Tim's Genius Hour

Here's my TED-style talk presenting the results of Genius Hour! I give a little intro to Erasure Poetry, and I tell you a little bit more about what went right/wrong with the project. I also toss an over-priced Educational Psychology textbook over my shoulder (gut reaction when I remembered how much it cost), so keep your eyes peeled for that gem! Thanks for following along on this journey. It's been a blast! Tim

This week's attempt at erasure poetry was remarkably more successful than previous attempts. I found an article that worked well, and spent a lot of time planning the process. I tried to think of ways that I could tie in a web tool that I explored today with this process, but nothing came to mind. The article I chose was called "Blending Past and Present at 33 Bowen". It was about the renovation of a restaurant that has seen Hamilton go through its ups and downs. After choosing the article and mapping out the words, I decided to up my creative game (thanks largely to the extra time from the snow-day) and make a collage from the featured photos in the article. The first step was tracing the word boxes so I could form a stencil. I did this by placing a lamp under a glass coffee table, like so: After tracing the stencils, I made the cuts! I borrowed an exacto knife and a craft cutting board from a friend for this portion. Once the stencils were cut, I lined ...

This week's poem went a little more smoothly than last week's. I set out with a clear goal and managed to capture it reasonably well. I chose the article titled "New Influx of GTA Homebuyers Eye City". My goal was to create an alternate title for the article that would paint a slightly starker, less-optimistic view of the trend.  I'm still trying to find a way to make a statement without it coming across as too preachy/judgmental, but you need to find excellent source material for that. So far I've simply bought a newspaper every week and tried to make a poem from one article. This coming week I'm going to work a little harder to find good source material. In the meantime, here's the finished product: "The Influx of New Wave Torontonians Putting a Further Squeeze on Hamilton's Lower Half."