Yesterday my group finally gave our presentation over hallway crowding. Even though it was a little hard to get going on this project and find motivation, I think it work out pretty well in the end for the most part. The worst part was finding a job for everyone to do so that everyone could be contributing all at once. But in the end I think that my group was able to come together and give a pretty decent presentation. I was happy that those in my group that weren't too active in the making of the presentation were willing to step up and help give it in front of the rest of the class and the administrators.

   Yesterday some of my classmates presented their power points to the administration. I thought that they all did a good job explaining what their point was and they all did a good job of giving possible solutions that I think the administration should definitely keep in mind. The fact that the administration was willing to come in and listen to what problems we saw as students and were willing to take our ideas and maybe apply them was really cool. The best way to solve a problem is to figure out how those that it effects feels about. When my group gives our presentation tomorrow I hope that we'll be able to present our ideas as well as the previous groups.

    This past weekend was our the choir christmas concert. Last year I wasn't involved in anything related to choir and this year I barely had any time to do anything but choir stuff. It was fun going around the community and caroling to all the people. You could tell that they appreciated us taking time out of our lives to come sing to them. I also liked how people from the community came and sang or played in the orchestra. I thought it showed leadership how they were willing to come and share their talents and support us.

    Today in class our guest speaker was Mr. Ritchie. It was obvious to me that he is a natural leader and a talented speaker. A lot of the material he used in his presentation was influenced by Ed Thomas. A lot of what he said reminded me of the message that Aaron Thomas had during his talk to our school. The themes of not forgetting where you came from and doing what you believe is right were his main points. My favorite thing that he said was that he was a positive person because there was already enough negative people in the world. It's true that showing a lot of negativity all the time doesn't really help anyone and only hurts you. Overall, I thought his talk was pretty well done and I think everyone could take something away from it.

        Tomorrow Thanksgiving break is over. I'm not exactly happy about going back to school, but I know that it's necessary. I'm happy that I had this past week to spend with my family and enjoy the time off. I like Thanksgiving because it gives everyone a break from whatever is going on in their life and gives them time to catch up with their family, eat a huge meal, and take a nap on the couch.

   Last Friday Ochayna gave her country presentation just like Vuk had done previously. I think it's cool how the foreign exchange program they went through requires the kids to present how they live in their countries. This way we as Americans can be exposed to a different culture just as they are exposed to ours. Everyone lives in different ways but it's clear that a lot of aspects of peoples' lives are the same no matter where they live.

Vuk's presentation

     The other day in class Vuk presented a powerpoint about his country of Montenegro. I thought it was cool how much he seemed to be really proud of his country and he was really excited about sharing it with all of us. I think it shows leadership in the fact that he signed up to do the exchange student program and left the country he obviously cares a lot about to come and learn about our culture and study in our school. I'm not sure if I would be willing to do the same.