My apologies everyone, I saved it in my comp and forgot to post. So it’s a little back-dated somewhat. I’ve made changes and the last part of reflection was something I added in recently. Yup, so here goes.

Hello.

I’m going to briefly run through today’s lesson and then do some reflecting.

Goodbye Peixin, Hello Ms Tang.

It was Ms Tang’s first lesson with us.
Some interesting notes:
1.

Good attitude
Engagement
Ownership
Grow!!

2.

Desert is spelt as desert, if you forget and spell it like dessert, do look at the picture below.

3.

Some people have funky-looking camels


Point 1
Wind moves from HIGH pressure to LOW pressure

Point 2
Cold air --> high pressure
Hot air --> low pressure

Point 3
Air rises --> rain

RECAP
The Hadley and the Polar cell are driven by the SUN.
The Ferrel cell is induced by the Polar and the Hadley cells.

The desert belt occurs where the air subsides.
Air subsides (where the arrows go down)
--> no uplift of air (i.e. air does not rise)
--> no rain
--> deserts

REFLECTION
I was whacked during lesson and it was hot and noisy.
I learnt that concept maps are useful for firstly identifying key concepts and secondly it helps us see the links between ideas and concepts.
Eh, I haven’t got much to reflect on the one and a half hours.
We kind of just revised some concepts, got to know ourselves better, and did a concept map on what we have learnt thus far in this module.

---

As I sit through, not just this lesson but all our lessons, I just kind of keep thinking that the world we live in is so huge, so awesome, so wild.
Yet here we are, tiny and insignificant yet trying to contain this gloriousness into words and diagrams.
Trying to manipulate, predict, exploit great things we can neither understand nor control.
We see a little and we make much of it.
We feel a little and we assume much from it.
We think a little and we decide we can re-create it.
Who are we?

Makes one think huh. Exams almost seem frivolous compared to this.
Ever sat back, looked at those hand-drawn air-cell diagrams and think, and silently ask in the general direction of the teacher, have you seen the earth as a ball? Have you experienced the force of tornado? Have you even tasted the brutality of the desert? Have you seen wind move in ways beyond all humans can imagine?
Sometimes I look at geography, and augh, how shall I say this.
Like,
WAKE UP, HELLO, YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT THE EARTH LIKE IT’S A BALL,
OF THE GALAXIES LIKE IT’S YOUR BACKYARD.
Wake up, ever thought of how small and puny our efforts are to record all these?
Yet we do it, why? I honestly don’t know.

Hahahahah, I sound like I’m ranting but I’m quite serious.
We, as students, sit in class, learning about things of such complexity and beauty, yet all we care about is, oh crap this module is gonna kill my GPA, or aiya only 3 credits.

I’m just suddenly appalled that we are trying to squeeze something great and make it small, boring and “muggerable” (which means able to mug for).
Sigh.

I think as we drill down deep, we find that there are things we just do not have answers for.
Yet we keep asking. :D
Humans ARE complex huh but also beautiful, like the rest of the earth.
So in conclusion,
As we learn all this, doesn’t even need to be geography, can be science or even LA,
I guess it’s important that we take a step back, and look at things from a different perspective eh?
One where grades are not everything, one where the classroom is not the ends of the world, and one where you know, we can really just stare in awe of the glorious wonder of all creation.

The end.

Esther.
PS: and I thought I had nothing to say.