Blue sky…..

Hello everyone for my final project in plp eight we completed a blue sky project. A project based around answering one question : what is something missing from your life that should exist. Many companies such as google and apple use blue sky to invent new products as well.
For our blue sky’s we mostly self directed ourselves and only had three rules….
We also were given a LAUNCH journal to help us stay on task, complete and keep track of our work.
The LAUNCH….

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0gT9Hd7ybUg&feature=youtu.be

So what is or was the launch you might ask well it’s one of many PLP acronyms. So let’s begin with the beginning of the project, journal and word. L , which stands for look listen and learn. The phase of this project ( look listen and learn ) was all about recognizing what would or could answer the driving question: what is something missing from your life that should exist. This was our brainstorming phase where we focused on what our project would be…
When I started L I came up with a few ideas by answering a few questions in the learning guide (the rules or directions that went with our journals) but knew originally I would chose this idea to create my boat connector. After figuring out what people needed, what I needed and what would be a possibility I started the next section: A. A in this case does not stand for apple but the phase ask a lot of questions. The next part of our blue sky project was one of the most important, asking questions. Since I knew barely anything about how I would make my boat connector this was a very important part since it would help me begin to understand what I got myself into….
After asking questions through a need to know document and creating a set of deadlines and beginning to sort my self out , it was time to take these questions and understand (by of course finding answers! The next part of blue sky was to Understand. To answer my questions from the previous part I interviewed neighbors and turned to google. I asked neighbors specific questions that were meant for people or the customers . I asked google or various websites the weird questions about materials. After I understood what I was in for it was time to navigate the ideas And answers I had. The next part of our project was N which stands for navigate. In this stage I took my ideas and started to group them together. Some of these ideas went into the trash bin while others were sorted into two possible prototypes. Once I had organized my ideas and had two clear paths it was time to test, fail and create more paths. Which brings us to C , create a prototype. I already had two prototypes from the last stage, so I chose the best one to continue to prototype and test. I then went on to create more models, drawings and eventually draft. After many LEGO boat connectors I built the real deal and began my testing.

Of course there were flaws and much room for improvement. Which brings me to the final letter H, highlight and fix. For this stage I started to take my best draft and fix it to become my actual product. Since it was a pretty good draft there wasn’t too much to fix besides some tools needing tightening. I then also realized while testing at night that I would need something to keep my product visual at night so I added a reflective strap for night time.

Now my product was complete and so was my LAUNCH journal now it was time to show it off at the exhibition. We were later on sorted into our exhibition groups, I was with Izzy , rhiann, Amelia, Taylor and anders. Our group was products of the world. For our area or section of the exhibition we decided to theme our exhibit as a trade show. To achieve our international trade show asthetic we made lanyards with name country and company logos on them. We also painted a mural with an abstract world in the background, as well as built a food truck to display our groups food. For our activity we made our own prize wheel that didn’t exactly work but spun for a little while.

Our exhibit worked pretty well and we had many people stop by to learn about our projects. By the end of the night I had probably seen about thirty or forty people and felt good about my presentation. In all the exhibition went pretty well and by the end of the night I was really proud of my product and also a little sad my last project of grade eight was over. I learned quite a bit from this project, I learned how difficult inventing things is (specifically when you need answers but they don’t necessarily exist!) I also expanded on what I learned in PGP this year and worked hard to be productive and on time with my work. I also learned more tips and tools for presenting from the night of the exhibition and almost had my presentation memorized by the end. This was a really fun and exciting project that I was able to make my own and use creativity to create. This was a great project and I have a few ideas for next blue sky ! Thanks for reading , Kaia

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