Week in Review: A Reflection of December 4 – December 11

What a busy, busy week it has been! There was the holiday celebration event, which included two BINGO events and a casino, a Lunch ‘n’ Learn, and final projects to work on for my classes at Moraine Park Technical College.

The cafeteria and computer labs were popular places for group projects and study groups this past week. It is definitely nearing the end of the semester. Which reminds me; book buyback starts this Thursday. I’ve got a few books l would like to sell back to the bookstore, but I highly recommend keeping books you know you’ll use in the future. I will not be selling my Photoshop or JavaScript book back. They were good books I know I might need to use for reference in the future.

Sometimes when I go down the hallway past the library at the West Bend campus, there will be something set up at the tables. This past week there was a fundraiser for Relay for Life http://www.relayforlife.org/. Students and staff could purchase tickets to enter drawings to win gift baskets filled with things like movies, iTunes gift cards, candy, and cookbooks. I was one of the first to put my raffle tickets into the bucket.

After completing my self-paced Microsoft Access class, I was able to focus on my final project for Graphics for the Web class that was due on Monday. It required a lot of research and a lot of time spent using Photoshop to create a logo.

Now, the last thing I need to focus on is the last assignments for Beginning Photoshop. That will be due on Monday, and then I’m all done for the fall semester of 2011!

Week in Review: A Reflection of October 23 – 29, 2011

Mission accomplished. I finished my homework by Thursday night so I had the entire weekend off to celebrate Halloween. It really wasn’t the “fall break” like I thought it was going to be since there was a lot going on. The weather could have been better, but at least there was no snow or ice.

My online Photoshop class is moving along quickly. I looked ahead in the syllabus, and it appears we will be going through the entire book. That’s a lot of material to cover in half a semester. By taking this class and the Graphics for the Web class concurrently, I’m getting to know Photoshop CS5 really well. I’m trying to memorize more keyboard shortcuts as I go through my assignments. These are combinations of keys you press on the keyboard to get the program to perform a certain action rather than clicking through menus. It saves time.

I didn’t have a whole lot of time to work on my self-pace Microsoft Access assignments this past week, so I’ll have to make up for it this coming week. The December 8 date is looming closer. I definitely won’t be able to get all that work done in a week before the due date. Guess I’ll be spending lots of time in the computer lab this week!

My First Online Class

Monday was the official start of my first completely online class, Beginning Photoshop. Although I’m familiar with Photoshop CS2 version, which I learned more than five years ago, I will be taking this class as a requirement for my program. The latest version is Photoshop CS5, which is what I’ll be learning in this class. There have been a lot of updates and changes since I originally learned the program, one of them being the Content Aware Fill. We had talked about this feature in my Graphics for the Web class. It’s simply amazing. To see what I’m talking about, watch this video: http://tv.adobe.com/watch/photoshop-cs5-feature-tour/content-aware-fill-part-1/

Taking an online class is different than taking a class in-person. Luckily, I know how to use eCollege, because I’ve had blended classes that use this tool. Blended classes are ones that meet face-to-face but also have an online portion. The online portion uses eCollege, an online portal for classes.

The posting in the announcements section from my instructor explained how this class was going to work. Even though we don’t have a meeting time or place, homework still has specific due dates. I will be following along in the textbook to complete assignments. The instructor has additional comments and instructions to go along with the chapters. There are scoring guides so we can make sure we are meeting the criteria of the assignment and a schedule to follow. Other students have already posted their introduction to the discussion board. It’s pretty clear what I need to do for this class and when I need to do it.

Now, it’s time to get to work!

Week in Review: A Reflection of September 12 – 16, 2011

This week I bought a student planner from the Moraine Park bookstore. My personal planner was too small to write down everything I needed to write. They were on sale because we’re already a few weeks into the semester. In a few days, we’ll be one month into the semester! I still feel like it’s the second week!

Some of my classes are picking up in pace, and I have multiple assignments due for each class. A few of the classes are half a semester long, so there’s a lot of work to do in a short amount of time. After those two classes are over, I start Beginning Photoshop. This class will be my first completely online class.

I decided at the beginning of the semester that I would keep up with my assignments by working on them as soon as possible. It’s been working well for me. My free time is more relaxing and guilt-free knowing I’ve finished what I need to finish for the week by Sunday night.

What I’ve learned this week is that setting a schedule for assignments makes the workload easier to handle. I set priority to the tasks that are due the soonest and the ones that will take the longest to complete. Pacing things on your to-do list is a transferable skill that can be applied to any job, especially in the Web developer field.