical Science is Muscles and Joints. I hope you like it.

References:

• https://kidshealth.org/en/kids/muscles.html
• https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/topics/z9339j6/articles/zpbxb82
• https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/encyclopedia/content.aspx?contenttypeid=85&contentid=P00044
• https://www.innerbody.com/image_skel07/skel31.html

I hope you liked and learnt from my post. Have a nice day!! Bye!!

Why do Joints Click?

Welcome to another post on my blog. I am going to share the second activity that I completed in Biology. In that activity, we had to watch the video: Why do joints click? And explain what causes joints to click.

All information is from the, 'Why do joints click?' and 'Here's what happens to your knuckles when you crack them' video.

The most common explanation on why your joints sound like bubbles popping is well, there are bubbles in there. When you stretch out that joint, you are releasing gas, and that gas forms a bubble, it collapses and pops. The joints in your fingers are the easiest to crack, but many people also crack their hips, wrists, shoulders, necks, shoulders and so on. 

Knuckle-crackers know that to get that satisfying pop, you stretch the joint farther than it normally goes by bending your fingers backwards, for example, when that happens, the bones move away from each other. The space between the bones gets bigger, but the amount of synovial fluid stays constant. That creates a low-pressure zone, that pulls dissolves gases out of the synovial fluid, that pulls dissolved gases out of the synovial fluid, just like the carbon dioxide that fizzes out of soda when you twist open the cap. Inside the joint, the escaping gases from a bubble with a pop. 

The reason knuckle cracking is like that because it contains lots of dissolved gas molecules, like other fluids in your body. But the bubble doesn’t last long. The surrounding fluid presses on it until it finally collapses. The bubbles gases scatter throughout the synovial cavity and slowly dissolve back into the fluid. In order to crack the same muscle again, you have to wait for around 20 minutes for the gas to return back to that fluid. 

Some scientists think there may by two pops. One when the bubble forms, and other when it bursts. Dr Donald Unger was a self-described researcher who chose to pop the joints in one of his hands for 50 years but not the other one and he wanted to find out if popping your knuckles would actually five your arthritis. After 50 years of doing it, he found that he didn’t have any more arthritis in one hand than the other.

There is still a chance it’s not good for you. One 1990 study did find that cracking your knuckles over a long period of time led to hand swelling and decreased scrip strength, but there hasn’t been any follow-up research on that. While knuckle cracking might not be bad for you, there’s still no guarantee that your popping habit won’t annoy the people around you.

Positive Thoughts and Self-Talk | Health

Welcome to another post on my blog. I am going to share the topic that I completed for Health. After finishing Hauora/Wellbeing we go on the second unit of Health, Staying Mentally Healthy. 

First, we had to pick topics interest us. Then, we need to create our own learning outcomes that relate to our chosen topic. This needs to be written out on our work to show your learning for each topic that we complete. After that, we need to show our learning by following the task instructions. 

We had to choose from.

1. Resiliency 
2. Mental health issues 
3. Media and M/E wellbeing
4. Positive thoughts and self-talk
5. Emotional regulation
6. Strategies to cope/getting help
7. Community resources
8. Statistics
9. Avoiding judgment 
10. Change, loss and grief
11. Inquiry 

I chose Positive thoughts and self-talk. We were given a few tasks to do in our chosen topic. As in my topic, I had to complete the left and right side of tasks.

L.H.S

The task was to:

1. Decide on how you will show your learning.
2. State what the meaning of positive thoughts and positive self talk are (define these two words).
3. State what the benefits of positive thoughts and self talk are.

I chose to show my learning on my blog. Here is my work.

Definition of Positive thinking and positive self-talk.

Positive thinking

Positive thinking is a mental and emotional attitude in which you think or expect something good and favourable results. Positive thinking is a process of creating thoughts which create and transform energy into reality. It also means trying over again and not accepting defeat. Positive thinking means having a good and positive attitude. Focusing on the positive side of the situation and not the negative.

Positive Self-talk

Positive self-talk makes you feel good about yourself and things. It’s like having a voice in your head that always looks on the good side. On the other side, negative self-talks make people miserable and can also change their improvement from mental health issues.

Benefits of Positive thinking and Positive self-talk

Positive thinking

There are benefits of positive thinking, such as health benefits. Positive thinking can help your health too like stress. Positive thinking can lower levels of distress. Having increased life san and lower rates of depression. Feeling stronger, as confidence and self-esteem increases. A positive mood can lead to many physical health benefits such as blood pressure, it can lower blood pressure.

Positive self-talk

There are some benefits and techniques for increasing positive self-talk, including

• Improved immune function
• Reduced pain
• Less stress and distress
• Greater life satisfaction
• Reduced risk for death
• Better physical wellbeing

These all can lead to a nice and happy life. 

R.H.S

The task was to:

• Watch one of these clips and explain what was said in them AND why it is important for your mental health to do this.

                                        

• Explain what areas of Hauora would be enhanced by reading the positive thoughts AND why.
• Create a poster that has a bunch of positive thoughts all over it. 

I chose the 2nd clip.

In the clip, it said to use positive self-talk instead of negative self-talk when faced in a challenge. Control yourself and be positive when facing the challenge and never give up. This is important for mental health because you can get focused on the challenge and overcome it.

One 2010 study shows optimists have a better quality of life. Research shows that positive self-talk can improve:

• Stress Management
• Wellbeing
• Self-esteem
• Reduce any symptoms of anxiety, depression and personality disorders.
• Improve your body image
• Can help treat people with eating disorders. 

Self-talk can enhance performance and wellbeing. 

It can improve and enhance performance of our physical wellbeing (Taha Tinana). Research shows that self-talk can help athletes with performance. It may support with endurance or to power through a set of heavyweights. 

Self-talk can also improve our mental & emotional wellbeing (Taha Hinengaro). Self-talk can help students and workers by doing their work or completing their work. Your thoughts are the cause of your emotions and mood. The communications you have with yourself can be destructive or beneficial. They determine how you feel about yourself and how you react to situations in your life. People are becoming more conscious that positive self-talk is a powerful tool for developing your self-confidence and restraining negative emotions.

Next, we had to create a poster that has a bunch of positive thoughts all over it. Here is my poster. I hope you like it.

References:

• HealthDirect - Self-talk
• HealthLine - Positive self-talk
• HealthLine - Self-talk

How Bones Grow

Welcome to another post on my blog. I am going to share the activity that I completed in Biology. In that activity, we had to watch the video: How Bones Grow, and answer some questions.
What are the materials used to make and reinforce bone? How does it work?

All information is from the, 'How Bones Grow' video.


Osteoblasts, the makers, have a counterpart called osteoclasts, the recyclers. Osteoclasts break down the unneeded mineral lattice using acid and enzymes so that osteoblasts can then add more material. As calculated by Wolff’s Law, that makes osteoclasts more active than osteoblasts, ending in a loss of bone mass and strength. When bones break, the body has an amazing ability to repair the bone as if it never happened.

First, doctors extract stem cells from the patient’s fat tissue and take CT scans to find the exact dimensions of the missing bone. Next, they model the exact shape of the hole, either with 3D printers or by carving with decellularized cow bones. Those are the bones where all of the cells have been stripped away, leaving only the sponge-like mineral lattice. They then add the patient's stem cells to this lattice and place it in a bioreactor, a device that will simulate all of the conditions found inside the body. Temperature, humidity, acidity and nutrient composition all need to be just right for the stem cells to differentiate into osteoblasts and other cells, colonise the mineral lattice, and remodel it with living tissue. Remember Wolff’s Law? An artificial bone needs to experience real stress, or else it will come out weak and brittle, so the bioreactor constantly pumps fluids around the bone, and the pressure tells the osteoblasts to add bone density. Put all of this together, and within three weeks, the now living bone is ready to come out of the bioreactor and to be implanted into the patient's body.

Mapping | Sustainability

Welcome to another post on my blog. In today's post, I am going to share the activity that I finished for Maths and Sustainability. The topic was Maps & Map Skills. First, we learnt about FACKTS (Frame, Arrow, Colour, Key, Title, Scale), then, we had to do a mapping task using what we've learnt about FACKTS. Next, we had to present our work on our blog.

The task was to complete a map by locating the Top 10 Countries to visit in 2019. Using an atlas find the following countries and colour them onto the map in different colours. The countries were;

• Sri Lanka
• Germany
• Zimbabwe
• Panama
• Kyrgyzstan
• Jordan
• Indonesia
• Belarus
• Canada
• Belize

Here is my work.

Key

	Sri Lanka
	Germany
	Zimbabwe
	Panama
	Kyrgyzstan
	Jordan
	Indonesia
	Belarus
	Canada
	Belize

I hope you liked my post. Have a nice day!! Bye!!

The Skeleton and Bones | Biology

Welcome to another post on my blog. For Biology, we are looking at Medical Science after finishing Nutrition and Digestion. The first part of Medical Science is bones and the skeleton. I hope you like it.

References:

• https://youtu.be/ywDOiNEdJVc
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clavicle
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phalanx_bone
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sternum
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skull
• https://www.healthline.com/human-body-maps/female-pelvis
• https://www.healthline.com/human-body-maps/humerus-bone
• http://www.childrenshospital.org/conditions-and-treatments/conditions/b/broken-tibia-fibula-shin-bone-calf

I hope you liked and learnt from my post. Have a nice day!! Bye!!

Our Own Money | Business Studies

Welcome to another post on my blog. In today's post, I am going to share the task that I finished in Business Studies. We had given a scenario;

To create two banknotes to be put into circulation. Either create a new value of choice or stick with the current values ($5, $10, $20, $50 or $100). Also, keep in mind the 8 characteristics of good currency:

• Generally accepted
• Durable
• Divisible
• Stable/ consistent
• Transportable
• Scarce
• Easily Recognisable
• Difficult to counterfeit

The money must be relevant to New Zealand, Christchurch or Hornby High School, and feature image or images that are important to that specific place.

Here is the currency that I made.

 

After designing the banknotes, I had to create an annotated diagram featuring one of the notes. 

Next, we had to write a paragraph explaining how the currency meets at least five of eight criteria for good currency.

One of the two banknotes that I designed was the $200 note. It is made of a thin type of plastic called "polymer", a note is waterproof and difficult to tear. As a result, these notes are durable and transportable. Both $200 and $300 are easily divisible. Polymer banknotes include many security features not accessible in paper notes. Polymer notes are more environmentally friendly than paper notes because they last more and can be recycled when they reach the end of their life in circulation. Both notes are polymer and use raised ink, these features make them difficult to counterfeit. On both notes, it is stated that there is legal tender in New Zealand. This makes them generally accepted and easily recognisable. While the money is controlled responsibility by the government, the banknotes stay scarce. The value of the money doesn't vary, it stays the same, making it a stable and consistent currency.

An Unusual Hole in the Ozone Layer - Over the Arctic

Welcome to another post on my blog. In today's post, we are looking at an unusual hole in the Ozone Layer. For more information, read this article.

Over the last month, a weird new hole in the ozone later has formed over the Arctic and looks to become the largest on record for the region also, it is expected to disappear.

Ozone is a gas made up of three oxygen atoms (O3)The ozone layer is a thin section of the Earth’s atmosphere that absorbs nearly all of the sun’s damaging ultraviolet (UV) light. It is a layer or shield of Earth’s stratosphere that absorbs most of the Sun’s ultraviolet radiation. The Ozone layer is a ring of protective gases around the Earth that absorbs dangerous ultraviolet rays before they reach the surface. 

Damage

Ozone layer damage is more like a really thin spot than a hole. The ozone layer damage is thinnest near the poles, especially the South Pole. As the ozone layer thins, more ultraviolet light enters the Earth’s atmosphere. A forest pathologist examines pines damaged by ozone in San Bernardino National Forest, California. Ozone in Earth’s lower atmosphere is created by people, from vehicle gases and industrial emissions. Ozone pollution can damage plants and cause respiratory problems in people. 

The Formation

Ozone forms a protective blanket in the stratosphere, about 10 to 50 kilometres above the ground, where it shields from solar ultraviolet radiation. But each year in the Antarctic winter, frigid (freezing) temperatures allow high-altitude clouds to combine above the South Pole. 

The Antarctic ozone hole forms every year because winter temperatures in the area routinely plummet, allowing the high-altitude clouds to form. These conditions are much rarer in the Arctic, which has more variable temperatures and isn’t usually primed for ozone depletion, says Jens-Uwe Grooß, an atmospheric scientist at the Juelich Research Centre in Germany.

However this year, powerful westerly winds moved around the North Pole and caught cold air within a ‘polar vortex’. There was more cold air above the Arctic than in any winter recorded since 1979, says Markus Rex, an atmospheric scientist at the Alfred Wegener Institute in Germany. In chilly temperatures, high-altitude clouds are formed and the ozone-destroying reactions start. 

The strange hole, in the past few weeks, scientists and space organisations have tracked from space and the ground over the past few days, has reached a record. Marcus Rex told Nature that the Arctic ozone hole didn’t threaten human health over the next month. There might be a possibility that it might drift over more populated areas. He recommended more sunscreen. However, the hole is to disappear in a few weeks. 

Maps of the Arctic Hemisphere by NASA’s Ozone Watch created satellite data that shows the hole growing in size from end last year till now. The hole looks set to break up in the coming weeks but not before setting a new record in ozone layer exhaustion at the North Pole. 

This is rare and unusual because an opening in the Ozone layer appears every spring over the Antarctic, but the last time this phenomenon was seen in the North was in 2011. In the past, mini ozone holes have hardly been spotted over the North Pole, but the exhaustion over the Arctic this year is much larger compared to previous years. 

Source: NASA Ozone Watch & Nature

Diego Loyola, from the German Aerospace Center, remarks, “The ozone hole we observe over the Arctic this year has a maximum extension of less than 1 million sq km. This is small compared to the Antarctic hole, which can reach a size of around 20 to 25 million sq km with a normal duration of around 3 to 4 months.”

“The hole is principally a geophysical curiosity,” said Vincent-Henri Peuch, the director of the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service. “We monitored unusual dynamic conditions, which drive the process of chemical depletion of ozone. [Those dynamics] allowed for lower temperatures and a more stable vortex than usual over the Arctic, which then triggered the formation of polar stratospheric clouds and the catalytic destruction of ozone.”

The hole is not related to COVID-19 shutdowns that have cut down air pollution and reduced greenhouse gas emissions. 

While the hole over the Arctic is a rare event, a much larger hole in the ozone layer over the Antarctic has been a major cause for anxiety for more than four decades. 

The Antarctic ozone hole was the smallest in 35 years last November, showing success of efforts to cut the production of the harmful pollutants. The ozone layer protects the Earth from dangerous levels of ultraviolet radiation from the sun. 

Even this unusual large hole in the ozone layer is considerably smaller than the more known hole over Antarctica, according to the ESA release. It can grow to be as much as 25 million square kilometres and the new Arctic hole is around 1 million square kilometres in size. 

It continues unclear what to expect in the coming years. While the larger ozone hole was caused in part by extreme weather, which has been linked to climate change, it’s too soon to state that the Arctic ozone layer exhaustion will continue to get worse if climate change continues not to control. 

References:

• https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/ozone-layer/
• https://www.whatarethe7continents.com/the-ozone-layer-what-how-formed-important/
• https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/ozone-layer-depletion-chemical-compound-earth-a9445911.html
• https://ozonewatch.gsfc.nasa.gov/facts/NH.html
• https://www.euroweeklynews.com/2020/04/05/climate-change-activists-left-startled-as-the-largest-hole-ever-in-the-ozone-layer-opens-up-over-the-north-pole/\
• https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00904-w
• https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/apr/07/record-size-hole-opens-in-ozone-layer-above-the-arctic
• https://futurism.com/the-byte/hole-ozone-layer-arctic

Earth Stops Shaking Due To COVID-19, Scientists Say

Welcome to another post on my blog. In today's post, we are looking at Earth shaking less after coronavirus. For more information, read this article.

Now, crowded city streets are now empty. Highway traffic has slowed to a minimum, fewer and fewer people are found outside. Around four billion people (approx half the world’s population) have been told to isolate themselves in their homes to prevent the spread of coronavirus. The significant reduction in the hum of normal human activity has lead to a surprising shift in Earth’s vibrations. The lack of noise means “Earth’s upper crust is moving just a little less,” according to CNN.

Scientists tell that coronavirus lockdowns around the world are making the Earth move less. Since people in many countries are stuck from leaving their homes, factories and traffic ground to a stop, seismic noise, hum of vibrations in the planet’s crust have dropped. The researchers told The Independent the change will not only make it easier to detect earthquake signals, but also provide a lesson for the environment. The vibrations from cars, trains, buses, factories and people going about their daily life to create background noise (noise pollution) that make Earth’s crust move. 

Residents of Brussels have been told to stay at home, leaving the city’s streets empty. Credit: Jonathan Raa/NurPhoto via Getty

Thomas Lecocq, a geologist and seismologist at the Roya Observatory in Belgium first pointed out this miracle in Brussels. Brussels is seeing about a 30% to 50% reduction in ambient seismic noise since mid-March, around the time the country started implementing school, business closures and other distancing measures, according to Lecocq. He discovered that about one-third of vibrations have decreased because of social distancing and quarantine restrictions, according to CBS News. That noise level is equal with what seismologists (the scientific study of earthquakes) would see on Christmas Day, he stated. Since quarantine measures were introduced, the surface seismometer at the Royal Observatory of Belgium has become more sensitive to quieter seismic activity that it would have earlier missed, which could lead to more precise measurements of small quakes, quarry blasts, storms and crashing ocean waves. The reduction in noise has provided scientists with a small profit - seismic detection equipment is now more sensitive, Thomas explained to Nature. With an overall quieter planet, seismologists around the globe can anticipate enhanced abilities in instruments that detect the locations of earthquakes and aftershocks. 

Source: Royal Observatory of Belgium

Lecocq said, “This is really getting quiet now in Belgium”. 

Dr Lecocq told The Independent that the capacity of noisy stations those affected by human-generated vibrations to detect smaller earthquake signals was larger since the coronavirus lockdown. 

But the findings are also sociological, he said: “Every individual thinks he is ‘alone at home’, but all together, we are making something big for the ‘seismic environment’ – and we can probably learn a lesson here for other parts of the environment. 

“The reason we are home is terrifying, but in the future, maybe, some critical number of individuals will change their ways, avoiding single-occupancy car-commuting.” Dr Lecocq said there was no proof that the fall in human activity would create earthquakes less expected.

Source: Seismologie.be

Update for Brussels. The background level remains low and stable (~33%).

In February, news articles were published when space images showed a huge fall in pollution over China as factories close. Studies show that it had cut 40% during the lockdown in China.

 “By combining satellite observations with detailed computer models of the atmosphere, their studies indicated a reduction of around 20-30 percent in surface particulate matter over large parts of China,” ESA reported Friday.

Pollution levels in January contrast with those in February

Source: The Independent

Air pollution causes an estimated 1.1 million deaths every year in China and costs the Chinese economy $38 billion USD. Earlier last month, Stanford Earth Sciences Professor Marshall Burke projected two months of coronavirus lockdown had saved the lives of 77,000 Chinese children and elderly from air pollution alone. Worldwide, air pollution kills around 7 million people annually, including 100,000 Americans. 

Fei Liu, an air quality researcher at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Centre said, “This is the first time I have seen such a dramatic drop-off over such a wide area for a specific event”. She said she had seen a drop in nitrogen dioxide levels during the economic collapse of 2008 but she said that decrease more regular.

This year, pollution levels did not rise again after Chinese new year, unlike last year

Source: The Independent

The number of coronavirus cases worldwide continues to skyrocket, with over 1.5 million confirmed positive cases and over 89,000 deaths as of Friday 10 April. 

References:

• https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/coronavirus-lockdown-earth-move-vibrate-seismic-noise-thomas-lecocq-a9445346.html
• https://edition.cnn.com/2020/04/02/world/coronavirus-earth-seismic-noise-scn-trnd/index.html
• https://www.cbsnews.com/news/coronavirus-lockdowns-earth-shaking-less-seismic-noise/
• https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2020/03/22/video-watch-from-space-as-air-pollution-vanishes-over-china-during-coronavirus-lockdown-then-returns/#17b6e6fe35f0
• https://www.foxnews.com/science/coronavirus-caused-earth-effectively-stop-shaking
• https://www.deseret.com/u-s-world/2020/4/7/21209641/coronavirus-covid-19-earthquake-shake-seismic