Finally! After weeks of hard work and some sacrificing of after school hours, the Destination Imagination regionals tournament has arrived and passed. I could write a whole post about what DI is but to make it easier for you just click right
here to learn all about it. For this project our driving question and cor competency was
How might I research and understand a problem, process, or challenge using different perspectives? At the beginning of our month long journey, I new very little about destination Imagination and what we were going to be doing. Although I had a advantage of having and older Brother in
PLP, I had only heard his opinion and what he did. That being the case I began with a bit of a fixed mindset.
Going into the challenge, I had some catching up to do. Since the explanation of what DI was and why we participated in the challenge was on the day we got back from winter break and our family vacation, I had to spend a few classes reading about the tournament and so I could understand what we were doing. As a group of five,
Liam,
Nathan,
Julien,
Raymond and I worked together to solve the challenge given by the scientific category. Much needed to be done before we could present and lucky we had more than a month to do so.
The challenge process was split into four stages that we had to get through before the day of the tournament and one after the tournament.
Stage one was recognize.
What is Recognize?
This is where you become aware of the challenge and gain an in-depth understanding of the challenge.
For this stage our group brainstormed ideas for what we would present. Our challenge consists of 6 elements that made the challenge unique. I found that I demonstrated a great understanding of the “research” aspect of the
DQ in this stage. I read the challenge outline, what was required and not allowed for our , and even the scorning to gain a different and better perspective on the task layer out for us.
What is Imagine
Stage 2 is all about generating ideas, focusing on promising ideas, and creating a project timeline.
With our the knowledge of what the challenge was and some possible ideas to support our solution, we needed to plan out how things were going to be done. This stage took a majority of our time due to the importance it had. In this stage we made a detailed plan on what and how we were going to present for our solution. We struggled on finding our two team choice elements for the challenge but after brainstorming everybodys talents and/or interests we decided to make a song using our own ukuleles as well as a couple of digital songs made by
Raymond. After generating ideas and narrowing them down to a clear process, it was time to present our ideas for critiques, which in this case was our teachers. After a many
FAILS we had a solid plan.
Our Solution
Monkeys enter B.C. Rainforest after zoo escape (greater Vancouver zoo)
Monkeys find this new environment is very different from their own
Monkeys taste leaves, and spit them out
Monkeys sleep, and shiver in bush
Morphs to claws and thick fur
Monkeys deprive natural resources
Eat everything in sight
Trees rot and decompose
Some trees still barely standing
Monkeys challenged by bear
Main monkey tries to slash bear with claws
Main monkey gets injured
Secondary Monkeys flee
Main Monkey try to climb tree to get away
Tree breaks (robo arm pushes over tree)
Bear battles monkey
Secondary monkeys come in to help
Bear gets injured
Bear flees
Monkeys are now very feared hunters, and can’t live in B.C forest anymore
Stage three: initiate and collaborate
What is Initiate and collaborate?
Stage 3 is when you research, explore, experiment, and then commit to your options. You will also build and complete all the requirements.
In this stage our main focus was mking sure that we were 100% ready for the building process. From creating a plan “B” or an alternate plan if something goes wrong to re-reading every aspect of our challenge to even watching videos on challenges before us. During this stage we made sure all the materials needed for the building process were available. We also plotted out what we would accomplish every class and the days we would work after school. This stage took a lot of work but in the end we were all glad we put in the effort.
Stage four: Assess
What is Assess
Stage 4 is about assessing your progress. This will inevitably lead to reworking or reimagining ideas. At the same time, you will be practicing your presentation of the solution.
Its been a long few weeks planning our performance and now its finally time to create. I wondered why it took three stages before we could start building and testing our solution. Although, when I realized how much we would’ve done the challenge wrong with out reading the rules our the challenge outline I understood why we spent so much time on the past three stages. It took many long days with countless hours of hard work to complete this stage and even with the time we ha we barely met our deadline. By the end we had completed everything that that we would use for our solution with a week left to rehearse.
Stage five: Evaluate and Celebrate
What is Evaluate and Celebrate
Stage 5 is about presenting at a tournament and then reflecting and celebrating the experience.
For this stage we reflected on the tournament and brainstormed what we need to do differently for provincials. To better our solution we have to re-design and build our props. We also have to construct a better story line that will make sure the audience follows what’s happening throughout our performance. In order to do that we will need to follow a schedule after and in school. In school the order we will do the tasks will be: trees then cave/bush then working on theatre in the round, after that we will make better and more realistic looking monkey costumes, then we could better our hydraulic arm by painting it and making a stand for it to rest on, finally we will work together to make the story element more significant. After the break we will rehearse for the remainder of the classes.
Throughout the course of the month long project I have grew not only to be better learner or creates but a a better person all together. I have improved my skills on collaborating, working well with a group, thinking outside of the box, and finding a solution to a problem. I am exited to present at provincial and show our improved solution. Make sure to comment any questions on this post below.