Looking Inwards: A Self-Assessment

It's been a journey. It's been almost a month since the first blog was due, and look how far we've come. I feel like I've learned a lot in this time. In my first blog post, I mentioned how I was hoping to discover that society was as ready to move on from gender roles as I am, and while the spirit may be willing, the flesh is still pretty weak. While society wants gender roles to move on, individual people are stubborn! I honestly don't know what else I expected; of course there's always a group of naysayers who are against any sort of change: that's life.

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What have I learned about myself? Well, I learned that when it comes to expressing yourself, you are the biggest obstacle (semi-related "fact": the person seven times more likely to kill you than anyone else is yourself [citation needed]). People admire confidence, and coming to terms with who you are makes other people ignore the fact that you may not perfectly fit society's expectations. More importantly, I learned that being yourself weeds out any negative forces in your life; if people only like you when you try to fit in, they never really like you, do they? Likewise, being truly yourself will bring in new positive experiences that you never would have imagined before. Just be yourself, and your world will change with you.

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Overall, I feel I did well with the planning and pacing of my inquiry and work. I spent to most time on my research and using my research to form a conclusion. To me this was the most important, as there's no product without solid research to base it off of. My product packaging helped make this easier for me too, since I was comfortable with my research and I had no problem presenting it in a video format. Unfortunately, I'm not very used to speaking to a camera, so my on-screen appearance is rather awkward. I also feel that I could have made my product longer, but I sadly didn't notice this until part way through the editing process.

Either way, I would still give myself a Level 4 on this project. I put a lot of time and effort into my gender research, and I am sure that it will pay off. I did my absolute best to make sure my research was well explained and easy to understand through both my script and editing, and I think my presentation was similar in that regard. After all, gender is a pretty abstract topic and even though I had some struggles, I was able to persevere and overcome them. I sought out to answer a question about the world we live in, and I think I was able to answer it pretty well.

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Goodbye, madyisu.blogspot.ca, and goodbye, ENG2DL ISU.

~Cameron

Inquiry Conference: Sharing the Learning

In general, I tend not to worry too much about presentations. If I did my research (which I did) and know what I'm talking about (which I do), then I know I don't need to worry about getting all the words exactly right. With my presentations, the real struggle is structure; I'll stray off-topic and lose my pacing if I don't stop myself. That's why I try not to put too many words or prompts on my slides and focus more on pictures that relate to what I'm saying; questions and prompts will make me over-explain.

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I think I'm fairly comfortable presenting. Although sometimes I may forget to make eye contact with half of the class, I'm never too nervous or afraid to speak to anyone. I'll say what I need to (and maybe even a little extra), and then try my best to move on smoothly. I often make cue cards for presentations just so I know what to say and what not to (more on that later), but sometimes I depend on them too much and try to overcompensate when I miss something. I don't think I have any nervous ticks and I don't think I stutter, but I guess it depends on the presentation and how nervous I feel that day.

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I was surprisingly not very anxious before presenting; I was confident enough in the subject to not be afraid of messing up or saying something wrong. Since my question had a definite yes or no answer instead of being more open ended, I was mainly worried about making sure that I actually answered whether or not gender roles were valid in modern society. I think got my point across, but I felt that my conclusion was a little shaky and may have left some people confused. Timed presentations like that always make me scared that I'll go over the time limit, and I often accidentally cut corners to try and make up for it. This in turn makes me worried that I'll go under the limit, and it just leaves me unsure for the whole presentation.

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I did have some trouble compiling all of my research into a relatively short presentation. I wanted to add more of my information that I neglected to put in my product, but I did a run through with some extra bits and it ended up taking over 7 minutes. I decided it was much more important to have the basics covered so people would have a general understanding of gender and gender roles, and my second run-through dropped to 4 minutes 20 seconds. I left it at that, knowing I'd probably talk a little faster but add in more information so my actual presentation would even out to about the same length. This leaves me feeling unsatisfied, since I know I have more to share but never got the chance to do it.

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Overall I feel I did fairly well. I'm not sure if it's because of the Laurier Program or just because I'm in high school, but I have much higher expectations for presentations now than I did before. Thankfully I was able to satisfy my high standards and I hope I did the same for yours.

Putting it Together: Product Creation

To be honest, I was having some difficulty choosing how to present my research. How can I make a project that represents gender? Gender is abstract, and personal, and hard to represent in any sort of physical product. Then I realized that a lot of people, especially teenagers like myself, struggle with gender identity and combatting stereotypical gender roles. They need help, and the research I've been doing can assist them in their own journeys of self discovery. It's a win-win!

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So I knew I was going to present my information and the answer to my question in a way that could potentially help teenagers answer their own questions about themselves. In that case, I'd need to find a medium that teenagers relate to, but also something I'm already fairly comfortable with. I like making videos, and I know there are a lot of YouTube channels already dedicated to things like gender and sexuality, so I thought I'd make a research based vlog-type video where I act as though I'm giving advice to people who are confused about their gender and society today.

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I think a YouTube style video works well with my project because it helps put the concept of gender into something more physical and malleable while still giving me an opportunity to present my information in a way that's both easy to understand for the audience and enjoyable for me to create. Vlog style videos are simple, but get the point across well. With a video I can also have presentation aids like pictures and videos on screen while I talk, further explaining my research. Vlogs are also informal and casual, so I'm able to relax and be comfortable on the camera, making the whole process less strenuous overall.

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During this stage, I had to ask myself a lot of questions. How long should the video be? How do I order my information? Where do I film? How will I cite information rather than just consulting it? It was a lot to think about. I decided to take it easy, and just make sure that I fit in as much information as I can without getting overwhelming, and the video will be done when I feel I've presented enough of my research. As for pacing the video, I planned to start simple by answering what gender and gender roles are. From there, I chose to ease into more complicated subjects like Gender vs Sex, Spectrum vs Binary, chimpanzee studies, and gender roles in the media. Finally, I decided to finish it off by tying all of my research together to finally answer my question "Are Gender Roles Still Valid in Modern Society?" What is my conclusion? Well, you'll find out when you watch the video..