Whats the deal with being human design documentation

What's the Deal with Being Human – the Rock Video

Design Documentation for
What's the Deal with Being Human – the Rock Video.
ILT 6710
Chris Thomas
29 November 2009
Introduction
This presentation, 'What's the Deal with Being Human- the Rock Video' is an element in
online course in Foundational Cognitive Skills for Teenagers.
The goal of this course is to teach students ages 13-17 methodologies for consciously
taking control of one’s own learning and life experience. This first step, the
development of increased self-awareness and self-empowerment, is critical to
increased cognition. In subsequent presentations, students will examine their own
skills and learning interests, analyzing and assessing those areas that may need
development and/or those that show the most potential for success.
The audience
The audience for the presentation is adolescents, both middle school and high school
students. This is currently aimed at those students in the Boulder Valley School
District, a generally homogenous group. There are, however, large socio-economic
disparities that have an effect on self-esteem. There is also a substantial Hispanic
population and the goal would be to develop this same sort of program in Spanish, with
culturally-appropriate visual adjustments.
Personality Implications
Extroverted/Intuiters/Feelers/Perceivers. Teenagers are predominantly still
generalists because of their lack of both life and academic experience, but they are
also still at the “ME” stage of development, meaning that they are very involved in
self-discovery. They're working on assembling the over all ‘Big Picture.’ Their

personality types (a la Briggs-Meyers) are, for the most part, still in the formative
stages, with notable exceptions. They are, at this point in their lives, taking most of
their identity cues from their adolescent culture which is a catalyst for struggle
between the as yet ambiguous ‘self’ and old and new influences from family and the
exterior world.
Any instructional programs will be more successful if presented within their ‘teen’
context utilizing music, visuals, games and any other cultural elements to keep their
attention. Any activity that was too transparent could derail the process. The
entertainment value has to appear to be higher than the informational value. Of all
the versions of this material, I think that this comes closets to doing that.
Presentation Implications. Teaching adolescents is a slippery slope compared to
teaching corporate adults; one miss-step and you may loose your audience for good,
whereas, most adult audiences will give you another chance. The trick with teens is
to keep them entertained. They probably won't be interested in a hand-out prior to
the presentation, but they may well be interested in accessing the presentation on
their own again.
The key is to present a reason to be interested upfront. This could take the form of a
strong emotional hook, something funny or irreverent, coupled with strong culturallyappropriate color, design and music.
Our stakeholder is our student. In this course and with this initial presentation, they
are being challenged and, in fact, given permission to think about themselves and
discover new perspectives about themselves. This course allows them to understand
that their lives really are all about them and that they can have some control.
Teenage Cognitive Skills. Cognitive science tells us that the teenage frontal lobe is
not fully developed, and won't be, for another five to ten years. And, there are new
surges of affiliative hormones that cause issues with peer interaction. It is not

entirely clear; therefore, the exact extent to which higher level thought processes can
be stimulated.
The concept of internal vs. external locus of control is perhaps one of the first, most
pivotal steps in maturation and cognitive development. This first piece is directed at
starting to analyze personal responsibility and the excitement of having the freedom
to create one's future. Below, the From-To, Think-Do Matrix, defines the first babysteps at this discovery process.

From-to /Think-Do Matrix
This video version starts to address some of these areas. This presentation is
foundational, therefore, further progressive levels aren't discussed here. In the
“Think” category, the goal is to progress from Feeling invisible, unimportant to feeling
a greater sense of self, of identity. Middle and high school students often feel
unempowered, victimized by an impersonal system, and confused and frustrated. The
goal is to help them gain an understanding of how one can begin to take control and
begin to address the responsibility one has in creating one’s life. Hopefully, it will
take them from being self-conscious and self-judging to appreciating themselves, their
own thoughts and interests more.
Under the “Do” category, the journey from passivity, non-participatory behavior to
beginning to show an interest in some subject matter, in self expression, in thinking
more about oneself and creating a life that includes education as a goal, or includes
dreams and the thought that they can create a plan for achieving them, is the
empowerment we're hoping to develop.

Audience Problem
Adolescents are difficult to engage and keep interested. This is a young, teen-aged
audience. Finding ways of capturing and sustaining their attention is the first learning

hurdle. They seem to 'forage' rather than learn in a linear fashion, and they require
that the information be straight forward and clear. They don't have time for undue
searching.
They require programs with a high entertainment factor. They also have state-of-theart visual sensibilities. Instructional programs need to be presented within their ‘teen’
context utilizing music, visuals, games and any other cultural elements to keep their
attention. Any activity that was too transparent could derail the process. The
entertainment value has to appear to be higher than the informational value.
Additionally; the concept of completion is an issue with kids. A great deal of getting
them to stay the course has to do with the entertainment value, but much of it also has
to come from a compelling topic. Most kids will find “ME” to be as compelling a topic
as comes along, but to pull them through information that may cause them to become
a little uncomfortable may be a challenge. The solution is to design internal
occurrences that re-hook the student throughout the piece. In the scope of a full
course, activities can certainly help move the student through to the end.

Spectrum of Solution Contributions
The problem is that none of us are ever taught how to be adults. Teenagers feel like
they’re playing a game where the rules keep changing and nobody is telling them. It’s
confusing, frustrating, dis-empowering and alienating. No one has ever been taught how to
be an adult; how to understand life from a non-childish perspective; how to understand
one’s own thoughts and feelings; how to think about how one learns or even what one likes
to learn. No one was ever taught how to think about their thinking, the reasons they think
the way they do or how to change their thinking to achieve a goal.
Today’s students no longer have the time to fumble around trying to figure out how to grow
up. There’s too much to learn and competition is too intense. We have to quit wasting
their time and teach them cognitive skills that will aid them in learning, growing and

maturing. They need to be taught how to understand what it means to be human, how
extraordinary their innate abilities are, how exciting, their individuality, how to appreciate
their talents and interests and how to explore and direct their learning paths. They need
to understand that decisions are just choices and that they can evaluate the consequences
and responsibilities of each of those choices in making their decisions. They need to be
taught how to use their minds and have confidence in their own thoughts.
Because this course is about human growth, there is no final solution. The interim solution
is to help the student understand and appreciate the qualities and attributes of the human
brain/mind, the physical body and the possibilities they present. The student should learn
methods of observing his own mind, appreciating his own feelings, determining his interests
and establishing his focus.
The ongoing gauge of success, therefore; is the student's ability to extrapolate his
learning/analysis process into other areas of endeavor. Additionally, and perhaps of
greater importance, is the creative application of these abilities to observe, analyze,
develop solutions and set goals; that is, realizing that these simple processes are
foundational. And, of course, most important of all—when to throw them all out and
launch into a more instinctive approach.
Solution Evaluation
A culturally-relevant presentation like the Rock Video enhances the personalization of the
program. Since the assessment criteria is individualized, I have adapted the options to
reflect levels of evaluation.
Accomplishment 1 Discovering the expansive qualities of human physiology
Accomplishment 2 Understanding how the mind/brain and the observer effect.
Accomplishment 3 Utilizing mindfulness to change attitude and effect outcome
Accomplishment 4 Developing an understanding of compassion and human perspective
The video focuses on discovering the expansive qualities of human physiology ,
understanding how the mind/brain works and what the observer effect tells us. We utilizing

mindfulness to change attitude and effect outcome while hopefully, developing an
understanding of compassion and human perspective. Growth in these areas might present
as:
Increased Self expression: Class participation. Non-academic. Activity participation.
Community Participation/activism. Coaching younger students in self expression.
Learning growth: Understanding Learning style. Developing Methods for supporting learning
style. Extrapolating methods for other life purposes. Adjusting and re-evaluating learning
behavior.
Developing Interests and goals: Discovering one’s interests. Developing goal structures.
Accomplishing and/or adjusting goalsSetting mastery goals.
Increased Creativity: Exploring creative interests. Determining the elements necessary for
creative activity. Practicing and refining creative elements. Extrapolating creative steps in
another academic endeavor.
New Found Academic success: Applying learning style information to academics.
Evaluating what worked and what didn’t- making adjustments. Determining learning path
to graduation. Graduating or advancing successfully.
List of Evidence
1. Brain/sensory system data: Evolve Your Brain, Joe Dispenza
2. Creativity: How to Think Like Leonardo Di Vinci, Michael J. Gelb
3. Conceptualization: Relativity Visualized, Lewis Carroll Epstein
4. Psychology/Spirit: How to See Yourself as You Really Are, His Holiness the Dalai
Lama
5. Consciousness/matter: The Biology of Belief, Bruce H. Lipton, Ph.D.
6. Perception and thinking: Visual Thinking, Rudolph Arnheim
7. Social and learning values, What video Games Can Teach Us About Literacy, James

Paul Gee

The Stakeholder
I see two Stakeholders in this scenario: the student, as indicated above, and society in
general.
The student has the most to gain from this presentation and this course. It could easily
change the way he/she perceives their lives. Giving them tools with which to examine
their challenges and make determinations, could relieve them of levels of stress that
have debilitated students for eons. Not only might they find learning to be more
enjoyable (since they will be doing it non-stop), but it may well make their personal
lives and their relationships less difficult.
Changing the paradigm, the lens through which millions of kids see themselves and our
society, could have an unprecedented effect on both the local community and the
global society. That said, the implementation of this kind of program could be
problematic simply because it diverges from current thinking in the public school
system. Also, this presentation is only a tiny part of a learning system that needs to
focus on individualized learning opportunities and personal development rather than
one-size-fits-all education.
In truth, there is a wealth of research information that supports such an approach to
cognitive development and its integration into a media-rich learning environment. All
it would take would be some committed, well-financed group to develop the entire
curriculum and offer it as an alternative public approach; much like Waldorf, only for
free.
Design Attributes
The re-design of this program as a rock video had several design ramifications.


Anecdotes: The most important point is that more work needs to put into teaching people
how to identify their strengths and weaknesses, their interests, their dreams and use the
whole complex of information about themselves to make academic choices and to grow
personally. The idea of greater training in this area and its affect on cognitive
development came to me when my husband and I were talking about a friend who seemed
to go through an inordinate amount of boyfriends. My husband said, 'It's a shame, her boypicker's broken.' I thought, hmmm...wouldn't it be nice if we actually had automatic
sensors for these sorts of things, but since we don't, we should be able to figure out a way
for us to have more information about who we are and what we need.
Sequencing: In truth, I've had a hard time with sequencing with this topic right from the
very beginning. The story in this chapter is about discovering that we are not our bodies or
our minds; that we are something that is in control of both. This might fit into Booker's
'Rebirth Plot',(Abela, 2008, p70), but without the dark spell part. That helped me to define
the sequence from the physical to the more etheric. Hopefully, the tension happens in
looking for the resolution of 'what' we are; setting up the questions, then wanting the
answer. (Abela 2008, p. 77).
Graphics: The Rock Video version revise specifically tried to utilize full frame images
rather than always having a matched background. I like full screen images whenever
possible and I will find my 'white space' in them. (Duarte, 2008, p.106). The color palette is
still primarily centered around blue. Blue can be a sort of ephemeral color and the use of
the blue star field gave this a more 'out there' effect. I kept it dark enough that there was
enough contrast so that all my visuals and text would pop. (Duarte, 2008, p.132).
I deliberately used dynamic and/or humorous video clips to enhance relevance to youthful
culture. The point was to leverage openness to the material. Vernallis has a great deal to
say about this. I was tempted to do music-video editing, but I knew that the resting length
on screen had to be long enough to read the screen. Normally, I find that at least 7
seconds is required to enable reading.
The music supported the experience; that is, the words bring out certain aspects of the
song. (Vernallis, 2004, p. 27) I was fortunate enough to locate several good sources of

video clips to emphasize the dynamic range of a human. One is a tracking shot of a
skateboarder overlaid with text about what's going on in the body as it moves. It adds
excitement and motion into 3D space. This is a huge topic and I have to cite entire chapters
of Vernallis that inspired me; specifically, however, Chapter 6. (Vernallis, 2004, p.107-136)
It was this footage that convinced me that this piece for active adolescents had to contain
motion footage. (Vernallis, 2004, p. 32-33)
Text: In the Rock video, I use scrolling text occasionally to not only add dimension but to
present an outside, authoritative voice. Mostly, I place text where it most relates to the
image, whenever possible. (Abela, 2008, p. 133) I like a round, chiseled font that has
enough serif to be easily read, but is still contemporary-looking. (Abela, 2008, p. 102). I
also often start slides with a sentence at the top left to introduce the page and let the eye
flow through the visual and to the rest of the explaining text. (Abela, 2008, p. 134).
Layout: Since each page it's own chunk of information, I designed each page individually,
to stand on its own. Abela talks about reinforcing the information, and I think that makes
more sense than carrying through a stiff format. (Abela, 2008, p. 108). I tried to keep the
visual elements down to one per page. This piece is for teenagers, it must be simple and
eye-catching, so I tried to keep it simple and spacey. I think Garr Reynold's opinion of
communicating with large images made an impression on me. (Duarte, 2008, p. 108.)
Measurement: In an instructional situation, discussions and/or follow-up activities will let a
teacher know if the piece has made its point.
Peer review results: The peer results for the Rock Video liked the introductory cut of the
soccer players. One liked the music for the audience, but the other didn't like the lyrics.
As a result, I went in and edited the verses out. There are still lyrics that support the
visuals and the underlying concept of the video.

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