It's a Wrap

School Bonds Q & A is out in the cybersphere, and I feel proud of the product we created. My team members and I come from school districts of varying size throughout the state and have professional backgrounds that range from elementary science and math to secondary tech ed to district administration. This diversity of experiences brings depth and perspective to our work, but also presents challenges to collaboration. The professionalism of my colleagues overcame those obstacles in fine style. We used a variety of collaboration tools during our process, including Google Docs and a Google Site. We found that, although the real-time editing functions of Google Docs had their uses, the multi-level platform of the Google site was more in line with the variety of uses needed for project completion. Through the site, we compiled video footage and audio tracks, archived transcripts of online conferencing, collaborated on assignment and proposal documentation, and tracked tasks and timeline status. Please feel free to take a look at our process at the EDLD 5363 PSA Video Project Google Site. My primary responsibility was to work with another team member to complete research and background on our selected topic and to develop the voice-over script. This was a humbling process; one forgets after years of being accountable only to her own judgement and discretion that all roads do not end at one's own opinion. I tend to oververbalize, and collaborating with a peer helped me to make my point more succinctly. Each team member contributed either voice-over templates or video footage, or a combination of the two, to the project. In the end, I felt privileged to have a small piece of each in the final product.
Collaboration has not generally been my strength in the past, and I quailed at the idea of a majority of my course grade being dependent on the result of not only a collaborative effort, but a long-distance one. I simply cannot be more delighted to be proven wrong. This experience has shown me how fulfilling, enlightening, educational, and how fun a group project can be when a group of true collaborators work towards a common goal. My profound thanks to Lynne, Shannon, Russell, and Janet for time well spent and a job very well done.