Grammar Gazette- Issue 1, 2011

SNAPSHOTS

ITS STUDENTS TACKLE INDUSTRY STANDARD PROJECTS MR BRENDON THOMAS, Co-Director, Technology Studies

Working with tight deadlines the students hone their problem solving, management and critical analysis skills; develop a disaster recovery plan and extend their technical knowledge of Adobe After Effects, lllustrator, premiere, The project has proven to be a great start to the Year 12 course "the task has unique rewards for the girls, they can apply their own creativity to the project and at the same time develop current Dreamweaver and Frash. '

All assessment shou ld be regarded as a part not an end of the learn ing process. The considerable chal lenge for teachers is to design assessment tasks that wi ll actua I ly im prove student learn ing and u nderstand ing wh ile necessarily measuring knowledge and skills. Another consideration for assessment design is to make tasks 'authentic' * linking them effectively to the concerns of contem porary lif e. A new fou r-week project, devised by the Technology Studies Faculty, requires students to combine five industry- recogn ised softwa re ap p I icatio n s to develop a unique end-product, Each student has to design a nd develop an interactive video sequence for the web platform which includes two video scena rios. Th is task provides students with the opportu n ity to ga in a gen u ine industry sense of competency and creative inquiry by demanding that they move beyond simply applying technical skills in one context to m anaging a range of in herent com plexities across a range of software platforms.

industry timeline authoring skills adding practical experience to their CVs" says Technology Studies Faculty Co-Director,

Mr Brendon Thomas.

The focus is on allowing students to visualise new concepts and analyse a d iverse ra nge of u n rehea rsed problems for themselves. Completing this project will give students a taste of the varied and interesting challenges they are likely to encounter in the business world and could give them a real edge to their employability.

lLlRlA MYRTEZA (YEAR '12): Completing this assessment task has taught me many new skills in programming and timeline authoring. The short timeframe was challenging but made the task enjoyable. What I liked most about the task was that it was more than just editing and computer-based, it allowed me to take a hands-on approach and gain experience filming in front of a green screen and photographing different spaces. I have learnt new media skills using the high quality equipment made available by the School and have further developed a broad range of skills with programmes such as Adobe Flash and Adobe After Effects. There were times when lstruggled with the more complex programming of ActionScript 3.0, but with support from my teachers I was able to problem solve difficult technical glitches. The end product is quite unique for interactive technologies as the final product has been modified and optimized so that the best possible outcome is exported for the web. The task was rigorous - it presented many analytical challenges and time management and planning played a key role in the final success.

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