The two main activities this week, the pecha kucha and rubric, were challenging for me, and it was the first time that I felt the pressure to finish my work on time. I have typically been a procrastinator for most of my life, so what I've discovered most about these projects is how much prep time goes into being well prepared. Yeah, I know; it's obvious, but I have been a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants kinda girl and have never minded last minute preps, even when teaching classes at times. So when I created my rubric for one of my projects I have my fourth graders do, I found myself exhausted at all the thinking that went into creating just one rubric. My brain was tired! Despite this mental workout, I have to say I was very pleased with the outcome and plan on continuing creating rubrics for many of my other projects. It is such a great way to communicate my expectations to my students. I can't count the number of times way back when I taught high school that students complained that my expectations were vague. Or the number of times where I went to grade their stuff and THEN decided on what my criteria were - so not fair to my students. No wonder they occasionally got crabby with me! Once I finished my rubric for my fourth grade, everything just fell into place, and not only did it give me something for the end result, creating the rubric really forced me to examine why I'm doing this project in the first place. Yeah, this is a real DUH moment for me people!
As for the pecha kucha, it took a very long time to create it, but overall I'm very happy with the result. I appreciate the motivation behind this presentation style, but I was a bit confused about the speaking aspect of it. I know it's 20 slides, 20 seconds, but does that mean you have to talk for 20 seconds on 20 slides? I had a hard time finding an answer to this and never really got one. All the samples we saw were really based on recorded live demos so the speaker spoke the whole time. I have to agree with what someone said in my group; talking for 20 seconds on 20 slides is too much verbal busyness. I think it sounds like you're cramming in a ton of info. Maybe I feel that way because unlike a live presentation, a recorded one doesn't allow for audience feedback and participation. I think it might be more fun to do one live although I think it would be incredibly challenging for me. I'd be too tempted to stray from my script.
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I am sure you will totally wreck the curve for us all..... actually very impressive work keep it up.
ReplyDeleteKara,
ReplyDeleteI have to agree that preparation can be an exhausting process. Part of the reason might be that some of us are trying to work with tools that are foreign, and part of the reason might be that we are perfectionists. Either way, I think that it is obvious the benefits of what we are doing when it pertains to value for classroom use. The Pecha Kucha assignment has also been a challenge for me. Take the estimated time to complete the project and throw that out the window. I am not sure how many hours I have logged to get my presentation together, and unfortunately, I am not sure that the result is indicative of the amount of time spent creating. But having to work within parameters is a good experience for us as we often have our students mold work to fit the parameters that we assign. I am not sure that 20 seconds of talking is "verbal busyness", but that might be proved or disproved as we use that presentation form more often. I know that the struggles I have had with the assignments have helped to change the way that I think about rubrics and presentations to be used in the future. :)