culminating blog post

I'm sad this course has to come an end - it was definitely one of my favorites this semester. Looking back through my previous blog posts, I was reminded of all the good times... and was also just pretty surprised about how much writing we did for this class. There were some really interesting readings and activities to guide my thinking and help me develop some ideas. Overall, I love the format of a blog as a space to write semi-informally about my thoughts and where those take me in response to a reading or activity. Along the lines of what worked well: having class out in the garden was an superb experience. I honestly don't think I would at all mind having class there all year round, though I now certainly understand the importance of dressing appropriately for the weather. I don't really have any thorns to offer with regards to the course - it was all berries for me!

Reflection on Inquiry Project pt. 1

I learned a lot from this Inquiry project! I found some answers to a few of my initial questions, but I also found many more questions (as to be expected). More than that, I feel as though this process of conducting research and giving a presentation to my peers got me to develop my own thoughts and opinions on the topic. Of course these are very much informed by what I’ve read and who I’ve spoken to, but I’m also thinking about everything through the lens of my own experience. I appreciate then, that this project wasn’t supposed to be a formal review of academic literature, as the informality gave me lots of space to follow my own curiosity. I will say however, that there’s so much literature on the subject of textbooks, that, during the research phase, I found it difficult to focus on any specific question or idea. As a result, my presentation was somewhat broad and general in scope. As it stands, I’m unsure of the direction I’ll take this project in Inquiry 2, as there are still many avenues to explore. For instance, what do courses without textbooks look like? Is it unreasonable for teachers to rely on them so heavily? Can I leverage this project to begin writing my own textbook?? I’ll also say that I really really enjoyed all of my classmates' presentations. They all chose such interesting topics, and were so perceptibly engaged by their projects, and were all so impressive to listen to - I felt inspired! A recurring theme throughout this program is just how much I have to learn from these people, and this series of presentations very much highlighted that fact.