I wish we had the time to make all of the changes suggested by our peer reviewers, but fear we may not. If we can, I would redesign the navigation, make a more harmonious over all look, create a more compelling video, and rework my section to include more of the reading I undertook to write what I did.
So far, I added an intro to the Manifesto in an attempt to make it come across as less aggressive. I also changed some of the language here and there. Somewhere in the midst of discussing the construction of this piece I suggested a statement of purpose. I think we lost sight of that in the midst of our technical confusion.
The rough draft of my section included a spot I was frustrated with in bold; in the rough draft version it was put in so I could remember where I was trying to go, so to speak. I would like to go back and add to that if time permits. One book I read is about conceptual blending in cognitive science—heavy duty stuff! Another dealt with creativity and the mind—also heavy stuff! The issue I am having with adding that information is that I read it during the time I was sick and all my notes seem a jumble of fever-thoughts in retrospect. I feel like I knew where I was going, but didn’t quite make it all the way there because I had to cut out the fever-induced writing. What I was trying to get at—and the reason I focused on the myths—is because I think they are still a major roadblock. In other words, we may cheer creativity on, but cultural biases still persist even for those of us in the cheering section.
In a perfect world the changes I would like to make:
• Clarify navigation to be more user friendly to those who aren’t as digitally literate as we assumed our audience might be
• Tone down the aggressiveness (tried to do that already and hope it works!)
• Re-do the video with less talking head and more creativity. (It’s a fine head McKenzie, so don’t take it personally if you read this!) Include the Intro in the new video so it’s accessible to a wider audience.
• Make the look match from section to section or find a way to make the look more harmonious throughout (This could be an issue because we had to use a template for some sections, which we worked on independently in some cases)
• My dream edit that we probably won’t have time for: more writing in all of the sections and less emphasis on presenting links/quotes without reflective writing about those thoughts.
• Another wish: more links between the sections. This is what we were aiming for, but had difficulty making it work as we had envisioned. I had hoped for more links to my co-authors, but didn’t want to confuse readers by sending them to their quotes/links in the end. I’ve indicated where my links need to be and they are far fewer than I would like them to be.
• Rework more of the cognitive science into my section. Get the images I gathered into the side panel of my section. This has been held up by bigger technical issues, but I hope we can get them in there!
• I still can’t say that I like the open-ended part at the end of the Manifesto, sorry guys. I was overruled, but it still seems like it might confuse the audience. My thinking is that ending on a positive note, saying that these changes are what the students want, but that we are looking to educators to help us in achieving reform takes the sting out of the demands.To me, it makes it feel unfinished with the unfinished sentence. At the very least, I think we need to add the final image that I suggested, or something similar.
• Work on this post-semester if the others are up to the challenge; to me the final draft will still feel Beta-ish to be perfectly honest, because there are so many changes that we might not get to with time constraints.
