park inquiry

On December 4, 2022

We’re already at the end of the term, which is wild and I’m so excited to share with you all the progress I’ve made on the picture book! I am titling the book Flower Sprout and have created a read-aloud video that you can find embedded below. Although my initial dream time-line did not totally pan out, I’ve completed a lot more than I thought I would. I was able to finish the final illustration outlines, the front cover and the back cover. I would love for you to watch the video or scroll through the pdf version and I hope you enjoy the book!

Flower-Sprout Download

Final Reflection

Overall, I learned a lot and had a lot of fun with this inquiry project. Some of the challenges I faced was an overall lack of time and a feeling of pressure to finish. However, I learned to take my time with it in order for me to put in my best work. Also, my previous picture book project was a very personal book to me, so creating a book that catered towards younger elementary students came as a struggle. I wanted to make the story meaningful and fun but also relatable and engaging for that age group. With this, one thing I wish to have worked on more, is the story and writing. I hope to develop a certain distinct style of writing that students engage with as I did with some of my favourite authors such as, Shel Silverstein and Robert Munsch.

The illustrations took the most time and I’m really proud of how they turned out. I spent a lot of time going through different renditions of illustrations because I wanted to achieve consistency and create a symbiotic relationship between the writing and images being shown. I didn’t want the writing to seem like a caption to an image or for the illustrations to be taken as add on visuals to a writing piece. I think a key piece to a successful picturebook is having the writing and illustrations work as one

You can see in the images above that I totally changed the format of one of my spreads because I realized while doing the final outline that it really didn’t work with the writing and the composition was not pleasing to the eye. Going through a process like this opened my eyes to how much goes into making a simple picture book and how intentional you must for a good product to come out.

So, thank you readers for coming along on this journey with me and I’m glad I had this platform to share it with you all. Also, big shoutout to Procreate! The app was really essential to this whole project and I can see myself doing more picturebook project illustrations on Procreate. I would really recommend it! Stay tuned for the final final printed product with colours, a dedication, a bio and all! I’m going to be working on this at my own pace over winter break so come by and check my progress. Have a great holiday season and I hope you were able to take away a little something from my inquiry project and the picture book I created!

Joining BookTok

On November 28, 2022

As a writer and illustrator of an upcoming bestselling picture book (haha), I have decided to join tiktok. Specifically, I’m joining the BookTok community. I thought this would be a fun idea to involve modern social media platforms in my free inquiry as I continue working on my illustrations. I created a tiktok interviewing my peers in Education about their favourite childhood picture books. It was curious to learn what books my peers grew up with and why they chose the books they did. This was so much fun to film and their answers brought back so many nostalgic book memories from when I was a wee young lad reading picture books at home and at school.

The picture book that holds a special place in my heart is The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein. It’s quite a sad book in the end, but it’s one of the first books that envoked some critical thinking and analysis in little Yireh’s brain. I also love Shel Silverstein’s other poetry books like Where the Sidewalk Ends.

Out of the Books my peers talked about, Mr. Kellam’s choice of Garfield sparked a new idea in me. Perhaps my next project will be on creating a comic or graphic novel. As someone who is shamefully not a big novel reader, I absolutely love reading graphic novels. Some of my favourites are the Amulet series by Kazu Kibuishi, Cardboard by Doug TenNapel and Smile by Raina Telgemeier.

Features and Favourite Picture Books:

Nova Long: Pippen and Pudding by KV Johansen
Chris Kellam: Garfield by Jim Davies
Meaghan Leong: Love You Forever by Robert Munsch
Jo Huber: A Bad Case of Stripes by David Shannon
Jayda Konnila: The Paper Bag Princess by Robert Munsch
Teagan Hunt: The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle

A big thank you to everyone who participated in the video!

In terms of my book progress, I am continuing to work on my illustrations and am striving to finish them by the end of the week if possible! There is a lot to do in the last weeks of the term so I’m quite honestly overwhelmed, but so far, this free inquiry experience has been really valuable and I’m looking forward to continuing to work on it after the term ends to finish it and post my final product! Maybe I’ll post more about it on tiktok too and build a bigger presence on BookTok.

a mug and laptop screen on a wooden table. The laptop screen is displaying a group video call.

Canva Adventure Reflection

On November 25, 2022

I had so much fun during this week’s class! Although it was on zoom, we got to learn more about how to use Canva more effectively for teaching and Canva is a godsent online tool that I’ve been using for quite some time now. When I ran the Global Citizens Club in my highschool, I relied on it for all the posts I made on the club’s instagram, I’ve made cards, and a lot of posters. I also used it quite a bit when I tutored over the summer to make worksheets, activites, and learning tools for my student.

The focus of the Canva learning lab was on creating a virtual classroom that could be used for online learning. I had never done this on Canva before, but we were provided a link to a video that provided intstructions and tips. I created my own virtual classroom and I really love how it turned out!

I chose mainly warm tones to provide a welcoming feeling within the harsh blue light students have to stare at constantly. To keep with my art theme of my blog, I have an easel that’s actually a GIF and an arts and crafts table on the side as well. Plants are always a must and as someone who went to high school with essentially NO windows, I wanted to add that too for “natural light”. I’ve also inserted a link on the whiteboard that students would be able to interact with.

As a student who had to go through nearly a whole semester of full online learning and a whole year of hybrid learning in highschool, I’ve experienced my fair share of failures and successes with different teaching methods. This was also at the very beginning of the Pandemic, so teachers and administration were not so well-versed or knowledgeable with how to be engagin through a screen. Student participation was lacking and at times, non-existent. We’ve come a long way over the past three years and I’m glad to see the progress and innovation within the education community.

These virtual classrooms are one example of creative innovating and to take it further, I thought a cool idea would be to encourage students to create their own virtual classrooms as well, just like we did in our class. It’s fun and also takes you back to the school mindset to see yourself in that setting on the screen. Creating the background also prompts students to want to show their creations to the class and therefore, participate and perhaps turn on their cameras, which I know is a big help to the teachers. If students aren’t comfortable with their cameras on, they can insert their own bitmoji or any avatar of themselves to add to the virtual classroom they make.

Students can be so creative and include their own personal designs, personalities and cultures into their virtual classrooms. I decided to make one for myself as well and I had a lot of fun with it. Overall, Canva is FOR SURE teacher essential in my opinion and I think I’ll be using it until my last breath. I really wish my teachers used it when I was in school, especially during the lockdown and in my sad hybrid senior year. I’m stoked about this virtural classroom tool and I’m excited to learn more about canva as a learning tool!

Tackling Expression and Consistency

On November 20, 2022

Hi readers! In my last free inquiry post, I introduced my old picture book, which was more of a concept based book, rather than a story. Because of this, there were two new challenges I had to face with the book that I am currently working on. First off, I’ve never had to draw one consistent character and secondly, I’ve never illustrated a character’s expressions for storytelling. As I continue to work on my final outlines, I find myself erasing and redrawing my characters’ facial expressions to get the right mood. The hair is hard to keep consistent within all the illustrations too. I constanly go back and forth between illustrations to make sure the hair is the same length and volume. I chose a pretty simple mushroom cut (inspired by my childhood haircut) in order to make it easier to draw the hair consistently.

The smallest changes in an eyebrow’s angle changes the character’s whole entire mood and expression. Eye placement and mouth placements also make big differences that are really noticeable. I had a lot of fun with the expression tests that I did in the image above.

My Progress: I’ve been able to work a lot more on the picture book so yay! The final outlines are getting done slow and steady, but I’m really liking how they look so far! Spread 3 wasn’t working out the way I had planned so I’m going to have to go revisit that one later.

I’ve now completed five spreads so I’ve got 7 left to go! With the pace I’m going at, I’m pretty sure I won’t be finished the book in its entirety by December 6th, but I’m hoping to have finished the final outlines and started working on the colouring. The dream goal would be to have the illustrations all complete by December 6th. I hope to continue working on the book through winter break to complete it!

Games + Learning Reflection

On November 19, 2022

This week, guest speaker Tina O’Keefe gave us a presentation on gamification and game-based learning. Although we’ve been discussing this topic throughout the whole term, it was really awesome to see a teacher’s rich and comprehensive implementation of tech in her class. The google classroom digital choice board that Tina showed us reminded me of Soft Start, which is an activity my link2practice mentor teacher uses in her class. The digital choice board gives a variety of activities at different levels that students have autonomy with. Students can choose activities which they can enjoy and learn from depending on level they feel they are at. This is exactly what I like about Soft Start, which is just an offline version where student have free choice activity time. I feel like UDL comes into play with both of these activities, as they are designed to be inclusive and autonomous rather than adapted to be inclusive.

Furthermore, gamification and game-based learning is incorporated in both Soft Start and Tina’s digital choice board. Games are a way for students to learn in an engaging way that normalizes trial and error. Instead of a one off test that students can fail or pass, with games, it is the norm to fail a level, but continuously try in order to progress. Even games that directly have to do with curricular content can be so beneficial to a student’s overall learning. Games such as chess, sudoku, and puzzles of any sort.

Hour of Code is a great resource we were introduced to with tons of different games and activities for varying grades to learn coding. One that I found for my grade 4/5 link2practice class is SciGirls: Code Quest. This game incorporates science with its ocean based theme, is leveled for beginners and increases in difficulty, which allows for development and is also goal-based, which incites motivation and incentive. In addition, the game has both audio and visual elements that students can interact with.

SciGirls: Code Quest

To go further, indigenizing online learning is a topic that comes with complexities because tech education is inherently not aligned with the traditonal indigenous ways of learning and knowing, which are rooted in community, togetherness, experience and place. The article “The Five R’s for Indigenizing Online Learning: A Case Study of the First Nations Schools’ Principals Course”, discusses this hurdle and how it can be addressed using the five R’s: respect, relevance, reciprocity, responsibility and relationships. In some cases, where accessibility to education is limited, online learning may be the only plausible option and the R’s must be implemented into decisions for how to indigenize online learning.

Stickers Galore

On November 12, 2022

the little things Download

This week, I went a little wild with my sticker designs and had a lot of fun doing it! There is a lot more than I had planned for now, but I’m really excited for all of them to come to life and for you all to see!

With some thought about the demand I might expect from buyers at the market, the big thing I thought of was nostalgia! We love our Y2K themed things nowadays so I thought I would profit on that a little bit by creating a CD sticker design and a goldfish or fishy cracker design. I also tried out an ipod, but that one didn’t end up looking all that great. I also added a couple new houses because I find it really fun to draw those. Another addition, is the submarine window with a deep sea view.

For those teachers out there, and by specific request from Meaghan Leong, I also made two stickers sheets. One with a variety of fruits and one with ice creams! I think these would be so cute to use for student work or crafts.

Although Nova Long and I have got our designs down, the issue now is how we will be making these designs into stickers. Our initial plan was to use a cricut, but with no prior experience with a cricut, this proved to be a lot more complicated and time consuming. Kudos to Nova for struggling through that in my stead. Now, our backup plan is to use a separate source, which we found online. Sticker App is a great company we found that has fair prices for custom sticker printing and if we order now, the stickers should be here at least 5 days before the market, which is pretty risky, but it seems like our best shot for now.

Picture Book Update: My reading break has been consumed by the stickers so I haven’t made any more progress on my picture book. However, being home, I now have a hold of the first picture book I made a couple years ago and I’ll be bringing it back to Victoria to use as inspiration and to share with you all.

The book description: “A collection of moments in life that are often taken for granted and forgotten in a world consumed by busyness and technology” What is a little thing in life that you often take for granted? Whether it be a moment, a certain smell, or feeling?

Here are some of my favourite spreads in the book:

Innovative Schools Reflection

On November 12, 2022

Hearing Jeff Hopkin’s talk this week took me back to one of our first reflection posts on the film Most Likely to Succeed, which was a documentary about another innovative tech school called High Tech High. That school seemed so far out of reach to me when I watched it, but it was in much closer in reach than I thought. Jeff’s Pacific School of Innovation and Inquiry (PSII) is right here in Victoria and the school is taking strides into a very similar direction as High Tech High with unstructured classes, student inquiry based learning, and rule-breaking!

For both High Tech High and PSII, what boggles me the most is the trust that the parents have with signing their children up with such radically innovative schools and I give a big kudos to them and the students themselves. However, It also says a lot that someone like Jeff, with so much experience in the traditional public school system would veer off the conventional tracks completely to start up a school like PSII. It says a lot about the currect school system, which I went through, which most of you readers went through, and will work with. It makes me question how I was taught and how students are taught now.

I wrote about this in my Most Likely to Succeed reflection as well, but I personally see the issues of the educational system rooted in expectations, expectations of a post-secondary education/degree. Because students are expected to know this and this in grade 5, they must learn this in grade 4. Because students need to get into university, they must know this and do this and get this grade. Students are trained to get a degree that they’ve been convinced guarantees stability. This is why I really like Jeff’s approach to avoid the BC curriculum in PSII. Schools like PSII and High Tech High are experimental, and pioneering. They’re examples for the future and It may take a long time, but I can see a future where these innovative schools will become the traditional system for all of BC and perhaps Canada.

“Students who only know how to perform well in today’s education system—get good grades and test scores, and earn degrees—will no longer be those who are most likely to succeed. Thriving in the twenty-first century will require real competencies, far more than academic credentials.”
Tony Wagner, Most Likely to Succeed: Preparing Our Kids for the Innovation Era

Art Fair Collab +

On November 7, 2022

Hi readers! If you haven’t seen Nova’s Portfolio‘s post just yet, I’m excited to announce a collaboration. Nova and I are going to be sharing a table at the UVic Artisan Market on November 30th! Our plan is to sell stickers, possibly prints and I know Nova plans to display her canvas paintings as well. To give a little sneak peak, I’ll share a couple sticker designs in the making.

I want to make at least 3 more designs for large stickers and I’m also thinking of making a sticker sheet for teachers to use when marking! Remember those stickers that would say “good job!” and “excellent!” My goal is to spot a random nalgene bottle with one of my stickers on it sometime on campus after the fair. I’m so excited for the fair so stop by on November 30th at the SUB!

Picture Book UPDATE:

I’ve officially created an official official draft/outline for the first spread of the book! The colours are only for test so they’re not the final colours. I might keep some of the same colours though. Also, I have made the formal decision not to draw noses on my people because they just look so much more adorable without noses for some reason. Wouldn’t you agree?

Another important aspect to picture books is the writing itself and how the writing is displayed. Font is something I still haven’t put too much thought into, but I’ve been dabbling around with a few options that I would like your opinions on to get a start on what direction I should go.

Classic: I’m a sucker for the classic prints and fonts because of the posh aura that they give off. This may be controversial, but I actually really like Times New Roman.
Handwritten: I would also love to handwrite the writing, but there’s the concern of consistency with that. However, I would love the organic look and it would feel extra personal.
Standard: For standard, I think of fonts like Ariel and the sample one I have on my draft/outline spread above. These kinds are the most beneficial for legibility. Also, they don’t stand out, but rather blend in.
Other: There are tons of other fonts out there so I’ll leave it open for you readers to put in some input and suggest any fonts you think might fit well with the story and illustrations.

A green speech bubble shaped by numerous yellow Q-cards with three balls of scrunched up yellow Q-cards in the speech bubble to resemble ellipsis.

Reflection on Accessibility

On November 7, 2022