Week 9

What I did:

-redid and printed my mock journal that I would include in the kit to be distributed to each girl (4 hours)

-started working on my grant proposal (2 hours)

What I accomplished/discovered/encountered:

It felt so good to actually print something and have something tangible that I made! Here are the various spreads from this journal:

I tried to take Erica's advice into consideration and make this journal more approachable and inviting. She made good points about paying attention to paper quality, visuals that create comfort, etc... I also tried to place quotes that relate to what is being said on it's facing page. Today when showing this to my group, I received very helpful feedback as well! They said that I should also create fun prompts in the journal, or things that do not have to do with bullying to get them to open up and not see the journal as some daunting experience. I also need to make sure some of the questions I pose to not seem like an exam. Amanda shared a journal with me that she used to use, which had some interesting questions. See below:

This journal is made by a company called Journals, Unlimited and is made in Bay City, Michigan. I am really going to have to figure out paper, etc... this little journal that I made as a mockup cost $10!

A really interesting activity to include in the kit was suggested in my group today as well! This activity goes along with my whole postsecret interest. I am really excited about this, and think it would be a good way to get the girls to think about drawing and expressing themselves in a nonverbal way and a way to give the girls a prompt (an activity like role playing, reading a story, etc...). This actually might even by my way of collecting something from them instead.

In this activity, each student would be given a small index card (4x6 or 5x7) on a monday, and have to take it home and draw a picture or make a collage on it about something that happened to them that week, a joke, a good story, something interesting about themselves. They would then give it back to the teacher on friday and would then be redistributed to a different student. That weekend, the student that has to react to that person's drawing/writing/collage. This would be a great way for the students to be interacting with each other, yet in an anonymous way. My hopes would that this would be done on a weekly basis perhaps.

I also thought of the idea of creating a blog for each group of girls that I work with. Each group would not be able to see their own work but only the work of a different group. I think this would be a great tool for them to see that other people are going through the same things as them, but they would not know this girls at all. I would be able to do this by creating usernames for each student- I looked into it on blogspot.

What to do next

-Stephanie and I talked about continue to make to be able to show the people that I am meeting with visuals of what I am envisioning. I am going to continue working on what will be included in this kit. (work on brochure piece) I think I am going to take a break from this journal and come back to it a little later. I at least have something that gives an idea of what I am thinking of for this.

-Meet with Carole Lapidos on Tuesday

-Work on Grant Proposal

-Eventually research other community art interventions- creative ways to address a social issue

*Question: I am having trouble making it so that my images will get larger once clicked on. I have spoken to different people who have been able to do that, but am still having trouble? Can we maybe go over this in class? Thanks :)