• I learnt these things about the Language used with reference to the culture of the country that I explored.

Komorebi as whole event was about 7 continents in the world however I was the leader of the continent Asia. We had 3 main ideas to portray the cultural aspects of all the countries although we also conveyed cultural aspects through the decorations we had. In the food and drinks menu, each item was from different country so we priced each dish in their own currency rates and with the currency symbol. In television, the text type chosen was due to the cultural norms. As the people find it interesting and instant to watch news channel we portrayed the news in the same text type which they like. We had created the leaders who represent each country for our decoration to show the audience who represents countries in Asia in front of the world.

2. This is how I attempted to incorporate my ‘Language in Cultural Context’ learning into my project

Firstly,We created food and drinks menu of 6 different countries from Asia. Here the each food dish and drink is considered as popular culture as they are traditionally famous in their countries and it is being consumed by a mass. We can also connect the text type of the menus to LO-1 “Analyse how audience and purpose affect the structure and content of texts”. As the purpose of the menu is to persuade the audience which leads to the usage of stylistic fonts and colors. We had given a brief description of each item because our audience were basically Surtis who are not aware of the main ingredients of the traditional dishes. Secondly, We created a video which had the weird rules from each country. We also connected this to the LO-1 as my audience were not really aware about the rules of each country and did not have a idea what is it so we used visuals for each rule we included and we converted the rules in our words so that The audience would easily connect to the visuals. Thirdly, We created a television after analysing the cultural norms of this world. The people find reading newspaper time consuming and due to technological advances people prefer television which have quick and instant news so we decided to create it.   

3. These are the things I did well in my Project

Manan & I were the project leaders. We had 6 participants under us and we collaboratively were representing ASIA. The project leaders basically had to get the work done and also help them if it was needed. Manan was a person who needed a push every now and then. He was a little less inclined however I took the responsibility to lead the group with his assistance. I used to initiate everything. I was the one who managed to get the work done. There was a stage where we called meetings to start off with the ideas we had decided but out of a total of 8 only 3-4 would actually turn up in the meetings. As the participants found a way to run away from the work, I also found a way to get them do the work. I decided to assign each of them with 1 work which had to be done from home and give them deadlines for the same. This was a win-win situation as they did not have to wake up early to work for this in school and also the work was in progress. I regularly took updates from the participants about the progress of the work. Towards the end, this idea was not working out well as we had to prepare the decorations also. We kept 1-2 meetings where everybody worked collaboratively and the freeslots were used by each participant to complete the work. Manan and I had to manage them but we saw there was a lack of enthusiasm in the participants so we decided to help them with the decorations and ideas.  

4. These are areas on which I could have worked to improve my process or final product(s).

I think our group put up a great show on the day of the event and we worked very well towards the end. I think we had everything about Asia but we had no information about arts which plays a vital role in culture of Asia. Our presentation was a bit time consuming and sometimes I felt the parents got bored. We had a video of 4 minutes were most of the parents got bored this was where we could have improved. We had a lot of last minute hassle on the day of the event for the decorations as we as a whole group procrastinated the decorations part. I think if we had not procrastinated we wouldn’t have faced difficulties on the day of the event. Because of the last minute hassle we were not able to cater to 1 set of audience in the start as we were not ready.

5. The CAS learning outcome that I met through the project is/are:

L1 – Identify own strengths and develop areas for growth

Before everything had started I already knew my essential strength and weakness. I wasn’t really confident while speaking however I had the skills to manage people so I decided to take up the responsibility of project leader. I thought this is one of the opportunities where I can make mistakes and learn however in future I won’t get such opportunities so I was keen on improving both my strengths and weaknesses. On the day of the event I was the one who had to introduce everything which was present in the class, explain how is every idea connected to language in cultural context and also explain the first idea. I was nervous in the start however after 1-2 times I improved on my confidence level as every teacher appreciated me the way I was explaining them.

L3-Demonstrate how to initiate and plan a CAS experience

We were 8 people all together in a group so to communicate freely we created a hangouts group where we the leaders can make some announcements and take regular feedbacks about the progress. Also the participants can ask queries regarding anything related to the event in the group. This was very effective however sometimes people made excuses such as they did not check the hangouts. We created a document where each participant was required to put up their information and to complete all the work on time manan and I gave deadline for them to finish off the research part. We assigned work to each participant and they were given deadlines to complete the task. I am a person who likes to be organized all the times and so I took the responsibility being the leader to keep our work organized. Initiating the event was a little easier than planning as we had many things which we had to cater for example we had to connect every idea to language in cultural context however in initiating we just had to work on the idea we had finalized which was easier as we were not supposed to think, we just had to put the information gathered as per the ideas. Becoming the leader helped me understand how to deal with different sorts of people. Also it will be lot simpler to plan and initiate another CAS.   

L4-commitment to and perseverance

This project for every continent was a huge task as we had to inculcate about 6 different countries and also all the different cultures present in Asia. Looking at such a big task already shows that we required commitment and perseverance while we work for this project. We had to commit that everybody adheres to the deadlines and completes the task with full integrity. I had to be persistent because I was the leader and I had to deal with different sorts of people so I had to work with them despite having several problems in the case of completion of task. Without showing perseverance or/and commitment we would not even have completed the tasks and would have presented a poor project.

L5- Demonstrate skills and benefits of working collaboratively

For me it is quite easy to work in groups as the work gets divided and so it ensures faster completion of the task. However in this case I feel collaboration was a must as there were a lot of ideas which we finalized. It would have been tedious for a single person to do all the work. There was 1 set back working in collaboration here, as the participants were less inclined the work did not happen with a good speed. I had pratik in my group, even after several reminders before the deadline and after the deadline he did not finish his work so I talked to concerned teachers about it however there was no significant effect of that. So, I did some part of his task so that he gets motivated and completes the work as soon as possible. Ali was also one of my participants who was lazy in doing his work and he used to make excuses such as I cannot find the required information. Since I react to such excuses very violently I asked my partner to deal with him which he did very well as after that we could see a well research and perfect work.  Manan was my partner for project leader however he needed a little push every time so It was really important that a leader pushes everybody to work and ensures that the work is being done. I took this responsibility to push each participant and my partner as well.