Final CAS Reflection

During the 2 years I've been attending OSC, I have been engaged in the CAS (Creativity, Action, Service) program that is a requirement for the IB program.

It has given me the opportunity to take part in a multitude of activities ranging from cycling to visiting children's hospitals and entertaining them.

This program has exposed me to many activities that I otherwise would not have experienced and has helped with my development as a person and has been vital to my growth.

Creativity

I have taken part in a number of "creative" activities during the two years I've been a part of OSC and I have learned many things and developed new skills because of them.

Something new I did was planning and organizing a fundraiser for my service group called Gecko Inc. This service focused on providing the children of the local school Kilinochchi, an opportunity to play various sports but this will be discussed in further detail later.
The planning of the fundraiser helped with my organizational skills because it required me to think of the most efficient ways to set up for the fundraiser and also improved my collaborative skills because cooperation between the service members was required.  The fundraiser itself was to raise money so we could donate sports equipment to the local schools and the purpose of the fundraiser addressed a matter of global importance, that is children all over the world do not have access to the simple pleasures even if it's as simple as different sports due to the lack of financial support.

My very first activity on the other hand was Surface Embellishment which definitely evoked the creative side of all the members. It was basically printmaking through various mediums. It was definitely a matter of skill development and trying new things as I have never done something like it. Vegetables were sliced in half and used as makeshift stamps, and shirts were printed with our own stencils which was a very cool experience for me. I still own the shirt from that activity!

Monday Basketball!

Hello hello,

This is our basketball ASA (after school activity) session and although there weren't many members present, we made the most of it.

We played 3v3 throughout the entire activity with the inclusion of Mr. Wasko, our ASA supervisor. It was very tiring since less members means more work for each individual but still enjoyable nonetheless.

Here are two pictures that show me doing nothing of particular interest!

Contemplating life whilst dribbling (Photo by Laurens)

I'm aware that this photo is exhilarating but I'm going to have to ask you to calm yourself.

It's just a sport.

As you can see, I am wondering what move to make next.

Should I shoot?

Should I layup?

Should I keep standing there?

Well the decision I make is depicted in the following photograph...

Contemplating life whilst shooting (Photo by Laurens)

Well... BAM!

Looks like I go for the shot despite having so many options.

That form looks pretty good.

Someone's got there fundamentals straight.

Coach Tharindu would be proud.

Too bad I still can't shoot and most likely missed this.

I don't even know what I'm talking about.

Please just enjoy the photos.

RCCI - Rehabilitation Center for the Communication Impaired

I unfortunately missed the bus for my service, "Hope For Kids", and so I did not have anything to do for the afternoon. Instead of wasting the time I had and going home, I decided to take part in another service group called RCCI (Rehabilitation Center for the Communication Impaired) and they were kind enough to let me do so.

This great service group concentrates on working collaboratively with the disabled children and people with special needs by playing sports with them in the school gym. The reason for this particular activity is to keep them healthy and fit as they do not get the opportunity to play sports as often as they would like to.

I thought this was a really nice activity to be a part of and the difference they made to the kids was evident on their happy faces. This is a boy I that I played some basketball with:

This is Umesh - A Basketball Prodigy

The lovely Mikka, leader of RCCI with a very friendly member of the group

We practiced passing the ball to each other and eventually we tried shooting the ball. He seemed to be enjoying himself which is the most important factor.

Basketball is tiring stuff. Of course, ethical implications had to be considered. When playing with the children, you need to remember to be gentle.





Here's a photo of Mikka with a member of the group.

He seems to be quite fond of her; most likely because of her enthusiasm and undying commitment to the group!

If I was not a part of Hope For Kids, I definitely would have chosen to be a part of this service.

I was only here for one lesson but I enjoyed myself very much.

Thanks RCCI!

Here is a link to Mikka's blog!

Pinhole Photography Selfies!

In the previous lesson of Pinhole Photography, we scanned the photos that we developed so we could blow them up and print them out on an A3 piece of paper.

We also tried inverting them through Photoshop to see how it would turn out. 

Self portrait of a pinhole photographer advocate (#1)

This time around I wanted to try taking self portraits to see how accurately I could capture my face. My skills in this method of taking photographs are developing as I gain more experience in this medium.

The photo on the left was my first attempt at the self portrait and I found that the lettering on my shirt was very profound.

Inverted self portrait (#1)

On the right is my first inverted photograph. It turned out pretty well and shows my face very clearly.

The lettering on my shirt is very easy to see and so is the background.

Yet another self portrait (#2)

This photo was my second attempt at a self portrait but this time around I wanted to get more of my body in the photo. I stood a little further back this time and managed to capture some sections of my arms and a little bit more of the lettering on my shirt.

Inverted self portrait #2

The photograph on the right is what the above photo looks like when it is inverted.

Now you can clearly see the subject of the photo (me).

Making Loom Bands With The Kids

We visited the hospital again but this time we wanted to try something with the sole purpose of having fun with the children. Previously, we tried to introduce an educational aspect to our visits but it isn't exactly something kids want to do in the short time they have with us.

This was an opportunity for us to plan and initiate an activity that was in a way requested by the children. Our aim was to plan something that was enjoyable and something that could be continued by them even after we left.

Loom bands was our solution to this and it was a huge success. The children really enjoyed making bracelets and necklaces with us and they didn't want to stop! 

A photograph of me and a master loom band maker

Here is a photograph of the results of an hour of rigorous loom band making.

I was unable to create anything due to my lack of dexterity but I was at least able to help with the construction of a very well crafted necklace and bracelet. A sort of collaborative effort!

After we left, the children continued with their new-found skills and were even helping each other build new pieces of jewelry.  

Next time we will have something else fun in store for them...

Monday Basketball!

Friday basketball has shifted to Monday!

It was quite disappointing this time around because the amount of people attending the activity halved. There were originally around 11 members but this time there were only 5. 

This led to the players getting tired faster than usual and not much room for making plays. Despite this we still had fun and made the most out of it.

As usual, basketball encouraged collaboration between the members of the activity and for most players it continues to aid in developing new skills.

All in all it was a very positive session and we achieved the aim of the activity. To have fun!

Pinhole Photography! First Lesson.

On Friday 13th, I attended my very first lesson of Pinhole Photography alongside my peers. We began the lesson with a short yet crucial demonstration.

Not only did we learn the mechanics behind pinhole photography, but we also learned that this techniques had many origins ranging from the Chinese and their optical principles that they knew of during the 5th century to Aristotle and his mentioning of pinhole image formation in his work "Problems".

The camera itself is actually just a tin container with a lid that does not allow light to pass through it and a pin hole in the side of the tin that will act as the lens. Whilst in the dark room, we pulled out some light photosensitive photographic paper because if it were exposed to light, the paper will become negative and will be completely black due to being exposed to too much light.

Here is the setup for taking a picture with this method:

The tin on the right is a camera that was lent to me by a veteran in this field.

The tape is what covers the pinhole until you're ready to peel it off and leave it for about 1 minute which is the pinhole version of "taking a photo".

After leaving it for 1 minute, the tape is put back on and the tin is brought to the dark room. Once the lights are off, the lid is taken off and the light photosensitive paper is removed from the container and place in the developer, then the stop , fix and then it's rinsed. 

Here is the product of this process:

I placed a filter on this picture to make the body of the picture more visible but if I were to leave the camera for maybe an extra minute, it would be even clearer.






This first lesson has already allowed me to develop new skills and I also worked collaboratively with the other members of the group by helping them with the placement of their cameras, inserting the light photosensitive paper and even being helped with the process of developing the photos.

Practice Basketball Games With the Girl's Team

During the short holiday, the girl's basketball team had a couple training sessions and me and and four other boys had the opportunity to help with their training sessions. We played matches against them in order to allow them to test out their plays and strategies and to see how they work out in real games. It was an enjoyable experience and a good challenge for us that will hopefully help us get back into the competitive mentality because they forced us to play with proper defense formations and strategies. 

Hopefully they benefited just as much as we did through being able to practice with real game conditions and circumstances.

 

Upcoming SAISA

Basketball SAISA is coming up soon and I'm unsure whether or not I'll be taking part in it. The tournament itself begins about a week before the exams and it seems like it would be better to use that time for studying instead.

If I don't go overseas for the tournament, I'll take part in the training sessions instead if it's possible. This way I'll still be involved in an activity but have the spare time to prepare for the exams.

Friday Basketball - Some Photographic Evidence!

Here are some pictures of the Friday afternoon basketball session we had last week.
In these sessions, we have the opportunity to develop new skills and learn how to collaborate with others. Some of the members are playing for the first time and are undertaking new challenges.



(photo by author)

We're learning new skills by learning where to stand for defense and how to play offensively with a team.
We mostly just play games which is useful because it's as close to a real game as it gets and some of us intend on doing SAISA basketball so it's helpful in that sense.



(photo by author)

The fabled milkshake drive

The milkshake drive that was held inside the school canteen was a booming success. We raised more money than we had originally expected and now we'll be able to purchase equipment of mass entertainment.

Here's a photo of two of our members, setting up the stall and making some delicious milkshakes!



(Photo by author)

A short clip of Fun Basketball!

This is just a short clip showing that I actually do attend this after school activity.
(That's me in the white).
Some photos will be on the way!

(Video by my dear friend Nishant)

Check out his blog here.

A product of drawing club

Here is a painting I created during one of my drawing club activities. I used wall filler for the white section which also gave it a rough texture and black ink for the background and details.

I started off by painting the background black. I then continued by drawing a pencil outline for the stag's skull to make sure I knew what I was drawing exactly.

I then went over it with wall filler which is a thick white substance that dries up and hardens. The wall filler is slightly raised off the surface.

The black ink was also used to add detail to the skull such as the eye sockets and nose.



This was an opportunity to develop new skills by exploring new mediums to create artworks.
(Photo by author)

Hope For Kids - Halloween Edition!

We went to the hospital on the 31st of October with a Halloween themed visit in mind. We planned on creating small decorations so the children had something to hang up around their beds. The decorations were orange pieces of paper in the shape of various spooky things such as ghosts and jack'o'lanterns.

Here is a picture of a few our members creating some decorations! 

A picture of a few our awesome Hope for Kids crew. Jithmi, Laurens and Amira.

Photo by author.













A photo of the kids adding their own personal flare to the pumpkin decorations!

They added the string so they could hang it up around their rooms.

Photo by author.

Dinosaur!

Just a random dinosaur from a previous session.

A small example of developing skills for one, I've never drawn a dinosaur (not that hard) and second, you might notice that there is some shading on the ridge of the body. Oh yeah.

Photo by author.

Drawing Club - 5

I had Drawing Club yesterday and I found infinite amounts of inspiration within the artworks done by other students. There was one in particular that was a painting of a leopard with its jaws wide open and holding a sword. It was an interpretation of the lion on the Sri Lankan flag but replaced with the leopard because there are leopards found in the country.
I wanted to do my own version of the student's drawing to see how different it would turn out. Yoon-jae, a member of the drawing activity, added a few features to my drawing including the whiskers and eyebrows...

Hope for Kids - Meeting

We've found that our resources are dwindling and we don't really have anything to take to the hospital of interest. We decided to hold a meeting to make plans for a 'milkshake drive' which will involve us creating milkshakes of various flavours to sell at school. The flavours will include vanilla, chocolate, Oreo cookie and strawberry. How extraordinarily exciting.

We want to raise money so we can purchase more equipment for the kids. So far we've only had drawing equipment and some arts and craft so we hope to either find something new to do or simply purchase newer tools. I will keep you updated as I'm sure you'll be eager to find out what happens next...

Hope for Kids - 4

This will be our fourth Hope for Kids session and the third visit to the hospital.
We aim to entertain the children at the hospital but at the same time, we've decided to try something a little bit different.
 We brought along the usual equipment such as the board games, necklace making set and drawing equipment but we wanted to see if we could test out a more educational approach. Bringing along some work sheets (it's as fun as it sounds) that will improve their spelling and some plastic letters, we spoke to two older children to see if they wanted to give it a go.
They seemed reluctant at first but they succumbed to our incessant nagging and off we went.
Turns out it was as boring as it sounded and was too difficult since they didn't speak any English.

We played snakes and ladders instead.

Drawing Club - 4

Drawing club! How wonderful it is.

As I said I would last time, I did something more worthwhile. I experimented with tone and shading with three-dimensional objects. By observing simple shapes like spheres and square-based pyramids, I can see where the light is cast from and where the shadow lies. This allows me to more easily draw out a realistic representation of the object despite not being very good at drawing.

I hope to better develop this skill.

Friday Basketball - 3

Woo. It's the end of the week which marks another splendid lesson of basketball! More warm-ups, more full court games, more running, shooting, stealing... Sounds like a robbery.

I play as though it's an actual game (most of the time) so it can be very tiring. I need to improve my endurance otherwise I wont be able to compete against all the other players at the SAISA tournament.
There's not a whole lot to say about this activity because it's very repetitive but it is enjoyable nonetheless. Go basketball.