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=Welcome to our "China Alive 2009" Wiki for "//G.A.S.//", which is an abbreviation for:= = = ="Green Adventures Shanghai"=

Starting Monday September 21 The Shanghai American School China Alive Trip, Green Adventures Shanghai, will be experiencing adventures in and around Shanghai while learning about local eco-friendly development. I will be posting many important documents for the China Alive group on this Wiki. Please check daily!

1. Here is our itinerary as of 9/17/09

Trip Leader: Mr. Bob Gould Trip Curriculum Coordinator: Mr. Tim Boyer Trip Chaperones:Mr. Bob Gould and Mr. Amir Salim for first three days For the Moganshan Trip, Mr. Gould & Mr. Tim Boyer & Dr. Jan Cantrill Destination: Shanghai is the base for the first 3 days; the fourth day will be spent traveling to and staying overnight in Moganshan, and returning early evening on the fifth day Group Size: 10 students

DAY 1 Monday Sept. 21 Shanghai-Day #1 in the city Mr. Gould and Mr. Salim Green Adventures and Team Building are blended with Eco-Friendly Designs • Take bus from Jinqaio at 8:00 AM to Portman Hotel and pick up Anna and Adele students at 9:00AM. • Continue on bus to Lu Pu “Arch” Bridge. 9:45AM Hike with guide to top. (Tickets paid by school; 75RMB per person) Return to bus at 11:15AM. • Take bus to People’s Square (12:00 noon) • Each person brings lunch from home; have picnic in People’s Square • Have “Ecology in China” class after picnic; learn differences between “green work” and “green-wash” • At 1:30 divide into two small groups and tour Urban Planning Museum (Tickets paid by school; 30RMB per person) Finish at 3:00PM. • Learn about metro, reading maps, etc. and take metro & taxis home (no bus) 4:30 – 5:00PM

DAY 2 Tuesday Sept. 22 Shanghai-Day #2 in the city: Mr. Gould and Mr. Salim More Adventures and Team Building Get Blended with Eco-Friendly Education • Take bus from Jinqaio at 7:00 AM to Portman Hotel and pick up Anna and Adele at 8:00AM. • Take bus and arrive at 9:00AM at Rock Climbing (Hongkou Football Stadium, Masterhand Rock Climbing, 444 Dongjiangwan Lu, Tel: 5696-6657; enter stadium at #21) Climb until 11:00 or so. Tickets paid by school • Each person brings lunch from home; we’ll eat picnic outside stadium • Take bus at 11:30 and arrive at 12:30 at URBN Hotel, Shanghai's first carbon-neutral hotel; have tour. Tickets paid by school. http://www.urbnhotels.com/idea-environmentaly-friendly.html • Take bus at 1:45 to Go-Karting. Arrive between 2:15 - 2:30PM Have two 8-minute “runs” in go-karts. Tickets paid by school. No. 809 Zao Yang Rd., Chang Feng Park www.kartingchina.com Opens at 2:00PM 6222-2880 or 6285-7778 • At 3:45 take bus to Portman Hotel and drop off students at 4:15PM and then drop off rest in Jinqaio at 5:30PM

DAY 3 Wednesday Sept. 23 Shanghai--Day #3 in the city: Mr. Gould and Mr. Salim Adventures and Team Building Get Blended with Organic Farming Education • Everyone takes regular school bus to school. Bring bike(s) and gear such as helmets and gloves if you signed up to bring a bike. Meet at 8:00AM in Mr. Gould’s room. • Work on laptops and learn iPhoto and GarageBand. • Go bike riding on bikes brought to school by students. Ride around campus and if ability level is high enough, some will ride off-campus through village. See local farming and fishing techniques/industries. • Eat lunch in school cafeteria at 11:30AM • Take bus at 12:00 to visit Bio-Farm at 12:30, an organic farm near school. Website www.biofarm.cn (5859-9853 or 5156- 4076 or Jane (Director) at 1381-779-4023) Tour of farm. Tickets paid by school. Do small community service project, harvest crops, weed, build compost, etc. • Eat organic snack at Bio-Farm. • At 3:30 take bus to Jinqaio and drop off students at 4:30 PM and drop off rest at Portman Hotel at 6:00PM

DAY 4 Thursday Sept. 24 Overnight trip Moganshan-Stay 1 night at Naked Retreats: Chaperones are Mr. Gould, Mr. Boyer, Dr. Cantrill Adventures and Team Building Get Stretched More with travel to and lodging at eco-friendly lodge • Take bus from Jinqaio at 6:15AM to Portman Hotel at 7:15 where we pick up Anna and Adele and Kieran. • Take bus to Shanghai South Station, arrive 8:15. Depart 9:30 on high-speed train (Tickets paid by school) to arrive Hangzhou Main Station by 10:45. Meet guide. • At 11:00AM leave on 17-seat bus with guide from Hangzhou station to Naked Retreat in Moganshan. (Tickets paid by school.) • Lunch at Naked Retreat, www.nakedretreats.cn (All paid by school) • Naked Retreat tour (1-hour) – see behind-the-scenes sustainable eco-friendly technologies, all fully integrated into this resort • Hike in and learn about local bamboo forests and tea fields. Optional swim in reservoir. • Optional Night Hike; spend night in “Purple Ridge Lodge”

DAY 5 Friday Sept. 25 Moganshan--Naked Retreats, w/ train ride back to Shanghai with Mr. Gould, Mr. Boyer, Dr. Cantrill • Community Service; spend 2-3 hours assisting construction of eco-friendly “structure” such as garden, compost bin, cement work, etc. • Ride Mountain Bikes on dirt road down through agricultural valley; see local villages and farms (Paid by school) • Meet up with bus and guide at 12:30PM, and ride back to Hangzhou Main Station on 17-seat bus. • Depart on high-speed train at 2:55PM and arrive at 4:17PM back at Shanghai South Station. • Take bus to Portman Hotel and drop off Anna and Adele and Kieran at 5:30PM and then drop off rest in Jinqaio at 7:00PM

Important Phone Numbers: Mr. Gould: 1302-027-5753 (All 5 days; Math Dept.) Mr. Salim: 1364-190-4133 (Monday Tuesday Wednesday only; Science Dept.) Mr. Boyer: 1379-546-7613 (Thursday and Friday only; Science Dept.) Dr. Cantrill: 1592-162-8342 (Thursday and Friday only; School Psychologist) Tracy Yin 1592-170-5493 (High School Nurse on duty on campus) Meryl Button: 1381-769-4566 (Middle School Nurse on duty on campus) Sylvia Shen: High School Secretary, 6221-1445 x3351 and her cell after 5pm 1590-161-7728 Zea: School Travel Coordinator 1381-780-5732 Steven Shi: Local Travel Agent 1381-654-6560 Harry:Yeap Bus Service Coordinator 1381-780-6990

== =2. Here is a detailed description of the Curricular Component to our China Alive experience, including our culminating Digital Project.= ==

__**=China Alive Green Adventures Shanghai (GAS) Writing Reflections and Media Project=**__

Part I – Writing Reflections on “ALL-ABOUT-YOU” QUESTIONS – Write a reflection on your laptop for each of these before we meet Monday morning at Jinqaio Starbucks (8:00AM) or the Portsman Hotel (9:00AM).

1. Think about someone either on this trip or that you know well that you would consider a friend? What special qualities do you bring to this friendship? 2. How do you think people perceive you? If you could write one special thing about yourself, about your inner self, what would it be? Explain. 3. In general, are you enthusiastic about trying new things in life? If not, explain why you think you are this way. 4. Do you consider yourself a leader? List your qualities as a leader or explain why you are not. 5. What do you think your life passion might be? Try to be as specific as possible even though you probably don’t know for sure. You might want to write about two possibilities if you are having trouble narrowing it down to one.

Part II – Writing Reflections to QUESTIONS:

Each day while you are on China Alive, you will bring your laptop and you will be given time to reflect upon some of the experiences you have had. You will be expected to write on your laptop reflections on any two questions from each of the following EAGLES. When writing your reflections, you need to make sure you give examples, and you are being clear and detailed. Be sure to show the EAGLE theme and the question as a heading before your reflection so your audience will understand what your are reflecting upon. One of your teachers will check off your writing each day. Without that check, you will not receive a Passing grade for China Alive.

The Six “EAGLES” Themes: You need to write a reflection on two questions for each EAGLE, and have six good photos for each of these two questions, which means 12 photos per EAGLE letter

“E” for Empowered 1. Describe a situation during the trip from which you learned something important from a non-SAS person. 2. Describe a situation where you solved a communication, travel or friendship problem by trying something you normally would not have done. 3. Keep track of healthy choices you made during this trip – what did you eat? How did you manage your need for sleep? When and how did you choose to “work” or “play”? How did you manage quiet time alone and noisy times with friends? Were there some risky or potentially unsafe choices you made? How did you handle them? 4. What about this trip has made you take responsibility for yourself? 5. Have you had to take a position of leadership during this trip? How were you as a leader? What was difficult? What skills make a good leader?

“A” for Adaptable 1. Describe a situation during the trip that didn’t go exactly to plan. How did you (and the group) adapt? Did you try something different? How did you feel about the results? 2. Describe a situation on the trip where you had to work with another person or with others to solve a problem. Discuss whether you feel it was easier to solve it alone or in a group? 3. Describe a situation that you were in that was challenging on a personal level (physically or emotionally). How did you get through it? Explain. 4. What happened on this trip that made you have to change your plans? Did something happen that made you change your mind about something? Explain. 5. What was one problem you had to solve on the trip? How did you solve it? What skills are necessary to be a good problem-solver?

“G” for Globally Minded 1. Based on your observations, what might be some of the advantages and disadvantages of living in a small minority community or village? 2. Describe a situation where local people did something in a different or unexpected way. How did it make you feel? What at the advantages and disadvantages to doing it this way? 3. Based on your observations what evidence of BIG WORLD ISSUES (ex. pollution, poverty, malnourishment, poor education, energy crisis) did you see in local life? 4. What are some of the unique aspects of the communities (people, land, customs, food, etc) you experienced that you wish you could “import” back to Shanghai? Why? 5. Imagine that you grew up in that local community and you were probably going to raise your children there. What do you like about your community? What would you want to change? What would you want to keep the same? Why? 6. Recommend this destination to someone else. Why would they want to visit here? What do you feel is of value and interest to everyone or to a particular person? Who should come here in your opinion? Why? 7. What is one thing you want to do and want to try to do to keep this China Alive experience alive after the trip? 8. Did you learn something about your classmates that was new and exciting? What was it?

“L” for Literate 1. Write down your observations, experiences and responses on your laptop during the China Alive experience. 2. Take photographs, record sounds and conversations (with people’s permission), sketch, create artwork, take notes of words, impressions, images for possible poems, and collect artifacts that may help someone else to understand your response. 3. On your laptop search for some “know-before-you-go” activities about the locations or activities you will be experiencing: what can you find on the web to give you background knowledge about the trip destination or make you more curious about where we are going? What do you want to know more about? Make a short list. (Hint: try googling these: URBN Hotel, Urban Planning Museum, Naked Retreats, organic farming, LuPu Bridge, etc.) 4. Collaborate in a shared presentation, which will be published online when we return. 5. How does keeping a journal deepen the experience of the trip for you? 6. Identify the most important experience of the trip for yourself and explain why it meant so much to you.

“E” for Ethical 1. What have you done to ensure that the people that you have encountered in this group remember you in a positive light? Give specific examples. 2. What have you done on the trip that demonstrates your honesty, generosity, caring and reliability towards trip members, chaperones and community members? Did you catch others in the act of being thoughtful of others? Describe how this is personally important to you. 3. What does life look like for the children in this rural area? 4. What do you think about the Chinese Government policy that all these children must leave the village and attend high school in a city? 5. Why must the children in these villages learn Mandarin?

“S” for Skilled 1. What have you found out about local minority people that you think would be of interest to others not on this trip? 2. What skills have you learned on this trip that you could share with others? 3. What skills have you learned on this trip that you can or want to personally use again. How and why? 4. What did you find out on this trip that has changed your view of China or the world in some way? 5. Imagine that you are travelling to a lost corner of Siberia for example. How would this China Alive experience help you with your Siberian-Alive journey? 6. Imagine that you are moving and going to a new school next year. How would this China Alive experience help you adjust? 7. What was the most difficult part of this trip for you? How could you plan for your next trip so that you would be more prepared and more able to overcome these difficulties?

Part III – PHOTOGRAPHS

You will need to take a minimum of 30 photographs and more would even be better. These photographs should be taken on your own camera and then downloaded into iPhoto. Please let the leader of the group know if you do not have a camera and we will help you to find someone to borrow one from. Make sure that many of the pictures you take relate closely to the questions you want to reflect upon. Remember you will need two questions per EAGLE, which means 12 photos per EAGLE letter. You will use these photographs to build your digital project on your laptop when we get back from the trip. We will check your camera daily. If you do not have photographs from each event that relate to the questions you are writing on, you will not pass.

Part IV – Making a DIGITAL PROJECT in your FLEX: The digital project will be made at school during your FLEX blocks when we return. Your teacher will guide you and train you if needed with iPhoto and Garageband to make your final project. This will be presented to the FLEX class, graded by your trip leaders, and will be a project you will want to keep forever!

Grading RUBRIC

You will PASS if: • You have written reflections for each of the “ALL-ABOUT-YOU” QUESTIONS prior to the trip. • You have two reflections for each of the EAGLES. Each reflection has detail and uses examples. You put effort into your writing. You did have your leader check you off on your laptop entries. • You did take at least 30 photographs that could be used with your writing to build your digital project. • Your digital project contains at least 20 - 40 photographs, has recorded laptop entries and is at least 3 - 5 minutes in length. • You have uploaded your digital project on to the Wiki in the “Green Adventures Shanghai” page by Friday, October 16. chinaalive2009.wikispaces.com • You have presented your project to your Flex class.

You will FAIL if: • You did not write reflections for each of the “ALL-ABOUT-YOU” QUESTIONS prior to the trip. • You did not have 2 reflections for each of the EAGLE letters written on your laptop. • You did not have your leader check off on your journal entries. • You did not take at least 30 photographs that could be used with your writing to build your digital project. • Your digital project does not contain at least 20 - 40 photographs, recorded journal entries and is not at least 3 - 5 minutes in length. It was not uploaded on the Wiki by Friday, October 16. It could not be presented to your Flex class.

Please come see Mr. Gould or Mr. Boyer if you want any clarification. = = =3. Here is where to find our packing list for each day.= The "Daily Packing List" is now posted and you can access it by clicking on"Daily Packing List" in the left hand column in the light-green column above. Click on it and it will open to the Packing List. (The format with coloring has been lost but the rest of the info is there and aligned.)

=4. Important Names and Phone Numbers:= ====Here is a list of your leaders and their cell phone numbers. Please enter Mr. Gould and Mr. Salim's numbers into your cell phone **__before Monday__**. I have made a folder for each of you that I will hand out to you Monday with hard copies of ALL of the above info as well as the names of all the students going on the trip, their pick-up/drop off locations at the start and end of each day, and their home and cell phone numbers for your convenience. I cannot post info about the students on the wiki.====

**Mr. Salim: 1364-190-4133**
OK, that is all for now. I sure am getting psyched for having a great time on this China Alive Trip! Call me with any questions you might have! Mr. Gould/Bob