Over the first few months of school, we have created some outstanding projects. Whether we were in Alberta creating a mini-documentary in a short period of time or working in large groups in harsh weather conditions, we were able to persevere and get the task done. Just from term 1, we created ten different videos to show our knowledge of the driving questions and the topic of each project and how we grew as a learner. I’m going to talk less about what each video was about and more about how each video has shaped me into becoming a better learner. I want to talk about my experience working in my groups and the good moments and struggles we had and how we worked together through them. I’m going to talk about each ISTE standard, which one I used the most throughout the creation of each video, and how I grew from them. With each video comes a different story to tell and a different learning experience to share.
Four Shot Video
The four shot video was the video that started it all. It was the first project to start the year. This project although very simple and short, required a lot of teamwork and communication. Creating a film that’s only four shots sounds easy, but it isn’t. I quickly learned that communication helped a lot with this project because the people that were acting needed lots of directing. It wasn’t that they were bad actors, it was that some of the shots that they thought looked nice while they were filming them didn’t look as nice as they thought. This is why we were there to guide their movements so it looked better on camera. Something else that I’ve realized which is an essential step to working in groups is to listen clearly to the instructions. Sometimes, you don’t fully listen to the task or you misheard what the instructions were and you get it all wrong. In our case, we didn’t fully hear the instructions which meant we had to redo our film. With all of these ideas in mind, I think that through this project, I have become a better empowered learner and creative communicator. Through using technology and using different strategies such as finding different angles, using different tricks and tools to brainstorm ideas and adding different sounds for better effects, I was able to achieve my learning goal for that project. Through communicating with my group and expressing my ideas for what our video should be about and what different angles we needed to change or fix, I think I have become a stronger creative communicator.
Ghost Town Silent Film
The ghost town silent film was one of three short films we had to create while in our field study in Alberta. There was a lot of planning before the field study that went into the creation of this video. This was the first film of the year where we got to learn about and create a proper storyboard. I learned a lot more about pre-production planning and how to prepare for the shots you’ll need to take. Along with that, I learned how we can use storyboards and how they help with the creation of films. I think that this video strengthened my ability as a knowledge constructor. From all the steps that it took in making that short film, I got to look at all the different digital tools that can help me with making an even more creative and meaningful final product. With the new tricks and tools that I’d collected from the creation of that video, I had all the knowledge to create an even better video.
Drumheller Documentary
The Drumheller documentary was the second out of the three videos I filmed in Alberta. This video was a surprise and different from the others just because it was an unexpected project. Along with that, we had to work in partners and you and your partner had to takes turns filming each other. Not only that, but we had a very short amount of time to film. These were all big and small problems that needed to be worked around. In the end, I was able to work around these problems using strategies such as time blocking for researching, planning, and editing. Even though there were lots of problems with the creation of this video, I was able to work around them and become a better innovative designer. Even throughout the problems, I was still able to achieve a new lesson and create an amazing video about dinosaurs from it. From my experiences with these problems, I am now prepared to use my new useful and imaginative strategies to find the best solution.
Alberta People Video
The Alberta people video was the third video that we had to create while in Alberta. The video was all about how place impacts who we are and I looked at Albertans and how Alberta impacted them. This video required not only a lot of time to organize and plan what we were going to create, but also set up interviews, take videos that had to do with the people you were recording about, (In my case it was Albertans) and put all of that together. This video was interesting because we were creating an individual video but worked in groups. This was nice because we got to share ideas and plans for how we were going to construct the video. The driving question for this project was how does place impact who we are. To answer this question, we needed to interview many different Albertans as evidence for our answer to this question. This was tough because we had to think of many different questions to help us answer this question. Overall, this video has helped me become a better Computational Thinker. With all the time we had and with all of the steps, we had to complete to reach the final product, findings helpful strategies was a big part in solving problems throughout the project. One of the strategies that I used constantly throughout the creation of this video that was so important to a great video was to go back to your groups for ideas and help. This was not only important for me but all of my group members. If one of us didn’t fully understand a topic or needed help with filming, we were there to assist. This is probably the biggest skill I got from the creation of this video and I think that its such an important skill and can be applied to any project.
Running a Remake
For running a remake video, we had to work in small groups to complete the task of recreating a short horror film. There weren’t many ways that we could be creative throughout the creation of this project but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t fun to make. I had lots of fun learning about my strengths and weaknesses and how all of these attributes contribute and affect the groups I work with. I learned lots about the pre-production, production, and post-production process and how each part plays a role in creating an awesome film and in our case an awesome remake. We learned about writing screenplays, storyboards, and call-sheets which have a big role in the pre-production part of film making. I didn’t know how important these sheets were to the production. When we were filming, it was great to have a screenplay to look at when we needed to know what shots were next or a storyboard to look at when we wanted to see what type of shot wee needed to take. All of the stepping stones and achievements that led to the final product helped me become a better knowledge constructor. Through using different applications such as keynote, pages, and imovie I now have a better understanding of how I can use these strategies and templates to advance my films.
French Revolution
The French revolution video was the first of four videos for our revolution project. In this project, we decided to create an animation to show the causes and the consequences of the revolution. We worked in a group of four to research, analyze, and investigate what happened during the french revolution and how ideas drive change. Not only did I learn about the french revolution, but I learned a lot about planning and call-sheets. Most of the time I was creating the call-sheets so I got to learn a lot about formatting and a better understanding of their importance. I’ve learned that you can put almost anything on it that is important for the group to know whether its contact information, who’s doing what or even what the weather’s going to be like on the day you film. Along with getting deeper into planning for projects like this, I’ve gotten better at having a backup plan if something doesn’t work or someone doesn’t complete their role for the project. All of these experiences helped me become a stronger innovative designer. Through solving all of these problems with group members and using technology as a way to solve these issues whether it’s through different strategies or communication, has helped me gain a better understanding of how much you need to create a successful video.
American Revolution
The American revolution video was the second of four videos for our revolution project. In this post, we chose to do a heritage minute style video to show the causes and consequences of the revolution. I was away on vacation for most of the production of this video, but I was still able to contribute. I mostly contributed from research and voice-overs. Even though this isn’t much, I still learned a lot from it. I learned how important it is to properly format your research and notes because they’re easier to come back to and look at. When I formatted my notes correctly, it was way easier to take those notes and convert them into a well-written screenplay or call-sheet. I never thought I would learn much from recording voice-overs, but that was one skill that I realized was so important. The three things I think help with a good voice-over is no background sounds, a clear voice, and proper cropping of the audio. Another tip I’ve learned that helped with recording voice-overs was to properly read over your lines before you say them. Make sure they make sense in your head before you record. I connected this to memorizing music. If you want to memorize a bar of music, you have to look at it first and memorize in small parts instead of blasting through the whole song. Because of everything I’ve learned, it has helped shape me into a better knowledge constructor. Some of these strategies are small but crucial to learn and to make a great video.
Russian Revolution
The Russian revolution video was the third of four videos for our revolution project. For this video, we decided to create a techno parody of the song Ra Ra Rasputin to show the causes and consequences of the revolution. There were a lot more issues with this revolution project than there were with other ones. I think a big factor was that we got carried away with the freedom we had to choose what we wanted to do and we didn’t use our class time efficiently. Because of this, our video didn’t turn out as nice as we wanted it to be, but that doesn’t mean it was all a fail! With our fails comes a reflection and we had time to reflect on our mistakes and remake it to be even better. Even though this video was a failure for our group, the learning experience helped me become a stronger computational thinker. Through all of the problems were solutions and learning experiences. At times, I helped our group by using technology and strategies such as editing and taking some of the things we did well out of our original video. I also used technology to help organize our group and get us back on track and to finish our final video strong. As we say in PLP, a fail is a first attempt in learning and this was no different. I think that this was a great learning experience and that not only me but the rest of my group also found a good learning experience from our mistakes.
Revolution Easter Rising
The Easter Rising revolution video was the last of four videos for our revolution project. For this video, we decided to create another animation to show the causes and consequences of the revolution. This was our final video that was part of our revolution project and we wanted to finish strong. An animation worked really well and we decided we wanted to try it again. It went well and we ended up taking everything we learned together as a group from the videos before and used that knowledge to create this final video. We started out communicating great and all divided everything up and stuck to the call-sheet. The one big issue we had was that one of our group members was away but we were able to use our technological strategies to solve this problem using imaginative solutions such as staying in communication daily to catch up with our group to see where everyone was with their parts. Overall, this video helped me become a better innovative designer. From skills such as teamwork and communication, my group and I were able to solve problems using our iPads that would help us and create a strong, creative, useful solution to create an amazing video.
Take Your Kid to Work Video
The take your kid to work day video was part of our personal growth plan course. I went to visit my dad’s workplace and recorded clips for my video. Not only did I learn a lot from going to my dad’s workplace, but I also learned a lot from constructing this video. This video helped with my understanding of being a better Creative Communicator. Throughout my time at the hospital, I visited several different doctors. I used my technological tools to creatively find different styles and tools to help me collect as much data as I could while at the hospital. I created my own version of a screenplay that I used to write my interview questions on to interview each doctor. This helped me because I was able to clearly see all my questions and had a better plan of what I needed to get done for my video throughout the day. In the end, I got lots of different answers to my questions which helped a lot with the information about each doctor in my take your kid to work day video. I’ve realized that the more creative my strategies are in skills such as organizing, the better I will get at it and the stronger my habits will get in creating a great video.
Each one of these projects has given me a different learning experience. Whether it’s about working in groups or planning and organizing work, each one of them is important in everything that you do. These skills have helped me become stronger with all of the ISTE standards. Not only have these skills helped me becomes stronger with the ISTE standards, but they’ve helped me gain a better understanding of them as well. As I said before, to fail is the first attempt in learning, it’s a time to reflect on the work that you’ve done and in what ways could you have done better. I’m going to keep all of these ideas in mind and I hope that I can not only keep what I’ve learned from term one and remember it for term two, but as my years in high school pass I can continue to strengthen them and find something that I can improve on and get better at in everything I do.
