In week 5 we were focusing on critical reflection and deliberate practice. Reflective writing is deemed an essential method for both personal and professional development. It assists you in becoming more conscious of your decisions and mindset, building more confidence, proactivity, and flexibility in your learning and practices, whilst ensuring you remain level-headed and on target to achieve your goals. Critical reflection and deliberate practice are solely based around contemplative thoughts and how you would act on them; through exploring personal constraints, impediments, encounters, and failings, you are far more likely to develop your skills through overcoming these matters. When fostering creative practice, professional practice, and business awareness, there are holes in experience that you are frequently being faced with, and a plan of action must be devised if the individual is to overcome these weaknesses and succeed in their ambitions. The 5 key questions relating to the reflection of challenges must be addressed to obtain true clarity on a particular plan of action: what, who, when, why, and how.
Spark Forum
We were asked to use the forum within Canvas “to share some reflections about your present situation, using all three perspectives:
· Reflect on-action – What critical incidents led you to enroll on the course?
· Reflect in-action – What critical incidents, if any, are you experiencing?
· Reflect for-action – How are the first two points shaping your outlook for the future?”
Here is my response from 09/03/2021:
· Reflect on-action - Since the early years of secondary school, I knew that I wanted to make games, but after not doing too great in school I got into the mindset for a time that I had lost my chance and convinced myself that I would be stuck in "dead-end jobs" for the rest of my life. After 3 years of working purely in retail and hospitality, I felt that I had enough of not expanding my creative repertoire, other than playing the odd bit of guitar and singing. Stupidly, I let myself be talked out of going into game design at this point as it was deemed an unrealistic goal by many people I knew at the time. In retrospect, it is funny because I ended up studying film production shortly after and this is an even more difficult industry to break into due to the level of elitism and egotism. It never really occurred to me how much I loved writing narrative until I started college; from this point on, I knew that regardless of the industry I found myself in, I would be focusing on this. Halfway through my BA, I decided that I would much rather prefer to study the industry of which I originally intended to: game development and design. That being said, I still love filmmaking. I quite simply took influence from Hideo Kojima and his approach of transitioning from filmmaking to designing and developing games, in which I will transfer my skills to this new creative and technical medium.
· Reflect in-action - I do find myself struggling to keep up at times as I am working full-time because living in Brighton is ludicrously expensive, not to mention the overtime I am having to work on top to pay off existing debts from previous films, etc. As it stands, I am only slightly behind, so it has not become too much of an issue yet. In relation to coursework, I find that I am falling into the comfort zones of existing skillsets that I acquired through film, and right now I am finding that the only way for me to keep on top of blog posting is to group all elements such as research, activity, etc. into a single post; thus, making my blogs look and read like essays.
· Reflect for-action - I remain excited for what is to come from the course and where I will end up either during university or after graduating, although it should be stated that I am, of course, extremely nervous also. I would love to be in the position of possessing the confidence to apply for internships or junior positions, but I am still very apprehensive about doing so. I hope I will feel comfortable enough by Jan 2022 at the latest. Initially I thought I would be struggling to come up with ideas for new games as I suffer with writer's block sometimes but thankfully this has not been the case. Working full-time and studying is a pain for sure, but it is also making me better my time management skills and so I just need to make sure not to get lazy and keep the rhythm. Even though I am falling behind ever so slightly, fortunately I do have just over two weeks of annual leave coming up so this will no doubt set me back on track. To get out of these comfort zones, I will be setting myself weekly challenges that correlate with my development. Seeing as I used a sizzle reel to conceptualise an intro cutscene for the rapid ideation of weeks 4-5, I intend to learn to prototype cutscenes with Unity for the next RI session.
The Five Reflective Domains
Dispositional domain
- This relates to time management, motivation, general behaviour, and discipline.
Affective domain
- This contains all aspects of how an individual deals with feelings, experiences, and emotions, and also external factors of which could be affecting the ability to focus.
Interpersonal domain
- This is all relevant skills that relate to interacting with others, and applies online as much as it does face-to-face. This could be an individual thinking back to having experienced miscommunication with a team member and reflecting on which interpersonal skill that they could have used and how they might go about dealing with these kinds of situations differently in future.
Cognitive domain
- In this domain the individual will find themselves studying books and journals, and going tutorials for the swift improvement of existing skills. Through this, the individual can Identify trajectories of learning that will complement their ambitions and career paths
Procedural domain
- This domain is based around evaluating existing skills and recognising where improvements are required. It is beneficial to emphasise on failure when acquiring new abilities.
Challenge Activity
Step 1:
Review each of the entries you created in your journal one at a time. Which of the five reflective domains are mentioned? Edit each individual entry and use the tagging system to tag it with the reflective domains mentioned. Multiple domain tags can be used for a single entry if the content spans multiple reflective domains.
Step 2:
Tally up the number of times each reflective domain tag is used throughout the journal. This data could be visualised in a table or documented in text form. Note this down and acknowledge any imbalances. Which domain is the most dominant in your journal? Which domain needs more consideration in your reflection? Consider how you can address any imbalances in the future.
Step 3
Review the content in your journal. Acknowledge entries that could be used to help formulate a SMART goal. Identify the highest priority entries and create two or three SMART goals that build on the reflection from the journal entries. Remember, SMART goals must be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time bound.
I only recently got around to participating in this challenge following the second rapid ideation session, but here is my response to the challenge given to us:
Step 1:
I found that when reading through my journal entries, I was able to find at least four examples of each of the five reflective domains. Granted I’ve done this much later than I was supposed to.
Step 2:
Dispositional domain: 5
Even though this was mentioned a lot, it was mainly due to motivation, general behaviour, and discipline. When it comes to time management and planning actions, it seems to be next to none.
Affective domain: 5
Aspects of how I dealt with or reacted to experiences, feelings and emotions was the main reason this was mentioned, although when it came to external factors that were affecting my ability, I have not been as transparent as I should. For the most part, I have been burying my head in the sand. I mentioned the fact that I was ill and that I work full-time in Week 7-8 Rapid Ideation 2, but other than that there is no mention of, or addressing of this, which in turn, most certainly correlates with my time management skills.
Interpersonal domain: 4
Even though we have only had the chance to pair up the once, I believe this also relates to how you engage with forums. Peers’ comments describing their decisions influenced my own. In addition to this, I wrote about my rapid ideation collaboration comprehensively for weeks 7-8.
Cognitive domain: 5
Even though, I have gone overboard with the number of words for some blog posts, it appears as if there is a lack of actual research (books or tutorials) that have impacted my learning trajectory, and for the most part it looks as if it is primarily course content and playful learning. This being said, I have researched employers needs and wants for the roles of which I have been applying for and this has influenced the path of which I am heading.
Procedural domain: 4
As I come from a filmmaking background and do not possess as much experience as the next person when it comes to game development, I have mentioned this domain several times as I have consistently transferred skills so that I can use them in the games industry. It is no surprise that with me being new to this environment, there are ample “failures” that have been emphasised to prove that I am learning.
Step 3:
1) Specific – Time management review
Measurable – Mention time management throughout blog posts after this module on a weekly basis. Schedule to-do list into calendar weekly.
Achievable – Be more transparent about external factors; work around and/ or address them.
Relevant - This will keep me on top of things in future and help with not falling behind on coursework. This will also be essential for my mental wellbeing.
Time-bound – Review how this has affected my time management skills after three months.
2) Specific – Regular research and practice for the betterment of skills
Measurable – Document research/ practice in journal on a weekly basis.
Achievable - Read for one hour at least twice a week and focus on what is relevant to my professional development and career aspirations. Practice tutorials at least once per week.
Relevant – This will ensure that I have a substantial number of sources to refer to when making decisions in future and will enhance my game development practice and knowledge.
Time-bound – Trial for the first three months and see if changes need to be made.