Today the class moved into the technology lab. Before we had the students enter, Ms. Burns and I tested out many ways to get demo images to the lab. We could not use flash drives, since the students’ do not have flash drives on hand. We could not use the “Common Drive” in the High School, since the students do not have access to it—even some faculty do not in certain labs. We only could use the Google Drives the students use on their Chromebooks. We thought that would work well, but then found out that some lab computers did not have Chrome loaded. When the students used Internet Explorer to download files, some downloads worked, but others did not.

I would recommend that if students are using Google Drive, lab computers should have Chrome installed, since Chrome seems to work seamlessly with the Google Drive. Having to use Internet Explorer is troublesome.

We began the Photoshop demo, which went very slowly. I guess you could say we worked out the kinks today. It was difficult, since some students had to use images other than the demo images—this caused confusion. We will continue in Photoshop next week, working with images students wish to use in their artwork. We will mostly address drawing, color changes, and printing for tile application.

My main concern—at this point in the course—is there has been so many technology issues (Pinterest and lab issues). This causes students to get the impression that technology is difficult and not worth their time when being creative in more than an “Instagram way.” Because of the Pinterest issues, students have not yet seen the value of seeing their whole identity at one time. Collecting images has been fragmented, since they have to use folders on their Chromebooks. Currently, students would have to print out all their images and view them on a table or wall all at once. That is a lot of work, and the students do not have the “critique” space to accomplish this type of analysis. I am in support of using Pinterest as a technology “critique” board. Again, it is a quick and efficient way for students to see their identity all in one glance. This is an easy path for analysis— utilizing a higher level of thinking about their work.

A photoshop image created today