All good things must come to an end.

When I entered my senior year of high school I knew that an English class would be mandatory to graduate, and I was already dreading it. On the first day of school I received my schedule and luckily enough my English class wasn't until fourth block of my last semester, but as the days drew closer I was already worrying about the work I would have to do and my senior project. The day finally came and I walked into my senior English class. The teacher made her introduction and as I awaiting to hear her say get your paper and pencils out and come get a text book, she said welcome to Globaloria and that is when the tables were flipped. All of my work was to be done on the computer and my senior project was to create a video game.

I then became very excited, and i figured that the class would be very easy but I soon found out I was very wrong. We would be keeping a learning log, social profile and a blog which were very simple as long as you kept up with your work. The class would also be learning flash as well as all of the other things a regular English class would with our online text book. As we really started learning things began to be very difficult, especially in flash we had so many codes. Everyday in this world we called Globaloria was a challenge, and things were also beginning to fall into place. Our games were begging to work and our pages were looking great.

This class was amazing and a great experience, that I wouldn't trade for anything. Things got difficult but I never gave up, and in the end I had a good game and a great time. I got the chance to learn in flash and be able to use my creativity in a great educational way. I loved this class and would suggest it to anyone, it is a great and easy way to learn. I am so glad I got to experience Globaloria, so thank you to the people who are over it and my incredible teacher.

Reviewing Team Pages

The first team I checked out was Katie and Amy's game named "Pinky & The Brain." Their game was about the social issue of education, and how life is like a big maze to graduation day. They only had part of their demo uploaded but it was very good. I think they had a great idea in creating their game. The demo was very organized and looked very nice. The only advice I could possibly think to tell them would be to maybe considering keeping the mouse inside the lines. The thing I will take back to my game is making it an option to view our instructions or not. The second team's page I viewed was Jeremiah and Jessica's, their team is called ''JESSAMAIH." Their game is about recycling and when you recycle you win money to get West Virginia out of debt. I absolutely loved their game I think it is great. Jessamiah's game looks like a real game that could be on the Internet instead of a student made game. I think that every aspect of their game is wonderful. Both of the teams pages I viewed were incredible and I can't wait to play their final games. http://www.myglife.org/usa/wv/rhswiki/index.php/Team:Team_JESSAMIAH! http://www.myglife.org/usa/wv/rhswiki/index.php/Team:Pinky_%26_the_Brain

Group Chat!

We were put into groups and given the task of reading a few different poems and discussing them, but not by moving around and talking. So we used our Gmail accounts we created to hold a chat between team members. My group was made up of Samantha and Shaina. After preparing our group chat we each picked a poem from our literature book to write a summary about. All three of us read all of the poems and discussed them so we could get a mutual feel. I think that working together helped us to get a better understanding of what we are reading. I really liked the group chat and thought it was a very effective way of learning. By messaging each other on the computer about our assignments the classroom was quieter and people weren't getting distracted by all the chatter.

West Virginia Girl ♥

West Virginia is known as the wild and wonderful state, and in my opinion it definitely is. West Virginia is home to some of the most beautiful places in the country, from the Appalachian Mountains to Ohio River. I love living here in this amazing state, and wouldn't go anywhere else. West Virginia is both rural and civilized, we have our small towns but we also have cities. Although our cities do not compare to the ones in New York or California they supply us with all we need. I believe that the residents of this state are by far more friendly than most people in others. Most people here will talk to anyone and give you the shirt off there backs, I guess you could say we just have a southern charm. Every one here is very unique, but most seem to share the same interests such as fishing, hunting, riding, camping, and just being in the woods.
West Virginia may not be the most wealthy state but we do take great pride in what we have. The pride of our state is West Virginia University. WVU is located in Morgantown, and is very popular for there academics and sports. Our football team is decent and from year to year they continue to get better. The boys basketball team is doing wonderful and even made it to the final four this year. No matter how well our sports teams do from season to season we all support them. And if I can assure you of one thing, gold and blue runs deep in our mountains and almost everyone is a Mountaineer fan.
West Virginia is very well known for it's natural resources, such as coal. Coal is great for our state's economy and provides many jobs to our area. This state is the heart of coal mining. To a lot of people here mining runs in their blood and their families have mined for many generations.
But mining is very dangerous and we have suffered a lot of losses over the years. This week over twenty- five people died in a mine explosion in Raleigh County. It was a great tragedy and our we are all mourning them. We are all gathering together and helping the families of the miners deal with their losses. Whether it is one life or one hundred lives taken it is a great tragedy, so I will continue to pray for the miners and their families and I hope that everyone does the same.
People tend to perceive us as just redneck hillbillies. Others think that we are inbred, have bad teeth or well not any at all, and are stupid. In reality we are the same as everyone else; we are very well educated but we just tend to like the more simple things in life. We may have our country accents but we are really good people and I hope that people from other states realize that one day.

PJ's Mini Lesson

Last week PJ who is in Ms. Cordle's digital imagining class, volunteered to help teach us how to use flash better. He made a tutorial and went over it with us step by step. The tutorial was very effective and taught me a lot. I was really worried about creating a real game and didn't think I could really make everything work correctly, but now I feel more confident since I have more knowledge in flash. Before he came in working in flash would give me a headache but now I can't wait to work on my game.

Buttons

A major part of our games are the buttons, and yesterday we were given the assignment to create them. So, after we finshed up drawing some of our scenes we tried to create buttons. The process was very simple but we made it very complicated by not listening to the full directions. We spent forever trying to figure for oursleves how to create them, but eventually we just gave in and asked for some advice. Our classmates showed us how to correctly create buttons, and it ended up being very simple.

Paper Prototype

Chad and I have came together and created the team of Thing 1 & Thing 2, and we have decided to make a game together. We have played different games to get ideas, made a mini game, choose a topic, and now we are planning our game. We put our ideas together and created our
paper prototype. Once we made all our different scenes and put them together we planned out what we would say in our video. Then we practiced and began filming.

Planning My Game

Chad and I have decided not to have specific roles and just do all the work as a team. We both want to create a great game and collaborating our ideas. We are both very creative and hard workers. Chad and I haven't had any disagreements thus far, we work very well together and are very considerate of each others ideas. We are both looking forward to creating this game and hope everyone enjoys playing it. Our game was inspired by the social issue of education. We choose education, because we both feel it is very important,and everyone should want to learn and better them selves. We also think that an education is essential for a good future.

"The Canterbury Tales"

The Canterbury Tales was written by Geoffrey Chaucer in the year of 1387, during his time he was unemployed. Chaucer uses twenty-nine different characters to display specific stereotypes in society. The story begins with him meeting these people and agreeing to join their pilgrimage. Like everyone does, his character stereotypes each person upon meeting them, and so he begins to describe each character in order of their social rank or status. Each character is very important to describing the society and how people truly are. Societies are filled with all different kinds of people, and although not all of the people are good they all have a role. The world is made up of a few genuinely nice people, some scam artists, and what seems to be a lot of very evil people anymore, but unfortunately I believe that our world would not function correctly without everyone. Each one of his characters portarys a certain kind of person we all know, or maybe the person we are whether we want to believe it or not.
The narrator begins by describing each character he meets in order of their status. The first character he meets is the Knight who known as a very great and worthy man. The second is his son the Squire, who is only twenty years of age. The Squire is a very musical and loving, he is also a bachelor. The Yeoman is very handy for the Knight to travel with since he is great at caring for weapons. All those characters have a very high social status as well as many other characters. At the bottom of the social ranking was the Host who is in charge of this long journey. I have only described a few of the characters he used but all of them are very important in the story and make the story a great piece of literature.
I believe that characters make the story and just like in these tales we must be very stategic about the characters we choose for our games. We must think out the kind of people we want to use and how we want portray them. I think that characters make up how entertainment including video games, movies and books appeal to people.

www.gradesaver.com

Imagine Your Game

Today we did some tutorials on flash and learned how to change the text and it's properties. Then we got with our partners and began to think up some ideas for our game. Chad and I chose the social topic of education to create our game. Our game will be about a student whose mission is to deliver an apple to their teacher. Our game will be located in a school atmosphere and the student will have to answer a series of questions to reach the teacher. The student will receive points if they answer correctly, and if they answer incorrectly they will receive detention slips. If the student receives three detention slips then they will loose the game. The number of points they receive will determine is the apple is fresh and juicy or old and moldy. The student should try their hardest to deliver a nice apple to please the teacher, because a rotten apple will make them very unhappy. We hope that this game will turn out just as we have planned and be very successful.

Anglo-Saxons and Video Games

Through all the generations and cultures the idea of an epic hero remains the same. Epic heroes represent the universal quest for knowledge and understanding. Each culture has a different version of heroes and they may all wear different attires but they represent the same beliefs. Epic heroes are exceptional kinds of human beings that are related to the gods and encompass supernatural energies within them. Heroes, just like us are subject to the trials and tribulations of life and occasional obstacles seem to stand in their way to achieving their goals. The hero must demonstrate confidence and courage in themselves and their powers to overcome obstacles. The tales of epic heroes may differ in their themes and purposes, but they all seem to relate to the characteristics of human life.

The epic hero Gilgamesh was two-thirds god and one-third human. He possessed incredible human and supernatural powers. Gilgamesh has hopeless desires and weaknesses just like us. He was handsome, strong and courageous, but he suffered form excessive pride in himself. He was the leader of his people and contributed in the building of the great city of Uruk. His people were very upset with how he would treat them and would often pray to the gods for relief. In turn the gods sent Enkidu, who they thought would be a match for him. However, the two became great friends and set out on many adventures together. They were looking for fame but would have to face many obstacles along the way. They would be scared along their journey but would have to overcome their fears and become courageous and confident.

In the game Super Mario, the hero is a little cartoon man named Mario. In the game his mission is to rescue the wonderful Princess Peach. On his journey he has to deal with many obstacles to save to princess who has been abducted. Mario has to fight off dragons and people from getting to the castle. He must show courage and defeat each level to finally rescue Princess Peach. Just like the other epic heroes he has a goal that he wishes to achieve and must try very hard to accomplish them. Mario must show courage and confidence in himself to overcome the obstacles set in front of him. So, the heroes of the past and present are a lot alike must all show the same characteristics.

Mini Game Tutorial

The "Bunny and Carrot," game was the first game that we were given the chance to create and publish to our Wikis. It was very challenging and exciting to create our first game. We were given different characters that we had to transform into different symbols and give them actions to make them move. Codes were given to us that hepled us make them move in different directions and even loop. We could even keep the score of our characters. It was a very fun and interesting process and I can't wait to create another game.

Choosing A Topic

We were given a list of social issues and we had to choose a topic that interests us. So I chose education, which is very important to me since I want to become a teacher once I graduate. I wrote about how education is just the knowledge of the world around us and how knowledge helps us to build a perspective on life. Having knowledge helps us to create opinions and form points of view on everything around us. To me education is a process in which it takes years to gain information about the world surrounding us. All the information that we gain over the years is converted to knowledge, that will help us for a lifetime. I think that an education is about the lessons of life, not just the things you learn in books.

Beowulf Part 2

The ultimate item of lasting value that Beowulf left with his people was courage. He wanted his people to realize that if you believe in yourself then you can achieve anything. Beowulf wanted the people to have the courage to stand up to their enemies and defeat them. The people saw him as having great strength and courage, and maybe with his influence they will look deep inside themselves and find the same courage that he possessed.

Audience Post

- I think the first person who prepared to share the tale of Beowulf, assumed that this story would be very educational. The teller probably made the purpose of the story to be about confidence, and how you should always have confidence in yourself.
- I think that the storyteller's beliefs about the intended audience is that all the townsmen in Denmark believed that Beowulf would win the fight, so they gathered and celebrated the hopeful victory.
- I plan to create a game that will appeal to every age group and hopefully everyone will emjoy to play.

Beowulf Part 1

The story “Beowulf” begins with a monster named Grendel, who was split into a thousand forms of evil spirits and goblins. Grendel lived in the darkness of the night. His mind was as quick as his claws, and he never second guessed killing anyone. He was so delighted with the killings he made, that once he killed them he would run with their bodies letting the blood drip from their corpse. One day a man named Beowulf ventured to Denmark, where he ran into the evil Grendel. Beowulf was believed to be the strongest person alive, and therefore was loved by everyone. Beowulf knew that he would have to use his great strength to help the people of Denmark and defeat Grendel.While Beowulf was preparing to fight the kind people threw a banquet in honor of him, for they knew he would have to fight for his life against this great evil. All the townsmen believed that Beowulf would come out with a great victory, even though they know great danger comes along with fighting this monster. The fight will be held on the thrashing seas and will take five long nights.

Hero

Martin Luther King, Jr. is not only a civil rights leader or nobel peace prize winner, he is a hero. He acted as a co-pastor at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta and pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama. He was also a dedicated worker for civil rights for his race. Mr. King was a member of the executive committee of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, which was the leading organization of its kind in the nation. He led the first great African American nonviolent deomonstration of the comtemporary times in the United States. Martin Luther King was also a big part in the bus boycott that lasted 382 days. He did many great things in his life before he was assainated, however he had to with many trials and tribulations as well. He was arrested, his home was bombed, and he suffered personal abuse. To some he was a friend,and to many he was a hero.

Playing to Learn

Our assignment was really neat, we were able to play games and pretty much write a critic. We had to play two different games, one that was made from a Globaloria student and one that was professionally created. There were a lot of really cool games, and then there were some that weren't that great too. The student made game I played was "Teenage Pregnancy." The purpose of that game was to prevent teenage pregnancy and let people know some interesting facts and statistics about it. Such as " Teens give birth to approximately 500,000 babies each year" and "A couple that marries at 16 is four times more likely to separate than a couple who marries after the age of 22." I also played the game "What would you do?" During this game you are put in situations and you can see the different outcomes from the choices you have made. I really enjoyed this assignment, and can't wait to create my own game.

Online Safety

The internet is like a second life for most teenageers, so it is very important to stay safe online. Teens should always stay anonymous and never put any personal information online, because the internet is public and everyone can see it. We should always keep our passwords to ourselves because we are responsible for everything that is done under our account. Online people may send inappropriate messages or pictures to you, and the best thing to do is ignore them and report that person immediately. Sometimes people may make themselves sound too good to be true, so they probably are, so never go meet anyone offline. So while online have fun, stay safe, and always trust your instincts.