Year #1 Wrap Up

Last Friday officially ended my first year of college!

I wanted to review my original goals for the year and go over what has surprised me and what I expected.

Goal #1: Understand the different styles of teaching and types of learning around the campus community

Overall, I would say I have accomplished this goal, even though it is the goal I have done the least work with. However, I do not think I took the route I was expecting. The main way I have learned about the different classes on campus was filming of the videos. Originally, I was going to research different styles of pedagogy. I tried doing this, but I will admit the language was hard to understand and it was much easier to understand why teachers teach their certain classes the way they do. I also wanted to research the beginning of Full Spectrum Learning. I feel like I did this a bit while trying to originally understanding what FSL is. The third idea is what I actually ended up doing. I talked to different professors around campus to understand the different classes available to students.

Goal #2: Learning how to communicate in a group to gain teamwork skills

Working in a team of five this year has really helped me to communicate better. I usually am the person who likes to work on their own project alone because they don’t want anyone to mess it up, but having to let go a bit and collaborate on projects has been really helpful. I am much closer and communicate more with Ruthie than I ever would have expected. I feel like I am constantly emailing professors, students and team members about filming or videos.

The way that I expected this to happen was to make a task list of different projects. This did not really happen. I do have a task list that I update each week for different projects I want to/need to work on for that week. However, I never made a full task list for the project, instead I mainly go week by week.

I would say I have accomplished this goal overall. I have communicated more with professors and students than I would have imagined. Being able to work in a group is a very important skill, and I believe I have gotten better at it over the course of the year.

Goal #3: Become More Fluent in Shooting and Editing Videos

This goal is a bit hard to track for me. When I first started the job, I thought I would be mainly editing the videos, and Ruthie would be the main one filming the videos. Looking back, this could not be further from the truth!

Both Ruthie and I film both the students and the professors because it is MUCH easier with two people instead of only one. We have gotten filming down to a science now. It only takes about 15-20 minutes to film a professor and only about 10-15 minutes for the students. We walk them through the questions beforehand and we go through the interview twice to make sure they do not want to change or add something to their original answer.

When it comes to editing, I do almost no work with it which really surprised me. Ruthie does almost all of the editing work, and I reach out to new professors and students while working on the website or other small tasks that need to be done.

I do think I am more comfortable editing videos than before. In high school, I mainly used Adobe Premiere to edit videos, so the transition to WeVideo was not that hard. The only thing I miss about Premiere is the ability to change more settings such as the scale of the video, the speed, and the animation of elements. I do really appreciate the ability to share videos in WeVideo while working with another student.

Goal #4: Develop a deeper understanding of WordPress and how to develop a more functional website

This goal is the goal I think I have improved on the most. The Full Spectrum Learning website has come a long way from my original ideas for it. There have been two main iterations of the site, but many more in between versions and tweaks made.

In high school, I only used Adobe Dreamweaver for website design and adjusting to WordPress took a little bit to understand. Here is a list of what I think the pros and cons of WordPress are:

Pros:
1. Shareability. It is easy to make a different account for a user to login and work on something if they need to. Dreamweaver requires files to be changed instead of it all being online.
2. Ease. Even though I do not like the templates (see below), I do like the idea of how WordPress (mainly Elementor) works with blocks you can move around and put together to create your own personalized website that is unique.
3. Uploading. While using Adobe Dreamweaver, there is more of a process to uploading and publishing pages than WordPress has. Even if you save a page on Dreamweaver, you still have to upload the whole site for changes to be made. However, on WordPress it is very easy to publish and update a site. I would always forget to update my site while using Dreamweaver, but with WordPress it is hard to forget.

Cons:
1. Templates. For most people who started on WordPress this aspect would probably be considered a pro. However, because I learned most website design aspects in Dreamweaver where everything is basically coded by the user, the templates felt like they restricted me a little bit.
2. Internet. This feature is great when I am on campus and have great internet 24/7, but when I am at home and internet can be a struggle it can be challenging. This is probably a pro for most other people though.

I believe I have improved on this goal the most because I have learned a lot between the first and second creations of the site. I have learned a lot about different coding ideas and animations. My favorite thing I have learned was the creation of the interactive grid, especially the rollovers on the axes.

I have learned more than I was expecting over the course of this year and I am very glad to have this opportunity. I am very excited to attend the Digital Pedagogy Lab in August with the FSL team! I can’t wait for next year and to continue expanding on the work that I have been able to do this past year.