The English Benchmark for the 1st Quarter was focused on the book “The Odyssey”. We were newly presented in the beginning of the quarter with writing thesis statements/papers. The Key assignment(s) were to create a thesis paper arguing while your thesis is correct. The thesis were mainly based off of the characters in the book up to book 10 and why they acted the way they did. Many of the thesis papers focused on gender roles, glory/honor and the gods and goddesses.

In Spanish 1 in the first quarter, Don Marcos told us to each create a travel guide. The travel guide was to help and educate a tourist visiting a foreign Spanish country. The brochure was to not contain anything from the English language, but only composed only of Spanish. So how was the tourist going to be able to learn anything from a brochure that only had Español and the traveler spoke anything BUT Spanish? Well, by visual aids, of course! For example, in my brochure, I have the phrase: Buenos Diez. Next to that phrase, an arrow coming from Buenos Diez would point to a depiction of dawn. Would you know what that phrase meant?

     Our History Benchmark was to plan/host a party for King Tut himself. We had to think as if we were in his time, we had to plan a Summer Solstice. We had to make King Tut feel welcome and accommodate to his needs. We had to make sure everything was just perfect. The Food had to e perfect, security, lodging and all.

     For my project I worked in a group of 4. The group contained myself, Natikwa G., Maxine H., Anwar A.-Q. For my portion of the project I had the role of organizer and caterer. I made sure all the menus had food that were related to King Tut's home. I organized parts of the Parade and Dinner's. Trying to make King Tut not feel home-sick was a test but I made it work.

     For our English Benchmarks we had to write a 5 paragraph essay. We had to choose a theme to write about. Our themes and choices came form the book The Odyssey. We had to include a quote in every paragraph with no excuses. Our quotes had to be good and not so obvious. It also had to meet all requirements. "Your 5 paragraph essay must be 5 paragraphs long!" says Mr. Kay.

     For my essay I chose to write about gender roles in the book. I also talked about society and it's equalitty. The basis of my whole paper was basically, "If men can do it, why can't women?" I talked about how it was wrong and unjust for their society and ours too, to be that way.