The utopia task has created several interconnections between various subjects. Project utopia was first introduced in English with the concept of a utopia, presented through The Giver, by Lois Lowry. The key takeaway from the book was that utopias are not easy to achieve, and there are many different factors that account to this. The book was able to give us a good knowledge of what a utopia is what is should be like.
A good way we could measure what our utopias should be like is using the liveability factors, of which I learnt about in HASS. I particularly focused on community wellbeing. This gave me a clear vision of what I want my utopia to be like. Liveability aided me in thinking about how I could improve the experience of my citizens. Environmental quality also made a connection with Science.
Part of environmental quality includes sustainability. Sustainability highlighted ways for me to enhance the quality of my utopia for the future generations. Renewable energies created opportunities for me to ponder about how I could create a suitable energy source for my utopia. I made a list of criteria that the said energy source had to fit, like what its CO2 emissions were like, or what the costs were to build it.
Throughout this rabbit hole of utopias, InnovatED emphasised on being a ‘good collaborator’. This was because soon the vision I had for my utopia would become a shared one. I joined a group of 3, and we started to think about how we could combine our notions. At first, it was difficult to combine ideas, because my group mates and I were just rooting for our own ideas, without considering other potentially better ideas than our own.
My solution to this problem was the core capabilities, especially being collaborative and inquisitive. They encouraged me to inquire, ‘why this?’, ‘or what does this do?’ From this, I also learnt to comprise my ideas, for the benefit my teammates, and vice versa. This skill will certainly be able to aid in future collaborative projects and endeavours, and wasn’t that last skill I would learn.
Now that I had worked well with my teammates in establishing a collective plan, building had commenced. We chose to make a physical modal Using my newfound collaboration abilities, I was able to work out with my group who would get what materials and we set a deadline for when we would approximately be finished. A main building feature we agreed to use was laser cut wood, of which we would design on a computer program. Challenges and problems soon came tumbling down like a giant snowball. Frustrations came from the laser cutter because some buildings we made were incorrect sizes, and we were soon running out of time.
The final product of our utopia. We made very different buildings to put onto using various materials.
A way for us to acknowledge and prove what we’ve accomplished were the UN Global Goals. They were a series of sustainable development goals that we wanted to achieve. Prior to choosing what goals we would like to be acknowledge, or accredited for, we order our goals of most important to least. From that, the most important goals to us were the ones we wanted to be accredited for. We then pitched our idea to a facilitator, and was able to earn a badge for the respective goal.
Through these issues, I learnt a new skill from the core capabilities, resilience. When things weren’t working the way I had planned. Instead, I ‘bounced back’ and took a new perspective of the dilemma, and what was going wrong. This was essential when I came to problem solving, which was another capability. With every problem that came my way, I was able to solve it calmly and efficiently.
Another task presented itself to us. We had to represent the civics and citizenship through the making of a constitution. This was by far one of the most difficult tasks to do, since we had to learn new concepts about how constitutions are made and what they do. However, this helped us put our utopia together, as we were getting different parts of what make up a society.
This would not be a project without be able to present it to someone. There are multiple skills that I needed to learn when doing a presentation. Something that helped me achieve this were the special guests who I was able to practice my communication skills on. A big part of this was learning how to use my models to help communicate ideas to my audience. The presentation day was nearing, and we had to make sure everything was finished by then.
Another problem had aroused. My group didn’t have enough lessons to finish the utopia. I had to compromise and schedule time for me to work on it with my peers, since it was important that we finish this project by the deadline. This event taught me to commit to projects, and that sometimes I might have to do some work at home.
The utopia presentation day was finally here, and all the work we have done over the past terms has been transformed into our utopia, made up by wooden structures. We put our constitution on one side, and my sustainable house on the other. This helped us when we presented because we were able to point out what we meant by our constitution and link our previous projects, such as the sustainable house, and tell our audience how it impacted our final product. I found the presentation day quite repetitive because we were saying the same things, just to different people.
Overall, I enjoyed the utopia project, and it shocked me that it was possible to connect so many different subjects. I had many learning moments, and took many different skills and abilities that I will be able to use in future projects like this.