Thursday 24 January 2013

Final Thoughts

I think overall I enjoyed most of the assignments we had to do in this class throughout the year. If I had to chose a favorite project, it would have to be the bucket list project. I like projects where there's a wide range of things you can create because everyone is different and likes to present themselves in different ways. I think this project really opens up a new idea to students. I'm sure everyone's heard of making a bucket list and how it works, but not many people actually have the time to sit down and create their own! This project teaches you what kinds of things are important in your life based on the things on your list. If traveling was important to you, there would be many locations to visit on your list. It also taught me that quality of life doesn't have to be about the things you have, but the things you accomplish. I also have to say that I really liked the blackout poetry project. It seemed quite short but it was very creative and refreshing to usual classroom projects and assignments. 

There weren't really any projects that I truly disliked, but if I had to chose, I'd say twitter fiction. Looking at myself as a writer, I enjoy writing long pieces. It was challenging to write such a small story in only a few characters. I'm also not a fan of reading fiction especially unreal fiction with vampires and werewolves. I like things to be quite factual so I had a difficult time being as interested in this project as some of the rest. I also found the unit sort of dragged on a bit, however I did enjoy being able to use sites that I'd usually be using outside of school to do this project. I realized that there's a different dynamic to Twitter than just people tweeting what they did on the weekend, etc. 
Reading on Fridays was a good idea. I wish it would've carried out throughout the semester because most of us don't find the time outside of school to read. I read more books in the past semester than I did in the past three years. I enjoyed the massive selection of books, and I'm already sad to leave this class and go back to having 0 books to read. Although we did a lot of technology based projects, it is a nice change to get to go back to a good old book every Friday. I really respect teachers who allow this time to read because it's useful class time, and I think people used it pretty well this semester.

Since I enjoyed reading on Fridays, I also enjoyed writing about what I read or writing about projects we were doing. It's important to me that I go back on things and review what worked and what didn't and also what I may have learned or wanted to learn. I think these questions gave me a better understanding of what kind of books I like to read and also what kind of projects I'm better at. We didn't do reflections all semester, and I didn't mind not doing them. In the beginning I was very into them, but later on you kind of get bored of the same format and topic, especially if the book takes 3 weeks to read because you'd be doing 3 reflections on that one book. Overall, Monday written reflections were alright and I like to have the chance away from technology to do some good old writing.

The readers writers notebook didn't last too long. In the beginning I was really excited to write in it and decorate it. I wanted to personalize it just like a journal or something. We wrote a few notes, did a few assignments, and then tossed it to the side. Although I was excited to use a notebook, I got used to having a blog and updating that instead. I don't think there needs to be a notebook involved in this class. I could've taken my notes on separate paper each time and have done just fine.

Blogging was one of the most fun things in this course. I like that you have to add personal additions, and they can be whatever you're feeling at the time. I think this was the main project for this course. We always posted back on our blogs about every project. I like the whole idea of creating a better digital footprint for yourself because many people at such young ages these days don't realize what their digital footprint is doing for them, and it's usually doing bad things for them. I think learning about blogging opens many doors for us as students. We can use our blog to further us in our occupations or interests. I didn't realize how easy it is to show off your opinion or interests online. 450+ people viewed my blog this semester! I can't imagine how many people would see your blog if you had a topic and worked at it everyday for a long while. Overall, I'd recommend this class to someone just to learn about blogging. Using blogger makes it cleaner and more private than sites like Tumblr or MySpace. I really enjoyed doing this in this course!

As I commented before, twitter fiction wasn't my favorite project. It was quite unique and creative and I like it for that aspect. As I also said before, it just opened up a different part of Twitter that most people don't see or realize. It's good to see people using technology and networking sites for educational purposes. It's also good to know that I can join in whenever. It's so easy and simple to start tweeting long stories or short stories. I had never used Twitter up until this project, so I learned a lot about it and how to use it in a positive way. I'm glad we got to experience this site and do this project of twitter fiction. 

Having so much technology in one course really surprised me. All of these years we've been disciplined to put our phones away, but now we're allowed to do projects on them. It actually worked really good for me. I felt like if I used all of my electronics in this one class of the day, I didn't need to use it throughout the day as much. It was almost like I had gotten my daily dose of electronics, so it didn't create any conflict in any other classes. More and more young people are getting phones with internet and cameras and apps, so to be able to use all of these things in an educational way makes sense. I see many phones out in classes where they shouldn't be so why not make a class where you can be able to do that, but in a purposeful way. I think this course is surprisingly good for bringing technology into the classroom and into our education. I like that we did some projects on paper or hands on and also some that were online. 

Throughout this course, I'd say I've learned a lot about myself as a reader, writer, thinker, and creator. We did lots of reading throughout the course and we also did reflections on our reading that we did. I think reflecting on what I read showed me what I like to read and what I don't, how challenging my books should be, the speed at which I read, and much more. I also like the reflections because we got to share them with the world over the internet through our blogs. We learned to be sort of little critics. I think I realized that I enjoy escaping into a book, but I just don't make enough time in my daily life to read. I also learned that I like non-fiction and books that have situations that really could happen in real life. As a writer, I learned that I like space and freedom. Twitter fiction was painful to me because of the limited character space and also because it was fiction! As a thinker, I learned that I'm very personal. I like to have my own final touches or sparks of personality in my work. I'm an emotional thinker so most of my twitter fiction showed emotion or explained it within a story. Overall, this course, surprisingly taught me a lot about myself and how I show myself to the world.

I do not think the name of the course necessarily explains the course. I think this should be explained as more of a digital course. I'm sure when it was first thought of there was going to be more writing and hands on assignments involved, but as technology furthers and shows itself to be very useful and educational, the course shifted a bit. The time that was given to do projects and assignments was very realistic and accurate. There wasn't an excessive amount of work that had to be done at home, but yet there wasn't too much spare time in class. As we grow up and more generations come into play, this course will be more and more common, or at least I hope it will be. This class is a very modern twist on English class and I hope people realize that this class isn't a waste of time. No complaints on the teaching. Very calm, but not careless. Easy to approach.

My advice for future students taking this course is to be open minded. I think I had judgments about what this course might be like, but you don't really know until you take it. I didn't think that I'd learn as much as I did not only about technology, but also about myself. I'd say that this course is for anybody who enjoys working with technology or wants to get more comfortable with it. I think my only other advice would be just to have fun with the course. There weren't any super high expectations. There was no pressure to do super amazing projects, and having that pressure lifted off of my shoulders actually made me work harder. I wanted to do the projects for once. Overall, great class and I'd take it again any day!

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