The Process |
The Poem |
I started off my project watching both versions of "A Miracle Worker," and taking detailed notes. This helped me to see how deaf children act, learn, and function. This gave me prior knowledge for my two shadows. I was fortunate enough to shadow an elementary class and middle/high school class in Dallastown that consisted of deaf and hard of hearing students. This was an amazing aspect of my project because I was able to be around deaf students and talk with them personally. I was able. to hear their experiences and opinions on being deaf. Surprisingly, most of those I talked to love it! I used my observations, the movies, and research to make a mind map, for English I wrote and signed a poem that related to the movies I ha watched, and for art I decided to put myself in the shoes of deaf students and make art that connected back with my English portion! Overall the process was pretty intense, but the results were outstanding!
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Mind Map
My mind map was big, intricate, and lots of fun! I used different colors to coordinate what went where, and to keep it interesting! I used a method called PIRATES to focus on a few core subjects. I used Education, Technology, Intellectual, and Social. I also added "The Movies" and "The Observations." This way I could connect everything I learned in the process with the research I had done. Creating the mind map helped me gain connecting skills. I had to really dig deep to make some of the connections, and this allowed me to see things that were under the surface layer of my project. My connections dealt with how using Sign Language defines deaf culture and what it does for it as a whole. This helped me to collect my thoughts and reflect on my project in the end. To the left is a picture of my completed mind map.
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The Art
For art, I connected my painting to my poem. My poem focuses on water, so I decided to paint water molecules to symbolize the intricate way of thinking that Helen Keller had. The bottom five are all the same, and they are all the very first one I painted, as a sample piece, with no disabilities. Each art piece represented a different disability. On the far left (top), I started with no communication. I was unable to talk to my teacher, my friends, etc. To make it a little more challenging, I also decided to not look at my sample piece (below). This eliminated any communication with myself. As you can see, the painting isn't far from the sample, but their are a few differences. The background is light, the molecules are placed slightly different, their is some size differences, and some of the shades are a little darker or lighter in certain spots. This was was not so difficult, more so amusing. Next comes the blind pieces. I had to do two of these because the first time I did not realize that I didn't properly hit record (perks of being blind folded...)! As you can see, the painting is very sloppy and there's honestly nothing really there. I stuck with black paint mostly, without trying, and it ended up being a blobbed mess because I went so quickly. The second time around I took it slower and you can see that there is a little more blue and even some red! There are also more distinct circles. You can also see that I almost got the molecule right in the bottom right corner. Next, I decided to do hearing. I put earplugs in and sat in a quite room. This one didn't turn out much different, and honestly I'm not sure why there is any difference at all. I was looking at the sample the entire time, yet you can see that there is more white in the top molecule, an that all around the colors are a little different. Lastly, I combined everything. I blind folded myself, put earplugs in, and didn't communicate with anyone. This one turned out a lot better than I imagined! I think this is because I had done it so many times already. You can see that the molecules are placed pretty similarly to the sample, but I only painted three instead of four. You can also see I used a little too much water while painting, which diluted the color. I also used black for the smaller parts instead of dark blue, and for this I used a paint brush for the background instead of a sponge, which affected the look. I did this on purpose, though, to eliminate messes. Overall, each painting has some similarities to the sample, but also have a lot of differences. This was one of my favorite parts of my project!