What Is Art?

What is art actually? I think every person has different ways of explaining what art is. My way of seeing it can be totally different from yours. This I think is one of the good things about art, you can always discover new things, because other people have other perceptions than you.

Art can be a song like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2-1u8xvk54 This is art to me.

What I think art is:
Art is what you make it.
Art is something that makes you feel good inside.
Art is a beautiful way of expressing feelings and meanings.
Everybody can make art, they just have to find their own way of doing it.
Art will always lift you up.
Seeing something familiar in a new way.

Do you agree? If you don't, that's great!
Do you have any song you think is art?

- Mathilde

Letter To The Editor

Dear Editor

A few months ago I started at a new school, Bjergsted. It is a great school actually, but there are some things that bug me.

I would like to air my view no something that really annoys me: Outside the classroom we have some lockers, one each. The people who need to place their instruments inside of them have the largest ones. That is fine with me, but personally I think the other lockers are way too small, and I have one of the little ones. I can barely get all of my schoolbooks inside. I could really wish I managed to get my backpack into the locker too, but I do not have any chance at all.

When I am going outside of the school I do not want to bring with me the backpack, but sometimes I have to because I do not want to leave it unattended. When I can not manage or do not bother to take it with me, I have to take the mac and lock it inside of the locker, and then I put the backpack in the classroom or outside. Sometimes when I do this I forget that I do not have the mac in my backpack, if I need the mac in the next class I have to run out and get it, and that is quite stressful.

With this letter I want people to think of the size of the lockers when new schools get built.

It is hardly possible to built anything if frustration, bitterness and a mood of helplessness prevail.

Lech Walesa

Yours faithfully

-       Mathilde, 15, student, Stavanger

Politics From My Point of View

 Today, the 9th of September is the day to cast the ballot. It is parliament elections. Everywhere in the country people use their right to vote. They may vote for the liberals or the conservatives, or maybe just something in the middle. Unfortunately you have to be 18 years to go to the polls, and I'm not :(. There are still two years until I can vote.

This evening people will sit up and stare at the television while the votes get counted up. Many people want to see the moment when we get to know who "wins". It is quite exciting to see who gets a seat in the parliament in the end. This is called in Norwegian: valgvake. In my house we like to make: valgkake, which means "election cake". This obviously sounds much more cool in Norwegian than in English.

In the first place I'm not a member of any political parties, not yet, but maybe I will sometime. I don't know for sure which party I prefer the most, but I would like to clarify that I'm more red than blue. I actually wish I were more into politics than I am, but I think I know the reason why I'm not. It is often quite hard to understand what different parties mean, and what they fight for. If a politician gets a question, he or she would in mostly every situation answer something that has nothing to do with the question. That makes it difficult to understand if I agree with them or not. I just hope I get satisfied with the new parliament.

The cake <3

- Mathilde

Me And My...Life

Before I start on this blog for real, I would like to write a short resume of me and my... life.

My name is Mathilde Bjørnseth. I'm a Norwegian girl, born in Scotland (Aberdeen) the 9th of October 1997. The year after, I moved to Stavanger in Norway with my parents.

I have lived in Trondheim for four years, but now I live in Stavanger again. I like to spend my spare time being with friends, playing the guitar, singing, dancing and so on. And I must not forget to tell you that I love traveling. To see new places is just so inspiring. Meeting people with other cultures, languages and often a total different way of living.

I go to school at Bjergsted, which is a Norwegian upper secondary school or high school. Bjergsted is a school of music, dance and theatre. My main subject is music.  I sing, and I hope to get better, to develope and learn a lot more about using my voice. We are not just learning about music in this school (unfortunately). We also study mathematics, English, Spanish, Norwegian and science.

In the English classes we currently study learning strategies, which is kind of interesting actually, believe it or not. We've been learning about cognitive strategies (when you use repetition, take notes and do exercises), metacognitive strategies (when you discussing tasks and assessing your own level and what you are good at), social strategies (when you work together with others “teamwork”, if you talk to native speakers of English, you use the social strategy) and even more. I find it quite hard to understand which strategy is the best for me to use, but I know I do learn a lot talking with other people, and writing essays. The social strategy does often work for me.

- Mathilde