SMILE!

It's yearbook time. Above are the two pages of candid photos that my class put together. I did not want the same ol' boring page of random quadralateral photos put together. I understand that the memories are fun, but I'm just not that boring to put together just another collection of photos without leaving my signature or at least arranging them in a little more interesting manner. I chose to do a physical cut-n-paste. We also did a very rough job to make it look like a scapbook page that someone might actually put together. The concept was to represent the places and subjects we've studied over the year. Represented are Africa, the Antarctic, art masterpieces, penguins, Chasing Vermeer, and Grease. (We only watched it once, but I think it had more of am impact on my students than many of our formal studies.)

Putting this page together was very stressful. I thought that I was basically finished with it on Friday afternoon. I thought I would need to do a couple of edits on Saturday morning, and that would be it. I arrived at school at 11:00am on Saturday, and I did not leave until 7:00pm. It was more than I'd bargained for.

In the end, I went for the image that I'd completed three hours earlier. I kept making changes and trying new ideas because I allowed someone else to influence my direction. Why do I do that? Why can't I just make up my mind, be comfortable with and confident in my own decisions? I think I'll never learn. My orginal idea ended up being the best. Well, after hour upon hour or edits, I finally accepted that. At least I knew for sure what was best.

I hope it looks good in the final print.

(Pay no attention to the possible copyright violations.)