The title is a pun! I’m marking your “What is Beauty?” work at the moment, and throughly enjoying doing so, so thank you all for your efforts! After a fair bit of faffing around, I have managed to shrink and upload the first version of the Beauty Video Presentation that EW submitted. I thought you might like to see the whole thing. It’s rather good, and gives you all a target to go for for the next piece of big work! Of course, I have no idea how I’m going to grade it…
I hope you’re getting some work done on your projects during the holiday… and knowing how the boredom must be kicking in by now, I thought I’d throw some distractions your way.
There are lots of ways you can demonstrate your thoughts on the topic, and I’m aware I often through out the names of a variety of online tools you might not know about, so here in one fun-filled package are a few you may wish to play with.
Please feel free to add your own ideas in the comments!
Glogster
Glogster is the site I used to put together the ‘poster’ I used to introduce the Owen poem.
Now… the bad news is that Glogster is undergoing a massive upgrade at the moment, so you may struggle to set up a new account. That said, it is worth the wait.
If you want to go for it, you can sign up for a free account at edu.glogster.com Using the edu.glogster.com site is preferred to the usual public site as the content is ‘safer’, but more importantly, you get more tools for free (My favourite price)!
Next up…
Wikispaces
Looking for a free website that allows you to embed all sorts of media? Looking for incredible ease of use? Looking for a brilliant way of sharing or even better working with others? Then try wikispaces!
A wiki is an online site that lots of people can edit. The great news is that, as long as you are using it for K-12 education, it is free and has no adverts. I love wikis, and wikispaces is the easiest one I’ve found so far. It doesn’t look too flash at first, but if you have a bit of imagination and time (and are willing to search around for this site : http://wheretostartwithwikisandblogs.wikispaces.com/More+Advanced+Wiki+Editing) you can make it look really great — or really awful if you over do it!
Don’t forget that if you use Dropitto.me to pass on your work, you need to include an email address in your document so I can return the marked/commented version! For those who have already uploaded work, can I ask you to upload another version that includes your email address! (Use the footer to include it if you know how to… If not, you’ll soon find help online to show you!)
The Task: You are going to investigate the question “What is beauty?”
What you need to know: You are free to define beauty in any way you wish. It can be physical beauty, or (please pardon the phrase) “inner beauty”. You can talk about people, or you can talk about objects or places or maths calculations or nature. In short, you have a completely free and open choice for the subject matter you choose.
What you need to do: No matter what you choose to investigate, you must use and acknowledge appropriate source material. No sources, no marks… Simples!
You can present your findings in any way you choose. This might be an essay, a PowerPoint presentation, a video, a song, an annotated painting, a website… in other words, in any way you think will best help you demonstrate an answer or point-of-view on the question, What is beauty?
What you need to think about: There are several obvious sources where you will find information about what “beauty” is. I’d start with Wikipedia and any other easily accessible sources such as dictionaries or encyclopaedias. Start by finding out what others have called beautiful. You may agree with their definitions, or you may disagree… But be prepared to support or argue your own point-of-view either way.
What you can do to develop your ideas: You are encouraged to think beyond the obvious. If you decide to look at people who are considered “beautiful”, have you considered how much our perceptions can be and are manipulated by someone using Photoshop? If you choose to talk about art that is “beautiful” have you considered the cultural background and baggage that we bring to how we look at something beautiful?
Consider how much of what we consider beautiful is because of peer pressure, or accepted points-of-view… be strong, and consider that if we all had exactly the same opinions, then we would all be trying to go out with the same person.
Consider the lists you created in class. When you wrote down the names of 5 people and 5 places that you considered “beautiful” and the same again for people and places you considered “ugly”, you were basing your decisions on a set of criteria that you had chosen. How well can you explain or defend these decisions?
Finally: Is there any value in considering the impact the “beauty” has on the person experiencing or enjoying it. Is it a truly personal response according to a set of rules that cannot be shared… or are there some truly beautiful people or objects or places that we can all agree on? And the obvious extension of this is can we ever separate the physical from the essence of that we call beautiful — how do we reconcile a physically beautiful person with an ugly personality?
Starting Points
To get you started, here are the slides I used in class, and also some links to the YouTube video(s) I referred to. Please use the comments to ask questions and to get some discussion going. This is an interesting topic, and you do all have something to contribute… So get busy!
My Slides
Dove Evolution
Related Video(s)
DUE DATE: You are expected to hand in your project on Friday 28th October. You are welcome and encouraged to submit early drafts or ideas during the October break using http://Dropitto.me/nwinton (I’ll remind you of the password if you ask me!). And as a last point to consider: you are welcome to include photographs and/or drawings or media in your submitted work… In fact, given the nature of the task, I think you have no choice but to do so… in this case, DO NOT FORGET TO GIVE THE SOURCE OF ANY IMAGES OR MEDIA YOU USE!
THE PRACTICAL STUFF: It is up to you to decide on the format you choose, so it will be up to you to decide on what you include in the final ‘product’. As a general guide, you will need to have some sort of discussion or explanation of what others consider beauty to mean, and then you will need to give YOUR point of view on what you think beauty is.
I am more than happy to give you advice or tips and suggestions, so don’t leave it till the last minute! Think through what you will need to make your project happen, and devise a good plan… Otherwise you may never finish it!
Finally, set your own goals! How will you decide that you have been successful?
Now that we are up and running a little more smoothly, I thought we should maybe use this blog for class writing before it goes live on the PA Writing blog.
In addition, I’m going to post a few bits and bobs here that should keep you busy.
First up is the question we are investigating:
What skills and knowledge do you need in order to be successful after school… and how well does school prepare you for this?
Obviously, this is a very open question and task, and you are welcome to bring any relevant information to the discussion… IF YOU CAN BACK IT UP WITH EVIDENCE!
The usual rules with evidence will apply: Give the source, and be prepared to turn any or all of it into your own words.
I thought I’d point you at a couple of resources to get you started:
The first is the UK version of Did You Know. There is/was a Scottish version, but I cannot find it online.
The second is by Sir Ken Robinson. It’s long, and you may get a bit lost, but his story about the girl who couldn’t sit still in the second half of the video is brilliant… and so is the bit about Shakespeare’s dad (near the middle):
I’ll post some questions through the week to keep you occupied… but for now, watch these and start thinking about the skills or knowledge you will need after school. Ask your parents/relations about the things they learned at school that are of use to them… and which things they wish they’d been taught.
Well done to those of you who have managed to login already! If you are not sure what to do, simply head to one of the following addresses to get started:
You’ll notice there’s very little on it at the moment… it’ll be up to you to change that!
(You could start by coming up with a suitable logo to replace the pot plant at the top of the page if you like! Needs to be about 150 x 150 pixels, and if you want it transparent, save it as a .PNG file)
So, now you’ve started your research, it’s time to explain the task…
You are finding out lots, all you have to do is find some way of sharing what you’ve learned with other people. Simples! I’ll leave you to it then…
Oh, all right. Here’re some guidelines for you.
The Rules
You MUST have the sources for ANY material you use. (No source, no use!)
Refer to Rule 1.
That’s it… honest!
You can choose to make a film, create a website, do a dance, write a song, make a presentation, deliver a talk, paint a picture, create a… well, actually ANYTHING GOES!
What is important is that you SHARE what you have learned.
You can work on your own, you can work with others. You can use online resources, books, people, anyone you think can help you. You may wish to visit the AK Bell Library, there’s a really good WW1 display and room in the Black Watch museum. If you’re in Edinburgh, you could do worse than visiting the Military Museum in Edinburgh Castle, or Craiglockhart Hospital which is now part of Napier University.
Getting Started – Going Deeper
This is the picture I used as the background for the Glog
As you now know, all the items on the Glog are linked by Wilfred Owen… and somewhere in amongst all these things, I expect you to find a narrative or story to tell. It might be about Wilfred Owen. It might be about the Poem. It might be about the Great War. It might be about the music… You can choose.
It is important that whatever you choose to do does have a loose structure… a beginning, middle and end… and you can decide how that need to be done.
Here are a list of possibly useful links that might help you… but be warned — the more you find out, the more you’ll realise you don’t know!
You’ll get your wiki and Google Apps logins on Monday or Tuesday, and you can get busy playing with the sites.
What’s Next?
As I told you on Friday, this has now become an interesting project because I’ll only be able to see you once a week for the next week or so! This means you’ll need to do a lot of work by yourselves. Having said that, you can get in touch through this blog, or the wiki, or by emailing: english [at] perthacademy [dot] net
Keep a careful note of your sources! I’ll create a form you can fill in as you go to make this easier and share it with you once you have your logins for the wiki…
We’ll aim to share what we’ve done by the last week of term (the week beginning 27th June), this doesn’t mean what you’re doing has to be finished by that date… but you will need to show what you’ve managed to do by then! I really hope you will keep going on this until you have a project completed that you are really proud of. I want you to blow my socks off with what you do, but more importantly, I want you to be really happy with what you do!
So… any questions? If so, post them on the comments here, if not, go and get busy!
Sorry I wasn’t there today, but I hope you managed to make a start on our investigations. Here’s a quick recap of what you should know now…
The ‘grid’ I posted yesterday is a QR Code. It should have taken you to the Glog where you can find most of the info you will need to get you started with your investigation.
Here it is for you to look at… remember, there are some media clips embedded in it that you may not have seen yet! (And there’s more to read below the image, so keep scrolling down!)
The Original is here: http://nwinton.glogster.com/cfe-time-detectives
You are tasked with finding out as much as you can about the various snippets on the poster… and then, you are going to try and put together some sort of common link between some or most or all of them. (I feel I should give a mad ‘Bwahahahaaaa’ at that, but I suspect you’ll manage this bit no problems!)
The librarians had instructions to only answer direct questions from you, and they weren’t allowed to give you any answers that you didn’t ask for… so I don’t yet know what you know… This means I’m not giving away any more at the moment until we’ve compared notes… so… have some HOMEWORK (sorry!).
TASK:
For next time you’re in English, be ready to report back to me and/or the class all the information you’ve managed to find out so far. WARNING: You’d better have a note of your sources, or you can’t use the information! (But then, you knew that, didn’t you!)
If you have any questions about this, you can post a comment to the blog and I’ll get back to you asap!
As mentioned, this is the blog to support your work just now. I’ll be posting all sorts of goodies here to keep you entertained and busy.
Today we were looking at reviewing your research skills from the library project you completed in First Year. Just to remind you, the key skills are:
Summarising
Note-making
Book and online research
Organising
Planning
Drafting and redrafting
In addition, I reminded you that it is really important that you keep a careful note of your sources. Please remember, the rules for your work are easy to remember:
If you can’t give the source, or if you don’t have permission to use the material, you can’t use it. Simples!
We’ll be looking at great ways of finding information you can use quite happily, and we’ll be showing you how to turn someone else’s words into your own, so by the time we finish in June next year, you should be really good at finding and using information to support your own thoughts. That’s the plan!
Now, I left you with a puzzle at the end of the lesson… here it is again in case you’ve lost it:
If you reckon you know what it is, or if you think you’ve solved it, please post your thoughts as a comment to this post… that way, you can share with those who haven’t cracked it yet.
One last thing: I won’t be able to teach you on Tuesday as I’ll be at RDM to take some lessons with the P7 learners who’ll be joining us in August… however… I have made arrangements to keep you very busy and I think you’ll enjoy it. All I will say is that you’ll need to work on your own and with others, you’ll need to make lots of notes, you should find bits of it quite difficult, you might want to have your own headphones, and all will be revealed tomorrow!
Of course, I have no idea how I’m going to grade it…
