After each semester at d.tech you must present infront of a panel a presentation of how you learned and grew over the past semester. When first introduced this concept the POLs were just a simple presentation that showed how you grew over the semester. Panelists would give you feedback on your presentation such as "add more pictures" or "I want to see more of your projects." But during my second semester as a Sophomore POL were redesigned and were now creative displays of how you'd grown. They could be anything but a slide show presentation. At first I was terrified because I thought I had no artistic capabilities but I soon realized that, it didn't matter. I was able to do anything I put my mind to and that included the new POLs.
PRESENTATIONS OF LEARNING
2014-2015
Since I was still new to the whole Design Thinking process my presentation on learning showed my growth in all areas. Although I had grown in every area, for my presentation I chose to focus on the explore, create and learn areas. Throughout my presentation I compared past rubrics I had received to rubrics I got in the second semester.
During the first semester I said that I had grown in many areas including passion, creativity, and public speaking. Some goals that I had set for the second semester and the rest of my design career were to implement an amazing idea, improve my public speaking, and to make a difference. I also tried to explain why we used design thinking at d.tech. We want to continually improve our empathy skills. We also want to learn how to work well and collaborate with others in our work lives. Also they way you implement design thinking is up to you. You are able to do what you want with the knowledge you have.
As for the second semester, the POLs had recently under gone a change in how they would be completed. Our one rule was that we couldn't create a slide show. At first I was terrified because I am not very artistically capable. Many people were creating this huge, creative projects that show cased all their artistic abilities; I was stumped. Through a class assignmen I found out that I had a knack for creating sonnets from song lyrics so I decided to create a few for my POL. I chose Vagabond by Misterwives, Flaws by Bastille and Different Colors by WALK THE MOON because they related to my growth in being able to speak my mind.
For the first semester I...