The importance of interactive lecture note

A good lecture is a good combination of lecture material and the method of presentation of the lecturer.

Storytelling is indeed an interesting teaching approach.

Yes, you are the chosen one!

Quite a lot of my past Design Aesthetics students complained to me that the programme they are taking now is not actually what they aim for. Some of them were upset and kept trying to change programme during their study.

As a matter of fact, they were chosen by UPSI from a huge pool of students who applied for studying in public universities through the UPU system. The choice of UPSI is grounded on the developmental need of the nation, and the need has been justified and verified by various governmental agencies, including MQA, EPU, KPT, etc.

Since each of the students is sponsored by Malaysian Government--the students pay only 10% of the actual fee while the rest is covered by tax payers' money, the Government will choose students to pursue in a specific programme based on the need of nation development.

In a word, it is not the students failed to choose what they want to study; in contrary, it is the country managed to choose students to study what will be good for the development of our country. 

Yes, YOU are the chosen one!

Gamifying Design Aesthetics Course

I appointed Ms Apple Looi to be the demonstrator of MRE3014 Design Aesthetics. Her first task is to support the gamification of the course.

The intended learning outcomes (ILOs) are:
1. To explain the principles and the appreciation of beauty in the form of arts. 2. To relate the issues to do with the varieties form of traditional art and modern art which includes the visual arts, music and performing arts from various culture.
3. To demonstrate and formulate the concept of beauty based on certain principles, system and techniques, concept and criteria.
4. To analyze and criticize the aspects contained in art forms which would be learned according to robust verbal and written arguments and evidence.

First thing first, we need to conduct a constructive alignment, aligning intended learning outcomes with learning activities. So far, I have proposed three assignments as the major learning activities:

1. Assignment 1: Personal Website for Learning Reflection
2. Assignment 2: Team-based Participation in Corporate Video Animatics Competition
3. Assignment 3: Group-based Involvement in PECIPTA 2015

Prior to the briefing of assignments, we have to explain the difference between team work and group work. Also,  we need to justify how the outcome of each assignment contributes to the attainment of the course learning outcomes.

In Assignment 1, the specifications used in last semester will be reused, in which sample assignments (excellent and bad quality of works) will be shown.

In Assignment 2, the learning events can be divided into three parts:

Part 1: instilling fundamental knowledge and skills in animatics design.
a. learning how to generate ideas for a short story
b. learning how to develop story idea according to three-act structure
c. learning how to write script
d. learning how to visualize a storyline using thumbnail board and storyboard
e. learning how to design audio and pace for an animatic.
f. learning how to add title sequence and credits for a corporate video.

Part 2: Transferring knowledge and skills into actual practice via competition
a. Forming teams for animatics competition
b. Role playing in design teams (producer, director, script writter, storyboard artist, audio designer, editor)
c. Design project management (Scrum)
d. Design project presentation

Part 3: Winning in design competition
a. Enrolling in the 48 Hour Corporate Video Animatics Design Competition
b. Preparing personal reference library for winning a competition
c. PPPPP in competition
d. Post mortem of lessons learned from participating design competition

In Assignment 3, all students will be appointed as secret design agents in which they will examine an invention exhibit presented in PECIPTA 2015. They will learn:
a. how to develop assessment rubric using four dimensions of design,  three levels of emotional design, and four principles of pleasure in design aesthetics.
b. how to assess the design quality of an invention