Thursday, March 10, 2016

The "Project Log" for documenting progress

A critical part of collaborative work is accountability. And with large projects with much in flux, it is equally important to document what one is doing for one's own sake as well as for others.

To this end, I'd like each of my students to start a "project log" post. This is to be updated at least twice weekly as students account for what they have done both to move forward their individual project, and to contribute to the overall project. Each student will only create this blog post once, but will update that same post, briefly logging their activity and linking to the other blog posts they've completed.

This kind of log is a bit of a hack -- there are other ways of doing this. But it will work, and this will keep each other aware of what one another is doing. (For academic purposes, this will also help grading.) Instructions follow. I have modeled how to do this in my own project log.
  1. Title your post "Project Log: [First name Last name]" 
  2. Enter the labels "project log" and "posted by [your name]"
  3. Insert a picture of yourself at the top of this post. It could be the same one you used in a prior post. 
  4. Use the jump break to divide your post
  5. Create subheadings and bulleted lists as modeled below. (After typing the text, select it, then go up to the drop down menu where it says "normal" and change this to "subheading." To create the bulleted list, select the icon for this toward the right side of the editing icons). 
  6. Under "Individual project - my progress" make one bulleted item for each blog post you have done to date. For each bullet
    1. insert the correct date in this format: 3/14/16
    2. give the title of your prior blog post
    3. link from that title to the actual blog post (It may be easiest to open a separate browser tab with our blog in it so you can find your own posts and copy the URL of each).
    4. In one sentence explain / summarize what you did
    5. In a second sentence, reflect on "what next" for your project based on comments received, feedback, or class discussion that affects your next direction.
  7. Under "Group project - my contributions" make one bulleted item for each blog post you have done to date documenting your efforts related to our group project. Follow the same pattern as with documenting individual project progress. 
You are starting this log by documenting your blog posts to date. But in the future you should use this to document reading, research, interviews, or other efforts you are making either for your individual project or the group one. Like the learning logs we used previously, this documents your thinking and exploring. As you make links to your posts, it also becomes an index to all your work on the project.

Feel free to link to other students' posts that are shaping your thinking, or that reflect work you do as a group.


Individual project - my progress

  • 3/5/16 - 

Group project - my contributions

  • 3/5/16 - 






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