Educational Reflections Or How I Learned to Instruct a Class For A Day

Sometimes an assignment is more difficult than you expect it to be. This was not one of these opportunities. When I took the class during the last 30 minutes I discussed all about animation, it’s art form, and how it is seen as an undervalued art form in Western culture.

Before I entered the class I had prepared for it by doing as much research about the films I wanted to talk about specifically. I was fortunate enough to have had a great knowledge about the subject in general already. I’ve seen Ghost in the Shell multiple times so I had time to make my own interpretations of the film.

The main goal I had for this was to get the members of the class to look at animation in a whole new light and expose them to more variety. I wanted them to see it from a different perspective, which I feel like I succeeded in doing so. The goals were met, but it was different than I expected. The big difference was in how I planned my time out. I’m certain I spent longer on asking and answering questions than I really expected to, but I felt it was beneficial to the whole experience. I was even surprised during the class time because more students knew of the subject than I reall expected. Especially those who talked about Japanese legend Hayao Miyazaki and his work.

The single most challenging thing was pushing past my own nerves at the beginning. I’ve gotten better at public speaking, but I’ve always been really nervous and once I got into the presentation I became a lot more confident. This nervous energy led me to find the most rewarding element and that was talking with my classmates and hearing their perspective. That was rewarding to be able to reach them and see their reactions.

In terms of improving I would say that an important thing would be staying on the allotted time limit, but I know that is a challenging part. I ended up learning a lot from this experience and it was a good diversion from normal class activities.