3-7-12

Everyday you learn something new. Today we were able to send our first email to our projected group partner. As our communication person I hope to see a response soon. I have been assigned with making posters and presentations for our group. I am pretty excited about that since I do actually enjoy doing things like that. I want to start soon but I think our project needs to develop more first. I can make base creations for our posters/presentations though. I have also determined that it might be nessecary to make a website for educational/presentation purposes.

"Shoot for the Moon, even if you miss, you'll land among the Stars" - Les Brown

3-5-12

Everyday you learn something new.Now that our I've finished my research paper I have started thinking about our group project. Since my job is communications I have been trying to figure out who our contact is and how that should work. I have ideas, and I favor the Neighborhood Services Department people out of all the possible contacts we have found, but I can't make decisions without consulting my group. I was thinking about creating a website for us, but it might not actually be necessary. I want to create a Skype account, but that might not be necessary either if our contacts don use/have it. I think we need to get some group time in class, like a whole period, so we can all make these decisions together and everyone will know what to do next.

"Shoot for the Moon, even if you miss, you'll land among the Stars" - Les Brown

2-29-12

Everyday you learn something new. Today we watched a video about a man and his photo editing. As I said in class, there was a definite relationship in the art of the 2 projects, the photos and our graffiti. I think that the differences are more important though, because the pictures are legal art, but graffiti is not. I read a whole article today about how graffiti can be justified, at http://www.graffiti.org/faq/damico_a_legal_and_economic_analysis_of_graffiti.pdf. I think that people need to find a way to make their graffiti somewhere other than walls. Could the same thing be done on paper? I dont even embrace the idea of legal graffiti walls, because it seems dangerous to get a huge group of people that might be in gangs together. I know my project is more about cleaning up graffiti, but in our awarness i think we should do something to recommend alternatives. 

"Shoot for the Moon, even if you miss, you'll land among the Stars" - Les Brown

2-27-12

Everyday you learn something new. My research has been going pretty well so far. I have found may sites by individual cities about graffiti, most of witch are .gov. I have also found many .org sites that outline financial effects of graffiti as well. There are a few .com articles that I hope to use, they are from sources that I find reputable, like the New York Times, but I still have to get approval for them first. In my research I found a few articles about graffiti internationally, in cities like Athens. I cant spoil the surprise, but I find it very interesting. I also found an article while looking for more information about the 2004 Olympic Stadium in Athens. Apparently after building the stadium and holding the Olympics, the stadium was abandon. It is now destroyed, and there are many refugees and gipsies living in the remains. It's terrible to see a country build something so great to hold the biggest sporting event in the world, then leave it to rot.

 "Shoot for the Moon, even if you miss, you'll land among the Stars" - Les Brown

2-24-12

Everyday you learn something new. So far I think the direction we are going in our study of Tuesdays With Morrie are looking pretty good. I like the idea of doing literary questions and group discussions on it. I'm not as excited about the literary elements, but maybe those will seem better after I read and attempt to do them. I hope that I will like this book. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society wasn't really that bad, It just got a bit slow in some places. I don't really think it was very gender based, it's just that many guys in our class weren't very big fans of it. I don't know if Tuesdays With Morrie will be that much different, but it will be interesting to see what people think over the next few days.

"Shoot for the Moon, even if you miss, you'll land among the Stars" - Les Brown

2-22-12

Everyday you learn something new. Today was a pretty good day for our project. Since I haven't posted about it before my group's topic is graffiti. One of my group members actually told me a lot of interesting information about it. I always thought that graffiti was mostly gang related. He told me that more of an artistic release for people, mostly teenagers or young adults. I found out about existing programs in Phoenix (Graffiti Busters) while looking for group contacts. My personal job for my group is communication/education. I am supposed to manage our group contacts and educate the community about graffiti. It seems like a pretty big and important job. I was given the research assignment of financial effects of graffiti. I am planning to start my research today. I think this will turn out to be a great project.

"Shoot for the Moon, even if you miss, you'll land among the Stars" - Les Brown

2-18-12

Everyday you learn something new. After the recent discussion in class I have thought about 21st century learning, since we were told it would play a part in our projects. Being a teachers son I hear about all the programs that are being brought in like PBL, and its really interesting. The focus of some of these things seems to be attempting to give students a bit more freedom, but it doesn't seem to be a good idea to me. As children we can't really be trusted with the freedom to be that independent. Some people would not gain anything because they are too free to just do some kind of really bad project. I think the idea is good but it needs to be refined for the reality of how children our in this time.
"Shoot for the Moon, even if you miss, you'll land among the Stars" - Les Brown