Week 1 Review: Blog Back-Up

For the most part, I enjoyed Orientation Week for this class! Obviously, the non-syllabus material is more exciting in any course, but the formatting was very streamlined for this course and it made the experience much more user-friendly than it could have been.

I liked this graphic from the Learning by H-E-A-R-T module:

Source: KOMU News (Flickr).

Part of me likes it just for the George R. R. Martin tag (I'm really looking forward to Season 8) but I also think that the quote is especially applicable to this course -- with the staggering amount of different stories we have to choose from in the UnTextbook, the course is sort of offering us "a thousand lives" to experience as we progress. At least, that's what George thinks. And I'm somewhat inclined to believe him. The variety is what is going to make this class so interesting -- there's always a new flavor coming the next week, which will ward off the mid-semester slump that many courses suffer from.

I also took the time to go back and watch the optional Growth Mindset video that I skipped the first time:

Source: YouTube.

I really enjoy this animation style! It makes the subject matter much more engaging (and the Harry Potter illustrations were fun). I still recognize many Fixed Mindset tendencies within myself. I default to the "avoid failure" mindset, so these lessons are good reminders that it's okay to go through progression within academics, just like you would when you learn any new skill. Praising the process (rather than intelligence) is also a concept that still feels foreign. I understand the ideas behind it, but not praising results seems very alien to me after growing up in the current education system.

I've got a copy of my blog back-up and I'm looking forward to finishing out the Week 2 content once blog comments come online!