Bonus - Martin Johnson

I learned to look at all my courses in more of a big picture sense and as less of a letter grade. Unfortunately all my classes seem to be tailored toward only striving for a grade. I really dislike this and wish there was more room for students to be creative and intrinsically motivated to do well. A letter grade seems to not only suck out all the fun from learning but make students uptight and stressed. 
I think about learning by doing over and over like how one learns how to play baseball. You don't split everything up; you may suck at first but that's part of the learning process. I think of my Spanish class and how I really want to become a good speaker yet all we do is complete worksheets for grade. I've gotten really good at doing worksheets (because this is what we practice) but can barely speak without hitches in the conversation. 


I want to try to learn in my own way and am going to apply what we've learned in class to learning Spanish on my own this summer. I bet I can become a better speaker in a week; more so than what I've gotten in the last 16 weeks here at IU. What I'm going to do is come up with a plan of what, when, and how often I will practice. I'd like this habit to carry over to other interests of mine. I want to stop doing the "worksheets" and start doing only the parts that matter to me.

Bonus - Alex Li

First I want to thank you for being a great teacher.
I really learned so much from you and that is why I want to meet you and just talk.
I have an internship this summer and I will be looking for a full time next year and to be honest I am really scared. I like planning stuff out but you really can't plan for the future. It's always random. I like it and I don't like it. What I would really like is just some more advice. I really enjoy your talks about life lessons because they mean alot to me. I hope to talk to you next week. Thank you again for being an amazing teacher.

Bonus Blog Assignment

Your last (optional) blog assignment. You have until next Monday, May 5th, to complete it. This is completely a bonus assignment for extra credit. Writing a thoughtful response will give you THREE magic points.

Designing Your Life

That's the topic of this blog assignment. We spent an entire semester talking about human-computer interaction design; you know, designing the obvious. And perhaps you've learned something along the way; not just the intellectual skills, not just the things you learn in order to pass a course, get the grade, but real things — the things that are truly important. Slow Change. Not twitter, not IM, not your smartphone — not the high school-like chatter that occupies so many of our conversations: "she said …; he said …" Really, who cares? What does it really matter, anyway? I'm talking instead about Slow Change. Important stuff. Life stuff.

Did this class teach you to take a risk? To learn in a new way? Did it make you think that on the next iteration of "playing the [design] game" you might actually change something about yourself? When will you stop taking from the planet and give something back instead? What are you planning to do to minimize bad habits and focus on the new and healthy?

I realize this note is a bit strange. Hey, it's the last blog note! Let's mess it up a little bit. Give me something interesting to read this week. It's just between you and me. No one is watching. Have fun. The deadline is the last day of class. An easy 3 bonus/magic points.