Blog post #7

Randy Pausch's last lecture on the video was great. It was very informative, but it was also very entertaining. He was a wonderful speaker. He was very upbeat and easy to listen to. He could really draw you in and make you interested in what he was talking about. He did a great job of using illustrations and examples. He used visuals very well. He livened the lecture up with humor, but never deviated from his points. I would have loved to be one of his students.

Randy's views on teaching were very interesting. He geared his classes toward working in groups on big projects. He would establish five projects a semester for his class. He would make sure there was a good mix of students that specialized in different departments. He would mix students from Art, Design, Drama, and CS randomly choosing teams per project. Each group would have two weeks to design, implement, and test their projects. At the end of each project, he would mix up the students into completely different groups for the next project on the schedule.

Randy believed in focusing his teaching on group projects because in the real world, especially in the entertainment technology field his students were in, they would work in teams. The fact that this was a master's degree also fueled his theory for the group project in his classroom. He believes in the four year's previously working on bachelor's degree, each student should have read all the books they needed to. He believed in challenging his students to work on actual projects and take what they have already learned in school and put it into practice.

I agree with his take on teaching. I will go further to say that group project learning is even great in undergraduate school. It is never too early to learn how to work in a group and how to coexist with a team. People have equal chance to learn from other students as they do with a teacher. Other people's ideas and skills can help you achieve your goals. How many times have you heard someone say something, or watch them do something and say to yourself I have never thought about it that way before? I have those experiences all the time. All and all I really enjoyed the video and hope that I can implement group projects in my own classroom one day.