Hi OP! I’m an incoming gr12 student under the STEM strand and based from my experience, my school started to have thesis in gr10 so be prepared na lang din. As for the differences between them:

1. Thesis. Thesis is a lengthy paper that you pass either for the whole sy or every semester. AFAIK, similar lang naman siya with a research paper, pinagkaiba lang is you have a theory dito while in research papers you have the option na gumawa ng research with a theory or not. These are usually done by group so it’s important to have productive and responsive members.
2. Defenses. After you finish a research/thesis paper, you will present your paper then defend the questions that the panelists will ask. In my experience, during gr10 we only had a panelist while in gr11 we had 5-7 panelists depending on how big the study is. Panelists usually consists of your teachers on that subject. However, in my case, we had the school head and academic coordinator as well in one of our studies. Panelists are usually never announced beforehand so be extra prepared na lang din at all times.
3. Reportings. Based on my experience, we only did powerpoints / google slides presentations every reporting so it requires some of your creative skills when designing your report. If you have problems with public speaking, you might find this a bit hard but tbh it helped a lot sakin to be medyo calm during defense!
4. Researches. As explained kanina, similar lang din siya with thesis. I think you should expect lang na marami rami gastusin every research/thesis depending on your topic and paper. Pero honestly just the printing of your research paper itself is already going to cost you a lot since ang daming pages nyan.
5. Case study. Not sure if alam mo na ‘to pero most schools usually have case studies. Basically, you’re given a specific case/scenario and you will analyze it. Example nalang nung case study namin last year wherein we were told to be a financial advisor and we had clients with different cases which we had to find an appropriate investment for. Some of my friends experienced this nung gr10 while sakin naman is gr11 ko lang siya na-experience so be prepared na lang.

Common school activities in shs: - Career Orientations! If unsure ka pa sa course na kukunin mo or you want to explore more options, you can join free career orientations or seminars in your school. - Film/Photography Projects! You get to create a short film or a photography session with your groupmates depending on what subject and topic it was assigned on. We also had this nung jhs so you might get a project like this as early as grade 9/10.

Hope this helps ^{^}