It's The End... It's Over. 2022-2023 Goodbye!

Pre-Algebra:

This week I completed my Final Mr. D. Math lesson and my Semester II test!! I completed a survey and gave them some feedback. I am now done with this for the rest of my life, apparently.

Creative Writing:

THIS WAS NOT OUR FINAL CLASS. WE STILL HAVE TWO MORE. WHEW!

I kinda got caught up after missing the last week's class and then we played a game. It was called DixIt. It had tons of cards with weird pictures on it. Someone picked one of the cards in their hand and vaguely described it, then everyone else picked a card in their hand that resembled the description, gave it to the teacher, and the cards were scrambled up. The cards were put face up in a row and people (not the describer) voted on what card was the original. Points were scored off of who got it right. It was very fun and I loved it!

Social Studies:

This week was my final suffering of History. I am so glad I got it done. No more beheading and stabbing for the whole of summer, please. Let us never repeat our ancestors' mistakes.

Tech (Exploring Technology):

This week I learned several tricks. Though I have not been able to win yet (the competition is fierce!), I will showcase all (if not most) of the things I learned these past few weeks.

I learned how to bridge really quickly and efficiently. Every second counts when you are over the void, for it isn't very hard to fireball someone off. The faster you bridge, the safer you are. At least, in theory. You're never safe in Bedwars.

I experimented with different bed defenses and found out what others do. Most people choose wool, which is super vulnerable to explosions and fire, as well as easily breakable by hand. It's cheap, though, and fast. Others do endstone, which is only breakable by a pickaxe, fairly easy to get, harder to explode, and a little harder to break. This is often my first choice. Few choose wood, especially in combination with endstone or the next option. Wood is flammable, and breakable by hand (though not as fast as wool), though with an axe (hardly anyone carries an axe around) it breaks a whole lot faster. The final option is glass, which is not breakable by explosion (wow, that sounds so wrong), not so cheap, and breakable by hand. It is awesome, though, because most people destroy bed defenses with fireballs or tnt, and glass is sure to thwart that- that is until they smash it with their fists.

Emeralds and diamonds are SO useful. Emeralds buy things, diamonds buy upgrades. They are both essential to most gaming strategies, and it often becomes a bloodbath to get them.

Strategy. Few (if any) go into Bedwars expecting to do whatever they feel like doing and then win. There are SO many strategies- offensive, defensive, rush emeralds, diamonds galore, etc.- and lots of ways to play. Solo, Doubles, 3v3v3v3, 4v4v4v4, 4v4. Not to mention the different versions of Minecraft- 1.19.2 (one of the latest versions), 1.8.9 ( the most common version for Hypixel Bedwars), and anything in between. So thus, you're never bored in Bedwars. Rage quitting and burnout, maybe (especially in my case), but hardly bored.

Clutching. When you're falling, there are a few ways to save yourself- but they require having just the right stuff with you and quick reflexes. Thus, very, very hard.

PvP. The bane of my existence. It stands for Player Versus Player. You have to have good CPS (clicks per second), aim, resources, and experience- and even then, depending on the player you're fighting, that doesn't mean you'll win. There are, however, some things you can do to weight the battle in your favor. Such as: the element of surprise, the player on the edge (about to fall off), your bed unbroken (you can respawn) while the other player's bed is broken (can't respawn), a quick escape if things go wrong (enderpearl- a teleportation device, bridge egg- creates a bridge away), etc. Also if you enchant your armor with protection and your sword with sharpness (though that technically fits in the Resources category), it helps you just that extra bit more. However, PvP mostly needs A LOT of experience, something I wasn't likely to get in just a few weeks.

Though it was hard and I didn't win, Minecraft Bedwars was so much fun and I'm glad I could play it for even a small time. I learned so much- hey, maybe I'll win over the Summer! See you, Minecraft. 

Elective (Writing for Publication):

This week we emailed our teacher our revised articles and she gave us feedback. Since last week we took the whole time reviewing the articles, she did this outside of class. We combined to write an In Defense Of article and each wrote separate paragraphs and then played a game where we hit people over the head with a No stick. Yes, you heard me right. It was a poem game.

End:

It's been a good year. A long year, but a really fun and educational year. I tried out a new math curriculum, took TWO writing classes, did something new for Tech, survived History, and made some good friends. And I'm not just talking about Minecraft friends. The school year 2022-2023 is over, and there is lots in store for the next year. Such as public school and High School grades!! I'm excited. I hope I can keep blogging, even though I won't be homeschooled anymore. Who knows what my life will do? Thanks for reading and have a great day!

Week of May 1-5 LL #38

Pre-Algebra:

This week I did two lessons of Mr. D. Math. I am SO close to the end of the school year! Next week I have one lesson and my Semester II Exam. After that I am done!!!

Creative Writing:

This week I ended up not going to my class. :(((((((((( Instead I worked on a word document of my story.

Social Studies:

Just... one... last... week. Then... I... will... be... free... of... this... torture.

History is basically all the same- king, war, death, rebelling, war, death, repeat. How do you find something interesting to report for each new blog post in that framework?

I tried looking over the chapter again and looking for a death count, but the book explains it in such emotionless reflection- 'they were tried, convicted of murder- and executed'. It also didn't say how many were killed, so I couldn't figure it out.

The bottom line: death and blood, blood and death.

Tech (Exploring Technology):

This week I set out to find the best way to win Bedwars on the Minecraft Hypixel server.

Bedwars is a Minecraft minigame where you have to protect your bed, destroy your opponent's bed, and then kill your opponent (the Minecraft player, not the actual person). If you are killed while your bed is not broken, you will respawn at your base. If your bed is broken and you are killed, you have lost the game.

You can still technically win even if they break your bed- it just makes it harder. You have to break the opponent's bed (while they have nothing to do but defend it or hunt you down) and kill the player, all without dying or it's game over. This is a very fun game and there are lots of ways to play- two teams of four, solo, eight teams of two, four teams of four, four teams of three, etc. There are also many strategies and my self-appointed job was to find the best one.

I mostly played solo mode, where there are eight players and you're all by yourself. I did try other ways, trying to find the easiest one. Although you have to do all the work yourself, including PvP (player versus player, which I am so bad at it's not even funny), it was really fun and especially rewarding when I won. There was no one else to take credit for the win but me. And though it shocked me the most, I like solo mode best (as of now).

The first thing I tried was leaving my bed unprotected and going straight off the bat to another player's bed. This worked kinda well, considering they didn't have great defenses, but later in the game I was jumped and since my bed had no defense, I was an easy target. Fail.

The next thing I tried was surrounding my bed in Endstone (a Minecraft block that requires a pickaxe to mine and is a pretty solid defense) and then went out and attacked. This worked better but I eventually lost the game.

The third try was where I stayed at my base, surrounded my bed in: layer 1, endstone, layer 2, wood (which requires an axe to mine), 3, endstone, 4, terracotta (which requires a pickaxe to mine), and 5, wool (which is the most basic you can get). With 5 layers it was huge and no one even came near it. I was finally intimidating! I let everyone else battle it out and to my great surprise and luck, the two players left (excluding me) broke each other's bed and then one killed the other. So here I was with a massive defense, fireballs at the ready, my bed unbroken so I could respawn.

Contrast this with a player who had to bridge over the void (if you fall you die) to get to me, thus making himself an easy target, bed broken so it was his final life, and although prepared (he even had an invisibility potion, but I could see him placing wool to bridge over and I knew where he was the whole time), I killed him easily from afar. Bows, arrows, fireballs, and height were my greatest advantage. On-the-ground PvP kills me every time.

(Sorry, I took a video of my win but the file size was too big... again. Ugh. I didn't think that was a problem because my earlier issues were with emailing the videos to the computer via mom's phone, and this was taken on the computer. But Blogger wouldn't let me upload it.)

Although I was so happy, I knew it was mostly luck that led to my win. I didn't break a single bed, and I just used a fireball to knock the last player off his bridge into the void. I played on my strengths, which was fantastic, but didn't do much. I was grateful for the win but wanted to win by doing stuff. So I decided to look at some more tutorials for PvP and I will continue my quest for Bedwars Domination next week. That would be a cool End Of School Year present- a fantabulous Bedwars win.

Elective (Writing for Publication):

We read over our essays and the teacher gave us feedback. I will revise my Saint George essay for homework. We also did a writing exercise where we wrote down as many synonyms as possible for the five random nouns the teacher gave us. This helps to do before writing an essay if you know you'll be using the same word over and over again because it slows you down if you have to stop, write a synonym word bank, and continue. It was fun and also hard, because the words we chose (not knowing what we would do with them), were book, food, game, baby, and toenail.

Week of Apr 24-28 LL #37

Pre-Algebra:

This week I finished Chapter 11! I completed my final lessons and my chapter test. I'm moving on to the final chapter, Chapter 12, next week!!

Creative Writing:

This week my class was canceled. Instead, I brainstormed some new story ideas and went more in-depth in my homework.

Social Studies:

This week I read two chapters of Story Of The World. Since I'm not very far into the book, I probably won't be able to finish it by the end of the school year.

Normally I would have added a :( emoticon after that sentence, but since I'm so fed up with all the death and destruction I don't really care about finishing it. Ha ha ha.

Tech (Exploring Technology):

I was busy on Earth Day and wasn't able to get on Minecraft and do my Frozen Peaks world. I will do that next week.

This week I tested out 3 Minecraft Java Servers. I wanted to find one that was fun and educational.

The first one I tested out was Cubeville. It was a server where you can build, create, and play with other players. The educational aspect that I thought it included went not as expected, but it was still great! It was a little hard to get started because you have to travel really far to get to a building spot away from everyone else (you have to be at least 40 blocks away from other players' build sites or it won't let you make a claim), but other than that it was cool.

The second one I tested out was a total flop. It was hard to get in, and once I did it wasn't what I expected and not really good quality. Just a random server where you do whatever, no structure at all, and no objectives.

The third one was my favorite. It was a bunch of minigames and had some educational aspects, but I didn't have time to see much. I was on there for about 5 minutes before I had to get off. I will do that sometime next week.

Elective (Writing for Publication):

This week we went over the homework from last week and gave feedback. Then we played writing games, received this week's homework, and did a quiz on what we learned in this class. The quiz was really easy for me. Some of the questions were defining words we learned in class- "ethos", "adverb", and "CECC"- which I answered perfectly. :D