Third Reflection

I am quickly coming to the realization that learning a new tool is not a quick, and easy process. I would like to say I am “computer savvy”, and I can normally navigate my way around a program or two. But learning Flash has taken me a little bit longer then other programs have in the past. While reading the articles for class I found a quote that struck a cord with me. The quote is from Seymour Papert’s article Constructionism in practice: Designing, thinking, and learning in a digital world

“Boy I sure admire you. I’ve never been able to fix those kinds of things or do anything like that. My neighbor, without a moment’s hesitation, shot back, “That’s because you don’t take the time.””

In the quote the author is talking to his neighbor who is fixing his lawnmower. The neighbor’s response is brilliantly simple, I love it! In our high tech, fast moving society no one takes the time out of their day to sit down and actually think about a problem. We just run off and call a repairman, or say “the hell with it” and buy a new one.

But to truly understand how things work you have to be willing to take the time and work through your problems. As I am working on Flash I learned another major lesson, you have to be able to fail, pick yourself up, and try again. No one, even a computer genius like me, gets everything 100% correct on the very first try. So I go back to the last spot my program worked, and have at it again, and again, and again, until I hit that magical “a ha” moment when the light bulb goes off, and I finally get it right. Once you get it right, 9 times out of 10 you will never get it wrong again because you worked so hard to get it right in the first place. Or even if you do mess up, you usually quickly remember what you have to do to fix it. That’s all the inspirational words I have for today, please view my technical progress up to this point below:

I would like to say that I did my last "demo" before starting on creating the actual product. Up until this point I have been trying to figure out how to make the transitions between the opening movie, the main screen, and then the interactions between the character and the different cities. I also found some audio which I am going to try and include in the project.

Reference:
Papert, S., (1996). A word for learning. In Y. Kafai & M. Resnick (Eds.), Constructionism in practice: Designing, thinking, and learning in a digital world (pp. 9-24). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates