EDLD+5370+Reflections+on+assignments+in+EDLD+5366+Digital+Graphics,+Animation+and+Desktop+Publishing

====EDLD 5366 was a course that was a little deceptive. When I saw the title of the course I thought, "finally we will have a course that will teach us how to use Adobe Photoshop". Needless to say when I found I that we would not be learning Photoshop, I was disappointed. That disappointment would not last too long.====

====In the first week we learned about the basic design principles. These are contrast, repetition, alignment, and proximity. Until this class I never knew how much thought actually goes into print media. I was truly fascinated and so was my wife. My wife even took some of my material and used it in her computer class. We also looked at some examples of ancient manuscripts and books in order to see how the basic design principles were used in those.====

====In the second week we learned about self branding. The assignment for this week was to create a personal logo that represents who you are. I have a side business and did not have a logo for the company name. I was going to pay someone to design me a logo, but since I was taking this course, I decided to design one myself. Next school year I want to have each of my classes create and design a logo that will represent their class. I think they would really enjoy the process.====

====In the third week we had to create an animation using a software called Styx. I had never heard of this program until I used it in this course, but I really enjoyed using it. It reminded me of how cartoons use to be drawn, then you flip the pages to see it in action. I enjoyed this program so much that I had my children create an animation themselves. I used this program in my class to have my students create an animation of two elements joining together to form a compound. They really enjoyed it.====

====One of the last things we learned about was desktop publishing. In this week we had to create a digital newsletter using some of the things we learned about desktop publishing. This was probably my favorite project of all. I had always thought about creating a newsletter for my class but I never got around to doing it. I got everyone in my family involved in the creation of the newsletter which made it even more enjoyable. My wife and each of my 3 children had a section that they contributed to in the newsletter. I was surprised to see how involved everyone was. I wanted to get everyone involved in order to see how everything would turn out because this would be the same approach that I take with my students. It worked out very well because I let everyone choose what they wanted to discuss in the newsletter. They each had they own little corner.====

====Overall this was probably my favorite course of all. It gave me some very useful things I could use in my classroom. In fact, I started using them immediately because it keeps the students engaged in something that is hands on. I showed my colleagues examples of the work my students had done and they were all very impressed. Some wanted to incorporate the same thing in their classrooms. My only concern is will they take the time to learn and implement it. Once again, this is where making use of staff development comes into play.====