Project Reflection

One of the final steps to completing Digital Portfolio is to write a reflection essay to accompany your independent project. In the essay you should reflect not only on the growth of your project but your own growth as a self-regulated learner. The reflection essay is also an opportunity for those of you who have struggled with the independent project to explain the difficulties and obstacles you have faced.

The reflection essay should cover the project rubric items that we looked at near the end of last marking period. Additionally, you want to make sure you reflect on your growth as an independent learner; setting goals, conducting research, gathering evidence, experimenting, creating, planning, and reflecting on your task. The reflection essay should cover the following points:

• Introduce and explain your project idea. What problem does the project address? What task, phenomena, stimulus, question, or discrepancy does your project attempt to solve? You should refer to and include any relavant planning information from your blog.
  
• Analyze your efforts to solve the problem, answer the question, or complete the task through your project. Describe what research, experimentation, and/or action you have taken to complete the project. What new knowledge did you acquire through the project? What if any new knowledge did you create through the project? What have been your strengths and weaknesses working on the project?
• Explain your personal and academic connections to the project. What attracted you to the problem, question, or idea for the project? Explain why the project is important to you and also why it is important to the community and/or the world? How could the project help others?
• Explain how your project synthesized your idea, planning, research, and actions into a new creative form. What ways did you create, image, or innovate to produce your project? Remember, synthesis is the form of thinking where you create your own solution to a problem. How did your imagination help you think flexibly or take a risk?
  
• Evaluate your overall commitment to the project. Predict whether your final project will meet all your goals and offer a solution to the problem you have addressed. This is an opportunity to appraise your performance honestly and address how your project could be improved, revised, or finished.
  

The length and depth of your reflection essay is dependent on how well developed your final project will be. If you feel that your project will be incomplete, the reflection essay should be longer and describe in-depth what your portfolio group will not be able to see on your blog and in the final project. At minimum, your reflection essay should be five paragraphs in lenghth covering the above points. If your project is incomplete, your essay should be substantially longer as you have to explain your entire project in depth. Please post all reflection essays on your blog along with your projects and/or project documentation.

Goal # 8 Reflection and Goal Setting #9

Good morning, today you will assess your progress on your last goal #8 by leaving a comment on your previous post. Please explain how you met your goal and describe your progress including any evidence that you produced last week. When you are finished commenting, post your new SMART goal #9 and begin working on meeting your goal during class today.

During your goal reflection and setting today, I will be coming around to check for evidence of progress. Please be prepared to show and/or explain how you met goal #8. We will look at the number of students who set and met their individual goals today and tomorrow in class. This is the final marking period and meeting our goals is the most important goal for the class.

Project Conferences and Finding your expert

Today I will be meeting with each of you to discuss your progress towards completing your project. We are entering the third Marking Period and projects for portfolio will have to be finished and graded by Tuesday May 26th for Juniors and Thursday June 4th for seniors. The rest of our time in Digital Portfolio needs to be used to create, execute, make, image, write, or design your projects. Your final weekly goals should be about making the product.

Today and tomorrow while I conduct conferences, you may work on your project after you spend some time searching for contact information for experts who might be able to answer your questions. Use Google to search for poets, writers, painters, artists, musicians, and/or people working if fields relevant to your own. Many of you have found blogs related to your topics, and you can contact those people with your questions as well.

Try and find contact info for 3 - 5 people you think could answer your expert questions and email me the information at mr.powhida@gmail.com. In your email, include a short 2 -3 introduction that you will send out along with your questions to the experts. Tomorrow, we will try and send out your questions at the beginning of class.

Goal Setting and Finding an Expert

Now that the Internet is working, please comment on last week's goal #5(6) regarding your progress and post a NEW smart goal #6(7) on your blog. The marking period ends tomorrow and we will be conducting progress conferences tomorrow and Thursday. You will have time tomorrow and Thursday during those conferences to catch up on any blog posting and goal setting you need to improve your grade, as well as meet this week's goal.

Finding an Expert

Many of you could use some guidance for your projects, because there is an overwhelming amount of information on the Internet. As you know, information is not valuable unless you are able to comprehend, apply, analyze, synthesize, and/or evaluate it. In order to help find some guidance we will be searching for experts, or people who have already applied the kind of higher order thinking you need to do in their own work.

We happen to live in a city of experts. In terms of your projects, many of you will be able to find help and ideas within the school and others will have to look beyond the school walls. How you do find an expert? You search for people and contact information in the industry you are researching and you reach out to several of them until someone responds. I was contacted by a student at the Young Writer's Academy to talk about my work as a writer in Brooklyn. I sat down for an interview about my writing process. The student found my email on the Internet and contacted me. I responded because I thought it would be good for the community (commitment).

Before you start searching for an expert on your project (or area of interest), you will need to think of several questions to ask your expert. For example, Karisha wants to write a fantasy story. She might ask an expert on writing "Why did you get into writing?", "What are some of the steps you take to write a story?", or "How can I develop my characters?"

Each of you needs to write a series of at least seven questions for an expert about your project. They should not be yes or no questions, but ones that will help guide your work. Email me your questions today at mr.powhida@gmail.com

If you finish your questions early, start searching for people in your field of interest or if you know a faculty member that might be able to help, include them in your email today. So, if you are making a video/film search for "Brooklyn, Film makers, production companies". If you are doing fashion, search for "Brooklyn, fashion designers"

Thinking about Thinking

Today we are going to look at higher order thinking and Bloom's taxonomy before we begin searching for outside experts to help us develop our projects. Please reflect on last week's goal#4 and then post your new SMART goal #5

Before you start your reading, I think it's only fair that you start to understand that the kind of work you are doing in this class is difficult intellectually. Why? Well, let's take a look at Bloom's taxonomy, which breaks down intelligence into different categories. Carefully read the 1st domain of cognitive learning only (unless you want to read more) and then answer the six questions below and email me your answers at mr.powhida@gmail.com

Don't post them or add a comment here. Email your answers only.

Copy and Paste the questions into gmail:

1. What is Bloom’s definition of knowledge?
2. How do you define knowledge?
3. Provide an example from school where you demonstrated knowledge?
4. Which of Bloom’s categories of knowledge is the most difficult? How do you know?
5. What category or categories might describe our habit of mind of perspective?
6. Describe which category of knowledge you are required to use in school and explain what you think that means about the school:

When you have finished please begin work on meeting your goal for next week.

SMART Goal #3 Reflection/ SMART Goal #4 Setting

Before you set your goals to today, I would like us to review the project rubric together, so that you can gauge your progress so far. After we look at the rubric here http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dhrh47t8_128cb227gg6 and discuss what the different standards mean, you have to give yourself a progress grade so far. Thinking about what you have accomplished so far leave a comment below this POST here and give yourself a progress assessment. Use the example format below:

P - Distinguished
A - Undeveloped
N - Developing
I - Undeveloped
C - Proficient

After you've left your self assessment, please continue to read below and complete your goal reflection and setting for this week.

Today you should take a moment to add a comment about your progress towards meeting your SMART goal #3. (if you have four that is OK, but most people are on SMART Goal #3). When you have finished posting your comment, POST a new SMART goal #4 on your blog. I will be responding to your goals this week as well.

Goal 2 Reflection/New SMART goal 3

In response to your second goal that you posted on your blog, add a comment that answers the question "Did you meet your goal?  If so, support your answer by describing or showing the evidence you produced.  If not, what obstacles prevented you from meeting your goal?"

After you have commented on Goal #2, you now have to set a SMART goal for next week.  Check your backwards plans and give yourself another goal to complete for your project.  PLEASE use the SMART goal template outlined below on the class blog.  Make it a reasonable (small) goal that you can accomplish during the week outside of class because we will be working on customizing our blogs and developing personal banners in Photoshop.  

BE SURE TO POST GOAL #3 on your blog (even if you are not here today)