Saturday, March 20, 2010

b203

The class started off with Chou giving us a tutorial to follow. It was a powerpoint file that went though three different projects. These are all flash related. We just worked the whole morning until we went to the ITA meeting. It was a full ITA meeting.

At the meeting, Excell and other ITA staff went over some rules that ITA is going to be stricter about, such as, no more going to the bathroom during class while it is not break time. All this is due to events that happened in the building in the previous months. The meeting lasted about 45min, and we went back to lab.

When we got back, Chou showed us the final product of what we have been working on. It was an example of the BTW that we are to make in Flash. He also mentioned that scripting is involved to make the Flash project interactive and make buttons work so you can navigate to other frames.

For the rest of the day we were given time to work on our BTW.

Permit Day

When 9 o'clock came rolling around, there were only four students present in Chris and Cristina's class. The ladies sat next to each other and chatted as the projector was getting hooked up, but when the projector, once again, did not work. The decision to omit it, because of time constraints, was hastily made and the tables were rearranged so that the four students could be in earshot of Cristina and their screens in Chris' view.

Because Chou was alone downstairs and the class was so small upstairs, it was decided that we would go downstairs to join Chou's class. That is, right after the students finished their Dreamweaver exercise (to illustrate the point that CSS to HTML is like ActionScript to Flash). However, once the exercise was finished and the migration to Chou's class was announced, the students were in shock. Just last week they were moved up here, and now they're moving back down! Cristina made the decision to stay in 3139 because A) The students requested the class be taught at a slightly slower pace B) Some students learn better in a smaller environment C) The students didn't feel like moving again - they liked their current place.

To reset up the classroom, the survey that AJ had written was distributed amongst the students via gmail. They took their sweet time and went over onto break.

The class continued onto their first demo and assignment, the Simpsons activity with ActionScript and moved right onto their Ladybug exercise. The students really enjoyed their Ladybug exercise and didn't really want to move onto their permit test review.

Once the review was said and done, the students headed out onto their break, came back and started their permit test.

One problem that occurred was... Julie wasn't in enrolled in Flash! All this time, a Julie Xiong was enrolled in ITA, but it was jxiong5... which was off by 1 number. Chris and Cristina searched through Learn@UW and added jxiong4 onto the roster.

The class ended on a good note and the students went to lunch.

Saturday, March 6, 2010

Flash Day V

AJ put a spin to the Flash class today!
The students were split up into two different rooms based on their past performances. Those who required a small close-knit setting was brought up to work with Chris and Cristina in Room 3139. Though the class was smaller, the students themselves needed more time with their instructors.

At first, the students showed disappointment, but when they realize that this is for their benefit, they'll being to appreciate a smaller setting. In fact, today, the students were all on the same page. They kept up with one another and even helped each other. In addition, the students even demanded for more 1 on 1 time!

Things from there went smoothly until... an ITA-wide meeting was in session. The students were informed of new enforcement to old rules. Rules that, in the end, will only help and keep them safe.

When the students came back to class, they were devasted and weren't shy to voice their opinions, but once all was said, they went back to being studious. The morning ended with the students eager to go to lunch.