Project Evaluation Blog Entry

How would you approach another project of this type differently given what you’ve learned here?

Consider the culture of my school more before doing too much planning or proposing. This involves communicating with my colleagues and Head teacher earlier on to give them time to digest my plan. I think it is interesting that when working with what could be controversial issues, more time has to be spent at the early stages communicating with parents and staff, despite student positive responses for such a resource. Starting the communication process much earlier will give time for concerns to be raised and addressed before the time scheduled for teaching the unit is over.

If I knew a project was likely to be controversial I would also prepare for meeting with those who make the decisions in my school, well prepared. This preparation would involve objectives that needed to be met, curriculum expectations, planning for all possible outcomes and challenges, solutions, and a Plan B and C, as well as my original Plan A. I received this advice from my lecturer so that issues can be addressed with minimum politics and personal values being imposed on others, which can block positive change within schools.

I would set about using the resources given to us from our lecturer and use them as a checklist to make sure my approach to the problem was thorough. I found that I became quite consumed with my project while not considering aspects such as; NETS for students, being explicit about subject population, considering if my project promotes coherent organisational change, and its adaptability for use in multiple contexts. Being able to take a step back and see the whole picture as well as prepare resources for others to use, is far more effective when creating solutions to problems, because the resources can go beyond being specific to the teacher’s situation. I liked being challenged as a professional to do this. I have kept these ‘checklists’ as valuable resource and will use them again in the future.

What are the lessons learned that others might benefit from knowing about?

Don’t try to be too ambitious about your project. If you really need to be, then have small stages you can achieve along the way that are beneficial in their own right as well as contributing to the larger project. This will give your larger project momentum and keep you motivated as you move through it.

If possible try to have a plan where it is possible to downscale if you need to, otherwise you could end up wasting a lot of time and effort, without much being produced.

Another is how beneficial it was to have others consider your ideas and give feedback. One of my group members gave me an easy solution to what I thought was a difficult problem. I was really thankful for her idea. I now wish I had shared more of my ideas with my colleagues and received feedback from them. Hopefully they can form a small group that will support you, or even if you have just one person that can encourage you and give you some ideas as you go along, as you cannot be sure of the challenges along the way, or the outcome. This strategy would have helped my project move forward considerably. In addition, my lecturer was so helpful when I came to an impass and I became quite discouraged; she helped me plan around the obstacle.

In what ways will you endeavor to do the same project again, and what will you change or not do?

I would like to try out using Ning with less controversial content. As it offers so many features that could be used to suit almost any unit. I really looked forward initially to achieving this, but now with the lessons I have learned and the familiarity I have with the tool, I can move to other content with confidence.

I will use make sure that the resources chosen or features of the site/resource selected could be used as separate parts in the classroom. For example, I plan to still use the sites on reproduction I found, in my classroom so that I can supervise student use so we can achieve our objectives without any obstacles. The resource will still allow students to independently pursue their questions, as part of our normal classes.