• Learning Environments

    Posted February 19, 2013 By in Personal With | Comments Off on Learning Environments Learning Environments

    As my senior year rapidly continues to pass, I’ve looked back at several things from my college career that have helped me understand who I am and how I learn.

    A big factor for me is my learning environment. I have not done as well in classes that are massive lecture halls, but have tended to excel in a smaller classroom where the lesson is more discussion based and there is an active engagement with the professor rather than a passive relationship between the professor and myself.

    I think this is why I’ve loved my time in the UNC Journalism and Mass Communication school’s advertising and public relations courses. I constantly feel engaged with the material and am interested in coming to class every day.

    In regards to this, I was really struck by a concept development technique that I participated in the other day for my Advertising Workroom course.

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    In this panorama you can see that, while brainstorming for a brand identity, we were instructed to use multicolored post-it notes to write down our ideas and place them on the wall. The system seems very haphazard but I was amazed how the physical action of placing an idea on the wall allowed me to mentally register it and then move on to a different concept. I didn’t feel like I was constantly riffing off my most recent idea. I was also able to move around the room, and be further influenced by the ideas that other students had posted.

    I really believe that this brainstorming technique helps your mind open up and become more efficient. In fact, I would expect that many more office spaces begin to feature this style of collaborative idea generation using products like IdeaPaint that turn walls into giant whiteboards.

    Image via http://www.ideapaint.com/spaces/work/

     

     

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  • Big A Challenge

    Posted February 9, 2013 By in Personal With | Comments Off on Big A Challenge Big A Challenge

    Personal achievement this past week: I completed the +HWY 55 Burgers Shakes & Fries (Formerly Andy’s) Big “A” Challenge.

    That monstrosity is 50 oz. of meat plus buns, trimmings, fries, and a drink in under 30 minutes.

    My friend and I do an eating challenge for his birthday and last year was El Gigante (4lb Burrito) at Bandidos in Chapel Hill. It got the better of me in the end, but he was able to defeat it.

    This year I was better prepared and we took on the Hwy 55 Big “A” Challenge. Needless to say, it was an immense trial. I overcame it though in a scant 16:30.

    Unfortunately, my friend did not so now we’re tied 1-1. Until next year!