Friday, December 17, 2010

project #3 ; blog #5

The dance off was very successful! More than half of the students in the cafeteria gathered around while seven hip-hop dancers from AHS strutted their stuff.

So originally, i was going to have the contenders pick the songs randomly, but when the first two people picked their song, they didn't know it. so, to change things up to make the dance off more successful, i flipped over all the song choices, (so that they were visible to whoever was choosing it) and gave them the chance to pick their song. i felt like it was more fair and it was still from the 28 songs that i've selected. There was a freshman fella who joined last minute. someone took the song he wanted to dance too and picked another one. a few minutes later, he asked me if i had a song that he had in mind. i did, and i switched the song choice for him.

the dancers were graded on in three different categories. the scale was from 0 to 20. the first one was how much fun they had, the second was their originality, and the third was their free style ability/body language. Jared scored everyone, and so did i. i took the average of our scores combined for each person, and who ever had the top average won.

there is a winner, but i'm not sure how the prizes should go, if there should be any. the winners will be announced after break so i wont name their name here.... yet.

i felt really good about this project. more than the bowling. this project didn't stress me out because i found it fun and people actually wanted to participate. i would do this project again. no doubt!

here is a video link to the dance off. :))

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

project #3 ; blog #4

So i have about 15 songs on the playlist right now. And im still adding more. the students that are helping with this project is Margo B., Corrigan, and Gavin. They've helped by making our posters which was really nice.

I'm helping Molly with her candy gram project which is going really well. I've helped her sell tickets when i was selling the bowling tickets. i even bought some grams for my friends while i was at it! tomorrow, i will help assemble and deliver the candy grams! i'm excited! :) i'm also helping Elizabeth O. with her talent show project. i still need to find one more person to help. i'm supposed to help driskell with his project, but i'm not sure where he's going with it. i shall check in with him tomorrow!

project #3 ; blog #3

Driving forces
  • there are students at AHS who are dancers
  • many students dance during lunch
  • it gives a mix of hip-hop into the atmosphere//hip-hop culture
  • a mixture of interests
  • upbeat, & fun
  • it gives students the chance to show themselves off and challenge others
Barriers
  • students might be shy
  • students might have a hard time free-styling
  • students might want to give up or change their minds
  • one student might out do everyone else because of prior skills
  • take the competition too serious// over competitive
  • might not have enough time for every single student to strut their stuff
------------------------------------------------------------------------

students might have a hard time free-styling
I think it would be a good idea to give students two choices and if they dont like one song choice, then they could choice the other. it might help the student feel more comfortable and not have them back down or out.

one student might out do everyone else because of prior skills
i'm not basing the competition on the skills part so much. i think that it might be a little unfair if there is someone who everyone knows will win and does. I would look for students who actually put a lot of effort and have fun doing the dance off.

might not have enough time for every single student to strut their stuff
i dont think any student would want to dance more than 50 seconds. its a dance off and its easy, very easy to run out of ideas when you're on a spot like that. I think that students will only use about 30 seconds, which helps with the time management. if there is time for round two, then we'll go for round two!

project #3 ; blog's 1 & 2

so i was originally planning to have this type of amazing race activity project, but as i tried to fit it in my schedule, it just didn't work out. And after the long and hard work i put in for the bowling event, i didn't think it was worth going all out again.

While i was having my thoughts on this race project, Jared S. asked me to help him on a project that had to do with hip-hop. I agreed, and then a second later, he came back and asked me if i wanted to help lead the project since he didn't know much about hip-hop. once again, i gladly agree.

We've decided to have the first hip-hop freestyle battle! (yippyyyy!) there are always a group of freshman boys who are always dancing at lunch, and i knew that they would be interested in participating. After all, every dancer wants attention for their skills every once in a while. to be noticed is great and it boosts their confidence.

Jared and i had only one day of sign ups, and it was very successful! I have a total of 7 students who signed up and i'm super pumped to start making a play list for it!

We do not have or need a mentor for this project. This is student based and teachers aren't needed, although, there are always staff in the cafeteria. this is going to happen during school grounds, on December the 16th, during lunch. students will draw from a hat filled with song titles, and that will be their song that they will have to freestyle too. Jared and I will grade them on their originality, skill and swag. We will also be looking for someone who is able to make up something fun to watch on the spot. there will be a winner, although a prize is not yet discussed.

milestone dates : as far as the dates go, Jared and I have been planning this project for about two weeks. within those two weeks, we've been making posters and thinking about songs that would be good for dancing too.

accomplishments :
  • we've gotten seven people to sign up, which is more than enough.
  • We got signs all over the school.
  • we have several song choices

Sunday, December 12, 2010

on 12/10/10, the bowling get together was a blast. Although only 20 people or so showed up, the event still went down. while selling tickets for two weeks, there wasn't a huge success at all. not many people really wanted to go or they had other things to do. this was frustrating because when i made a survey a month prior to the event, 200 students said they would be interested and would attend. Only 17 people bought their tickets! i would have like to see at least 30, but it didnt happen. at one point, i felt like all my hard work was for nothing but when i went bowling that day, i had a good time and concluded that i did it all for myself. if i could do this project all over again, i wouldn't have done a project this big. i felt as if i put so much time and effort into it, it became a stress factor and i got very little out of it.