PBL Teamwork Reflection

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The PBL project required a lot of teamwork. If my partner, Meena, and I, had not used teamwork, we would not have the model we have today.

Teamwork involves collaboration. Everyone will have different ideas and thoughts on how to create and present their model. Collaboration takes all the ideas, and combines them in the way that seems most beneficial and productive. Meena and I both had our own ideas, but then we adapted them so that they would fit together. For example, Meena wanted to show the arms moving up and down with helium balloons to represent what happens after the brain sends a signal (which is to trigger a reaction/movement). While I wanted to use water to represent the signal traveling through the body. Together, we combined our ideas so that the ‘signal’ water would run through the body and ‘trigger’ the arms to move with the helium balloons. Unfortunately,  it did not work out in the end, but another part of collaboration is being able to work together to adapt and tweak the plan and blueprints so it becomes a working model. Another part of collaboration is equally dividing the work to be more productive. Whenever Meena or I found ourselves with nothing to do while the other one was working, we would stop and talk about somethings they could do to help. This brings me to my next point which is communication.

Communication is also a major part in teamwork. As said before, everyone has different ideas and this is because everyone thinks differently. Therefore, it is important we communicate clearly and specifically so that nothing is misunderstood. Often when people don’t communicate properly, there are arguments and it can lead to big mistakes that forces your team to step back instead of moving forward. Meena and I have had some misunderstandings, but we clarify with each other so that it give us another chance to explain in more detail, so we didn’t make any major mistakes that hindered us. Communication also helps understand people’s parts in the project, such as leader, researcher, etc.

Here is a video I think represents teamwork.

 

 

In this video, the penguins communicated to slide over on one side of the iceberg. There was also collaboration because everyone needed slide over in order to make the iceberg tilt like it did. Therefore, I think this is a great video of teamwork.

 

Nervous System Reflection #2

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My group had some challenges that didn’t occur to us before. But when ever we ran into this obstacles we made adjustments.

Whenever we made an adjustment or added something new, we would rewrite our diagram of our working model so that we had something familiar to look at that we could follow.

Some of the new challenges we faced was taking in the account of how heavy our brain was and trying to fit it onto the sheer cardboard vertical base we had wouldn’t be enough. So what we added strength to our base by reinforcing it with more cardboard. We also didn’t take in the account that if we do end up presenting in the BBT during conferences, how the audience will know how to work it if they come while our hour isn’t there. So we have decide to put labels on both the working model themselves, and have a set of instructions on the side.

What we plan to do in the future lessons we have left, is to simply assemble the working models since we have all the parts but we need to put them together and glue them on our base. After we do so, we can see if there are any last minute tweaks, and finally at the end we will add finishing touches such as labels on the working model and also the instruction sheet on the side. Afterwards, the only thing is to update our diagram/plan one last time and add any relevant decoration that could help our audience comprehend the model easier.

PBL Nervous System Reflection

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My group is doing the Nervous System. In our last lesson we began to build the base of our working model and began constructing the arms. The arms were made of big plastic bottles and the base was made of cardboard. We realised that one of the materials we were planning to use might be a problem. This material was the helium balloons because after a while the helium runs out and won’t float anymore.  I am in charge of bringing clay (to make the brain), food colouring (for a more easily seen version of water), and 10 water bottles (both to hold the fluid, and to make the arms).

 

 

My Body System

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I have chosen to do the Nervous system. I wanted to learn something new so I chose mainly from the systems we did not study in class.  After reading the research questions from the guide, I realised I could answer  the least of those questions than the other systems. This was because I only had a general and broad view of the system.  Also, for each system I put down as a choice, I tried to draw a diagram of how I would ensemble a real life working model of that system. When I sketched out the nervous system I thought of many different ideas  I could use to make the model. So I am excited to start the research and begin building.