Week 1: WeVideo Makerspace Remix
What an inspiring project to start off this class! I chose to have my video show simply what a Makerspace is. I had it describe the environment and what it allows students to do. A Makerspace is a place to create, explore, innovate, critically think, etc. It is a place where anything is possible. If you can think it up, you can create it. I chose to insert two video clips, one to show a school’s Makerspace in progress and the other showing a student explaining their definition of a Makerspace. I thought the student’s explanation was very powerful depiction of the effect a Makerspace can have upon a student’s confidence to be great thinkers and creators. In the video the student said, “There is no limit to what you can create.” A Makerspace helps students to realize their full potential. My goal for my video was to show the mindset of a Makerspace and the endless possibilities it provides.
Makerspaces evoke inspiration and innovation. This past week I had the opportunity to attend MACUL 2017. Many workshops revolved around the idea of creating Makerspaces in the classroom. Makerspaces take learning beyond the contained walls of textbook learning and turn it into a three dimensional learning process. Students are given materials to create anything or they have specific tasks to fulfill. Makerspaces allow students to work through a process by designing, creating, testing, and remixing or improving on their original design. They learn from trial and error, from their successes and failures. Thomas Edison once said about his many attempts to invent the lightbulb, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work”.
I love starting off the school year talking about the idea of failure as a learning process. Sometimes we learn better through our failures, than through our successes. Makerspaces create a safe space for students to try, learn from their mistakes, improve on their design, and try again. Through the activities in a Makerspace, students are learning how to critically think, problem solve, imagine, and create. They learn how to find solutions to their problems from either experimentation or research.
As I was creating my video I couldn’t help but think about my students going through this process. I was already familiar with WeVideo from different trainings, but also from having my students create a WeVideo to publish their narrative stories. Because of my prior experience, I wanted to push myself to create a video by using the Timeline mode as opposed to the story mode which I had formerly used. After a lot of trial and error, I was pleased with my final result.
I had a vision for what I wanted my video to look like and in order to make it come to life, I had to play around with the program, test things out, and research. I researched how to best work “timeline mode” on the internet so that my video would match my vision. One of my goals, was to match up the transitions from one picture to the other with the downbeats of the background music. This took a lot of time and editing as I could not simply drop the pictures in and hit play. I had to lengthen the clips, shorten it, replay the video, and repeat until it was aligned. One the main takeaways of completing this assignment was that I had to problem solve. There was no one there to tell me the answer. I had to figure it out on my own.
As teachers, students are constantly coming up to us to ask questions. They want us to feed them the answers. But, if we always do this, they won’t learn how to problem solve on their own. Makerspaces create a learning environment that pushes students to be the problem solvers. They have to work with each other, research, or simply try things out to find the solutions they are looking for. Makerspaces allow students to open up their minds to a world of possibilities and allows them to use multiple senses. It is said that the more senses that we use, the more we will remember. Let students use all their senses and CREATE!
Credits for WeVideo:
What’s the Maker Movement and Why Should I Care? (n.d.). Retrieved March 19, 2017, from http://www.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=3758336
Rendina, D. (2016, April 13). Defining Makerspaces: What the Research Says. Retrieved March 19, 2017, from http://renovatedlearning.com/2015/04/02/defining-makerspaces-part-1/
East Hills Hills Middle School MAKERSPACE 2013. (2013, December 20). Retrieved March 19, 2017, from https://youtu.be/aWAq5PdFSvg
“Creative Commons East Hills Middle School MAKERSPACE 2013” by Michael Medvinsky is licensed under CC BY 2.0
GCAA Makerspace Cardboard Carnival. (2015, September 30). Retrieved March 19, 2017, from https://youtu.be/Rzpwe-7aY8s
“Creative Commons GCAA Makerspace Cardboard Carnival” by GCAA Makerspace is licensed under CC BY 2.0
Free stock photo of black, blur, close-up. (n.d.). Retrieved March 19, 2017, from https://www.pexels.com/photo/black-blur-close-up-desk-296127/
“Creative Commons photo” by Lukas is licensed under CC BY 2.0
IMG_4088. (2017, March 19). Retrieved March 19, 2017, from https://goo.gl/0sUHZx
“Creative Commons photo” by Bruno Sanchez-Andrade Nuno is licensed under CC BY 2.0
Free Image on Pixabay – Building, Blocks, Construction. (n.d.). Retrieved March 19, 2017, from https://pixabay.com/en/building-blocks-construction-play-674828/
“Creative Commons photo” by Steve Pb is licensed under CC BY 2.0
Abesamis, S. (2014, November 26). Create. Retrieved March 19, 2017, from https://www.flickr.com/photos/enerva/15698486387
“Creative Commons photo” by Sonny Abesamis is licensed under CC BY 2.0
Ltd, B. (n.d.). Paper And A Pencil Free Stock Photo – Public Domain Pictures. Retrieved March 19, 2017, from http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?image=177877&picture=paper-and-a-pencil
“Creative Commons photo” by George Hodan is licensed under CC BY 2.0
Create. (2017, March 19). Retrieved March 19, 2017, from https://goo.gl/L5Hs0t
“Creative Commons photo” by Alisa Burke is licensed under CC BY 2.0
Free Image on Pixabay – Light Bulb, Lightbulb, Light, Bulb. (n.d.). Retrieved March 19, 2017, from https://pixabay.com/en/light-bulb-lightbulb-light-bulb-1246043/
“Creative Commons photo” by Unsplash is licensed under CC BY 2.0