“Thank you for coming to my presentation of learning. I am the expert on my own learning. I am also responsible and accountable for my own learning. You can expect me to give an honest evaluation of my progress. We will discuss my strengths and opportunities for growth. Thank you in advance for listening and for offering feedback that I can use to improve as a learner.”
As I move on into the next semester, this post is to reflect on what I’ve accomplished so far this year. There was three projects I worked on that were all very different from each other, where I showed my strengths and also places I need to improve in. One was about politics, another was about the atomic bomb, and the most recent one was focused on poetry. I’m excited to go over my experience in all three of these interesting projects.
At the very start of the year I prepared my current self for writing this post by recording in my learning plan, the areas I wanted to grow in this year:
I said that I wanted to create work I am proud of, meaning that I would try to only submit work that I was happy with and was the best I could do. The next thing I wanted to do was take creative risks outside of my comfort zone. I wanted to incorporate new things into the work I do, and extend my blog posts, projects, and assignments beyond what I have done in the past. In all of the projects, there are examples of me doing these things and also not doing these things. Why I did, or didn’t accomplish these goals in different areas of the projects is what I plan to discuss so that I can improve going into the second half of the school year.
Where I’ve shown Improvement:
Now for the examples, I want to begin with the “Think You Can do Better?” project. This is the example I’m starting with, because it was where I first showed this year that I could grow to reach my learning goals.
This project was the first because it fit with the timeline of the Canadian Federal Election in September. I think it’s always interesting to have real time, and real world examples to go with our projects. A written reflection on the election was the first big assignment, which I definitely completed at an accomplished level.
I met the requirements of the assignment and showed I understood the learning behind it. However, through feedback and reflection it was clear that I could have gone into more detail. Taking more time to read over and add to my initial thoughts, would have allowed me to to that. More detailed explanations in my writing is one of the ways I wanted to improve, so I tried to do this in the following assignments, and will continue to do so.
The project ended as usual, with a summative post. In this I demonstrated critical thinking, creative writing, and I was happy with the post. From the election reflection to the summative post, I successfully showed growth in my writing and understanding. Although I started with an accomplished☀️ on the first assignment, in the end I was able to create extending🌈, insightful work with my press releases post. I was proud of my press release and I tried new things I hadn’t before in a blog post, like a new structure that engages the reader. This project was also a good display of teamwork as the political party was a combination of my groups ideas.
I was encouraged after showing I could go from accomplished to extending, to continue showing that growth so my grade could go up. I kept that in mind going into all the next projects.
Taking Creative Risks:
At the winter exhibition this year, what I presented was a conceptual artwork and an artist’s statement to go with it. Going back to my learning plan, this was definitely work that I was proud of and it showed creative risks.
What stands out about this work is that I did things I don’t usually do in assignments, and really showed my creativity. In my summative post I talk about how the interactive aspect of the artwork helped tie it all together. In my artist’s statement, the structure, writing, and personal connections were things, looking back, I was glad I did because I saw that they engaged the visitors of the exhibition, and helped them understand the artwork better. It was a risk to use different writing techniques than I have in the past and make the art interactive, not knowing how it would turn out, but in the end both of those things made my work better and received great feedback. I will continue to think about how I can incorporate things I haven’t tried before into my projects to make them better and to grow as a student.
Going into more detail:
The biggest thing I would say I struggle with in writing is going into more detail with my explanations. I talked about this with my election reflection, but since a majority of the assignments were written, I have more examples.
The most recent project was one I really liked. At the end of it, I did what was maybe the most writing I’ve ever done for a project, each piece of writing was in response to a song I chose. I didn’t leave it to the last minute, but a probably should have given myself more time to complete this.
The first paragraph I wrote was about the song “Kids.” Since it was the first, I spent the most time working on it. You can see that in the writing (you can read all of them in my last post), with the detail of my descriptions. This is because I wrote my ideas down in a draft paragraph, and then I stepped back and looked at where I could elaborate. This made for a paragraph that I was proud of, it thoroughly described my analysis of the song.
My analysis for this song “Woodland”, shared some qualities with the other like I still connected with the song and tried to have a good analysis. The difference though, is that it was the last song I wrote about. This gave me less time to rework the first draft to explain my thoughts better and in more detail.
These two song analyses show that I have made an effort to improve in this area of writing, but better time management will help me fully get there.
Challenging Myself:
I think to really reach my goals grade wise, and grow as a student, I will need to challenge myself more. I can complete an assignment, but I should try to go deeper than that when possible. I definitely did this in my conceptual art and artist statement since I wanted to do really well in the exhibition. An example where I could have done this, but didn’t, was in the Socratic seminars we did as we read “Hiroshima” by John Hersey.
In the discussions for the book, I did push myself to share my ideas even though entering a large discussion is not something I’m a natural at. Preparing for the discussion and participating in it, were the requirements for this assignment though. Where I could have challenged myself, would be preparing further before the seminar, by spending time with the text and thinking more critically about it. Even creating detailed notes before could have prepared me to challenge myself in the seminar. I know now, to take the opportunity to challenge myself because it will also help me reach my goals for learning.
In the last semester I showed that I can purposefully improve my work when I give myself time to challenge myself and take creative risks. Feedback and lots of reflection has helped me understand the specific areas where I can do better, like having a deeper understanding of topics, writing with detailed explanations, and trying to go beyond what I’ve done in the past. Acting on that feedback is what I can to to create work I am proud of. In the next semester I want to continue creating work I am proud of and show growth, by doing these things I can accomplish that. I want to add to the growth section of my learning plan, because I don’t think the two points I put are enough to get my contracted grade.
I want to add to this two things:
- I want to manage time and stress so that it does not get in the way of my performance
- I want to challenge myself before deciding I’m done with an assignment
That’s some of what I’ve done so far, and what I hope to accomplish in the next semester.
Thank you for taking the time to read/listen to this presentation! I appreciate any feedback.
-Asha