ABC, Easy as 123
Ah - back to school after winter break. No, I'm not going back to school. I'm done with school. B-school was the end for me. And my Roth. But, I have so many fond memories of school projects throughout the years that I want to share with you. Mostly, I can't believe how crazy some of these projects were... (in a how!-why!-did-they-come-up-with-that way) or how crazy I was.
These don't even scratch the surface of all the school projects I completed in my near-20 year education expedition, but they are, by far, the most memorable. From how creative I was, to how mean I was, to how long I procrastinated - the highlights:
---
Baby Beluga
5th grade, MARE (Marine Animal Something Something) Unit
The project and the point: Pick a marine animal, do research on the animal, prepare a report, and present it to the class. I chose to research the beluga whale - Baaaaaby beluga! Gotta love those Raffi tunes.
What happened: The MARE unit occurred around the same time as my brother’s pinewood derby race car project for Cub Scouts. Only, I worked on the race car with my dad, not my brother. Why my brother didn’t want to do it, I don’t know. But, I recall many trips to the hobby shop and doing a lot of sanding, ramming weights in the front (within the legal limit!), puffing graphite in the wheels, and doing test races in the garage. It was great fun. Being experts at pinewood derby race car design, my dad and I carved a beluga whale out of some pinewood for my MARE project. Similar...sort of. Dad did the carving and I did the sanding and painting. I completed the look with little Sharpie dots for eyes. I also fashioned a carrying case out of an old blue and pink plastic pencil box. Not sure what I learned about beluga whales - the report must have been decent - but, I sure do remember making my model whale with my dad.
Lesson learned: Breidenbachs are a crafty bunch. Thanks, Dad!
Note to the Cub Scouts: I also worked on the sailboat for the sailboat race - it was green. Can you make me an honorary member now since you accept girls? Or am I too old?
---
Design-a-Pool
7th grade, Math project - Mrs. Peterson's class
The project and the point: Design a swimming pool and then build a scaled model of it using one foam core board as the base and the other foam core board to cut out pieces. The point was to learn about… scaling stuff? Why were we designing pools when we lived in New York and pools were usable maybe three months out of the year?
What happened: I spent some agonizing hours with my mom trying to understand how to “scale” the pool, the deck chairs, the cabanas (of course there were cabanas!), the tables, etc. It helps if you know how big these pieces of furniture actually are in real life. I just wanted to get to the decorating part - screw the scaling. But, mom made me sit there and do the math part of the project and convinced me I wasn’t the “stupid” girl I kept saying that I was. Math classes were intense struggles all the way up until high school. I have memories of faxing - yes, faxing - my dad my math homework so he could help me while on work travel. Finally, I got out my markers to decorate the lounge chairs and cabanas I'd cut out of the foam core with an X-Acto knife (that's how great of an idea this was, tell 7th graders to use X-Acto knives), and glued down some dried parsley for grass. My pool looked pretty damn good in the end. And it smelled like parsley. Yay…
Lesson learned: I did not want to be an architect. Let’s auto-scale in the cloud instead :o)
---
Colonial Alphabet
7th grade, Social Studies project - Mrs. Wilson's class
The project and the point: Write a rhyming sentence or two about colonial America using each letter of the alphabet...with a partner. And not just any partner. With the person sitting next to you. We sat in alphabetical order. Fun times. The catch - you and your partner each had to turn in your own copy of the project.
What happened: I was less than thrilled with this partner business - but I had no choice. My partner and I divided up the letters evenly and so that we each had some of the hardest letters like J, Q, X, and Z. We agreed on a date to swap our portion of the rhymes over email - naturally, the day before it was due - so we could each put it together and print it out. I sent her my rhymes and after I received hers and read through them, I decided they were NOT going in my report. I spent the rest of the night rewriting her rhymes. When my mom asked me if I was going to send her the new rhymes, I told her “no.”
At this point you can go ahead and call me whatever names you would like.
We each turned in our rhyming colonial alphabet projects. Two weeks later, we got them back - graded. She saw that I had an A and I saw that she had a B - 'cause remember, we sat next to each other. I remember being a bit embarrassed, but hey! Those were MY rhymes! I suspect this is why she unfriended me on Facebook many years later (after I believe I friended her - I sure had some nerve).
Lessons learned:
-7th grade girls. Yikes.
-There is always a catch and sometimes it works in you favor.
-Don’t let others take credit for your hard work. And teachers need to stop insisting that middle school group projects are beneficial for everyone. They are not.
---
Balance puzzle
8th grade, Math project, Mrs. Bastone's class
The project and the point: Create a 3D version of a balance puzzle with a partner of your choosing (Thank you, GOD!) for extra credit. I needed all the extra credit I could get. “What are balance puzzles,” you ask? Well, the 2D version was a piece of paper with a bunch of different shapes drawn on it that were connected with lines - sort of like an org chart. The different shapes had different values/weights and your job was to figure out what the weights were and/or fill in missing values to make it “balance”. We did a lot of 2D versions at the beginning of class as a precursor to ... ALGEBRA.
What happened: I partnered up with my BFF Allie. Allie and I had been on all sorts of math adventures together - read: Katie calls Allie’s house 10x a day for help. Allie and I spent around a week after school working on our balance puzzle/mobile. We dutifully designed our mobile and then created different shaped pouches which we colored and decorated. Then the real fun began…stuffing the pouches with coins for the “weights” and then attaching them to rods with string and seeing how well our design actually balanced. And then doing lots of adjusting with coins and random desk supplies like paper clips and staples. I’m sure this was just a sight! After many after school snacks and dinners at Allie’s house, we finally got the sucker to balance. Allie brought it to school for us and Mrs. Bastone was so impressed that she kept it! We never got our masterpiece back! Harumph!
Lesson learned: A girlfriend who does a project like this with you when she didn’t even need the extra credit is a girlfriend for life. <3
---
Junior Author Paper
11th grade, English project, Mr. Smith's class
The project and the point: Pick out a book (from a curated list), read it, analyze the bejeezus out of it, and then write four (five?) very long, very different papers about it all (e.g., analytical, write the next chapter, write a different chapter in the same style). In the end, you were expected to turn in 50-75 pages of some hardcore understanding of your book in a creative and meaningful way (aka: you better not just turn in a stack of papers). This project was given to us at the start of school that year and we were supposed to be working on it for months in addition to our regular classwork. Note that word - months. The point… Lordy, I have no idea. College prep?
What happened: The book I chose was Robinson Crusoe. You think it’s gonna be like Cast Away in book form - WRONG! That book was really a complete (completely boring) commentary about 17th century English politics. It was precisely because it was so friggin’ dull that I did not even finish reading the book until two weeks before the project was due. Yeah, I know - major mistake. The week before it was due, I stayed up ‘till after midnight every night working on the papers, the never ending list of CITATIONS, and how I was going to creatively deliver them. My idea - wrap the papers in some kitchen string like a package, put them in a box - with sand in it - and make the box look old... like it washed on shore after months at sea. So, in between furiously typing, editing, and printing, I was dying paper with tea bags, drying it on low heat in the oven, and then mod-podging it onto a scrapbook box. I also randomly had an ink well and wax seal kit so I dripped some ink *creatively* on the box and put on a wax seal. It looked washed up. Perfect. I finally turned in my crowning high school achievement - all 70 pages of it - and was shaking from exhaustion with my other fellow procrastinators. My teacher liked it too until he realized there was sand in the box when it spilled in the trunk of his car. Oops.
Lesson learned:
-Plan. ahead.
-Need some nighttime reading to fall asleep? I’ve got just the book for you.
---
Management Game
MBA, Capstone project
The project and the point: Demonstrate your knowledge of the core business domains: strategy, finance, marketing, and operations - by forming a group/company and playing a simulated game and meeting with a fake board who yells at you and makes you feel like you-know-nothing-John-Snow. I thought one week of the Junior Author Paper was bad. This was three months of shenanigans! We were a group of five - President (me, obviously) and Strategy, Marketing, and Finance VPs who managed a watch company. We operated in a “world” with other groups (our competitors) in different countries also playing this same game (for realz). The goal was to be successful (sell watches, make money) by putting your resources into different variables like factories, making your watches attractive to your market, but affordable, and making your business sustainable. Each week there was a simulation of events and we received a report on how we were doing to inform our strategy the next week. We also had a “board” made up of alumni that we had to meet with every couple of weeks. Your grade was based on how you did in the game, what the board thought about you, and what you thought about each other. This hellacious game was quite timely as I had just moved back to Virginia after starting the divorce process. Between my job and the game, I had one hour, one day a week where I could sob about my situation - Wednesdays in therapy.
What happened: I summarized the experience in meme format. My mom was living with me in my new place for half of the duration game to help me get back on my feet. And to make sure I was eating and sleeping. One of my favorite game memories included a board member telling us he wanted to know how we were going to turn this company around. We weren’t even doing badly! Peeved, my friend and teammate sent a text over the group thread “I’mma turn his ass around.” I paused my video screen so that the board couldn’t see me dying of laughter.
Lesson learned: We didn't exactly turn his ass around. But, we survived. Sometimes, you just have to play the game and raise a glass to the best teammates and mom.
---
These don't even scratch the surface of all the school projects I completed in my near-20 year education expedition, but they are, by far, the most memorable. From how creative I was, to how mean I was, to how long I procrastinated - the highlights:
---
Baby Beluga
5th grade, MARE (Marine Animal Something Something) Unit
The project and the point: Pick a marine animal, do research on the animal, prepare a report, and present it to the class. I chose to research the beluga whale - Baaaaaby beluga! Gotta love those Raffi tunes.
What happened: The MARE unit occurred around the same time as my brother’s pinewood derby race car project for Cub Scouts. Only, I worked on the race car with my dad, not my brother. Why my brother didn’t want to do it, I don’t know. But, I recall many trips to the hobby shop and doing a lot of sanding, ramming weights in the front (within the legal limit!), puffing graphite in the wheels, and doing test races in the garage. It was great fun. Being experts at pinewood derby race car design, my dad and I carved a beluga whale out of some pinewood for my MARE project. Similar...sort of. Dad did the carving and I did the sanding and painting. I completed the look with little Sharpie dots for eyes. I also fashioned a carrying case out of an old blue and pink plastic pencil box. Not sure what I learned about beluga whales - the report must have been decent - but, I sure do remember making my model whale with my dad.
Lesson learned: Breidenbachs are a crafty bunch. Thanks, Dad!
Note to the Cub Scouts: I also worked on the sailboat for the sailboat race - it was green. Can you make me an honorary member now since you accept girls? Or am I too old?
---
Design-a-Pool
7th grade, Math project - Mrs. Peterson's class
The project and the point: Design a swimming pool and then build a scaled model of it using one foam core board as the base and the other foam core board to cut out pieces. The point was to learn about… scaling stuff? Why were we designing pools when we lived in New York and pools were usable maybe three months out of the year?
What happened: I spent some agonizing hours with my mom trying to understand how to “scale” the pool, the deck chairs, the cabanas (of course there were cabanas!), the tables, etc. It helps if you know how big these pieces of furniture actually are in real life. I just wanted to get to the decorating part - screw the scaling. But, mom made me sit there and do the math part of the project and convinced me I wasn’t the “stupid” girl I kept saying that I was. Math classes were intense struggles all the way up until high school. I have memories of faxing - yes, faxing - my dad my math homework so he could help me while on work travel. Finally, I got out my markers to decorate the lounge chairs and cabanas I'd cut out of the foam core with an X-Acto knife (that's how great of an idea this was, tell 7th graders to use X-Acto knives), and glued down some dried parsley for grass. My pool looked pretty damn good in the end. And it smelled like parsley. Yay…
Lesson learned: I did not want to be an architect. Let’s auto-scale in the cloud instead :o)
---
Colonial Alphabet
7th grade, Social Studies project - Mrs. Wilson's class
The project and the point: Write a rhyming sentence or two about colonial America using each letter of the alphabet...with a partner. And not just any partner. With the person sitting next to you. We sat in alphabetical order. Fun times. The catch - you and your partner each had to turn in your own copy of the project.
What happened: I was less than thrilled with this partner business - but I had no choice. My partner and I divided up the letters evenly and so that we each had some of the hardest letters like J, Q, X, and Z. We agreed on a date to swap our portion of the rhymes over email - naturally, the day before it was due - so we could each put it together and print it out. I sent her my rhymes and after I received hers and read through them, I decided they were NOT going in my report. I spent the rest of the night rewriting her rhymes. When my mom asked me if I was going to send her the new rhymes, I told her “no.”
At this point you can go ahead and call me whatever names you would like.
We each turned in our rhyming colonial alphabet projects. Two weeks later, we got them back - graded. She saw that I had an A and I saw that she had a B - 'cause remember, we sat next to each other. I remember being a bit embarrassed, but hey! Those were MY rhymes! I suspect this is why she unfriended me on Facebook many years later (after I believe I friended her - I sure had some nerve).
Lessons learned:
-7th grade girls. Yikes.
-There is always a catch and sometimes it works in you favor.
-Don’t let others take credit for your hard work. And teachers need to stop insisting that middle school group projects are beneficial for everyone. They are not.
---
Balance puzzle
8th grade, Math project, Mrs. Bastone's class
The project and the point: Create a 3D version of a balance puzzle with a partner of your choosing (Thank you, GOD!) for extra credit. I needed all the extra credit I could get. “What are balance puzzles,” you ask? Well, the 2D version was a piece of paper with a bunch of different shapes drawn on it that were connected with lines - sort of like an org chart. The different shapes had different values/weights and your job was to figure out what the weights were and/or fill in missing values to make it “balance”. We did a lot of 2D versions at the beginning of class as a precursor to ... ALGEBRA.
What happened: I partnered up with my BFF Allie. Allie and I had been on all sorts of math adventures together - read: Katie calls Allie’s house 10x a day for help. Allie and I spent around a week after school working on our balance puzzle/mobile. We dutifully designed our mobile and then created different shaped pouches which we colored and decorated. Then the real fun began…stuffing the pouches with coins for the “weights” and then attaching them to rods with string and seeing how well our design actually balanced. And then doing lots of adjusting with coins and random desk supplies like paper clips and staples. I’m sure this was just a sight! After many after school snacks and dinners at Allie’s house, we finally got the sucker to balance. Allie brought it to school for us and Mrs. Bastone was so impressed that she kept it! We never got our masterpiece back! Harumph!
Lesson learned: A girlfriend who does a project like this with you when she didn’t even need the extra credit is a girlfriend for life. <3
---
Junior Author Paper
11th grade, English project, Mr. Smith's class
The project and the point: Pick out a book (from a curated list), read it, analyze the bejeezus out of it, and then write four (five?) very long, very different papers about it all (e.g., analytical, write the next chapter, write a different chapter in the same style). In the end, you were expected to turn in 50-75 pages of some hardcore understanding of your book in a creative and meaningful way (aka: you better not just turn in a stack of papers). This project was given to us at the start of school that year and we were supposed to be working on it for months in addition to our regular classwork. Note that word - months. The point… Lordy, I have no idea. College prep?
What happened: The book I chose was Robinson Crusoe. You think it’s gonna be like Cast Away in book form - WRONG! That book was really a complete (completely boring) commentary about 17th century English politics. It was precisely because it was so friggin’ dull that I did not even finish reading the book until two weeks before the project was due. Yeah, I know - major mistake. The week before it was due, I stayed up ‘till after midnight every night working on the papers, the never ending list of CITATIONS, and how I was going to creatively deliver them. My idea - wrap the papers in some kitchen string like a package, put them in a box - with sand in it - and make the box look old... like it washed on shore after months at sea. So, in between furiously typing, editing, and printing, I was dying paper with tea bags, drying it on low heat in the oven, and then mod-podging it onto a scrapbook box. I also randomly had an ink well and wax seal kit so I dripped some ink *creatively* on the box and put on a wax seal. It looked washed up. Perfect. I finally turned in my crowning high school achievement - all 70 pages of it - and was shaking from exhaustion with my other fellow procrastinators. My teacher liked it too until he realized there was sand in the box when it spilled in the trunk of his car. Oops.
Lesson learned:
-Plan. ahead.
-Need some nighttime reading to fall asleep? I’ve got just the book for you.
---
Management Game
MBA, Capstone project
The project and the point: Demonstrate your knowledge of the core business domains: strategy, finance, marketing, and operations - by forming a group/company and playing a simulated game and meeting with a fake board who yells at you and makes you feel like you-know-nothing-John-Snow. I thought one week of the Junior Author Paper was bad. This was three months of shenanigans! We were a group of five - President (me, obviously) and Strategy, Marketing, and Finance VPs who managed a watch company. We operated in a “world” with other groups (our competitors) in different countries also playing this same game (for realz). The goal was to be successful (sell watches, make money) by putting your resources into different variables like factories, making your watches attractive to your market, but affordable, and making your business sustainable. Each week there was a simulation of events and we received a report on how we were doing to inform our strategy the next week. We also had a “board” made up of alumni that we had to meet with every couple of weeks. Your grade was based on how you did in the game, what the board thought about you, and what you thought about each other. This hellacious game was quite timely as I had just moved back to Virginia after starting the divorce process. Between my job and the game, I had one hour, one day a week where I could sob about my situation - Wednesdays in therapy.
What happened: I summarized the experience in meme format. My mom was living with me in my new place for half of the duration game to help me get back on my feet. And to make sure I was eating and sleeping. One of my favorite game memories included a board member telling us he wanted to know how we were going to turn this company around. We weren’t even doing badly! Peeved, my friend and teammate sent a text over the group thread “I’mma turn his ass around.” I paused my video screen so that the board couldn’t see me dying of laughter.
Lesson learned: We didn't exactly turn his ass around. But, we survived. Sometimes, you just have to play the game and raise a glass to the best teammates and mom.
---
These projects ended up being much greater learning opportunities - about creativity, self-confidence, developing a backbone, and time-management. But, none of the projects would have been as memorable without the friends (or non-friends) who celebrated and suffered with me or mom and dad's love.
with love,
KB
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