March 8

Today was in the computer labs again. Instead of having another lesson where we give a design lecture than go through the software, our plan for today: Muskan and I would go around and help each kid individually while everybody tried to finish their covers. Because the period is so short, we barely made it. We looked at each student's cover, and only one did not have anything to show (he claims the file was lost). A couple students had something interesting, but the majority were relatively generic. Most just slapped on an image and some text without really designing anything. None bothered to use the masking tool that we taught last class. With only an hour, we spent maybe four minutes on each student. It was extremely difficult trying to get them to talk about their concept. They really need more 'studio time' where students just work and we go around talking to each person. That's the way most designer's educations were. But there's just no time for that when we only go once a week and the class is more than 30 people. Next week we plan on going around the room and projecting on the wall each cover to get them to talk. We need to get a discussion going. We might have kids shadow us on Tuesday, don't know yet.