Introduction
For our Documentary Project, we profiled an intriguing person by gathering primary sources through interviews, and secondary researches in the form of articles. Our goal was to explain their significance and importance to the world today. Our final project in English was an article about our profile subject, which we then placed in our books which were created in Design.
After discussing potential subjects with my parents, I chose to do my project on Monte Fisher. He’s the executive director of the Achungo Children’s Center, an organization that helps to educate children in Kenya. I wanted an end product that brought to light the living conditions and lack of proper education in Kenya which, in turn, explains the significant of Fisher’s today.
English
This English project was certainly a unique experience, since I’d never interviewed someone about who they are and what they do, let alone write about them in a subject-profiling manner. After a lot of feedback from the teacher, I was able to polish a final draft that met my goals and I was proud of. I thought I did a good job of portraying Fisher as a person and explaining why he’s important to the world today.
Click the image below to read my final article, “An Ally for Kenya”!
Design
During the time that we were writing our articles in English, we were simultaneously creating our books page by page in Design class. Once the final draft from English was complete, we copy and pasted it into the shell of our books.
It was great to see them come to life as they were filled with our text. However, a lot of adjusting had to be done since it was hard to place all of the images and other book elements prior to finishing our English article without knowing exactly how long they would be. While we had a hard deadline since we had to send them off to print, this project was slightly stressful. But once I finally pressed submit, it felt extremely good and rewarding.
Click the cover below for a digital copy of my final book!
Reflection
Looking back on this project, it’s really amazing how many different things I was able to learn and experience. I became pretty proficient in InDesign, the program that we used to create our book in our Design class. I also went through the process of sending our books off to be printed, allowing me to hold a physical copy in my hands. I think that’s a very unique thing to do. Overall, I’m extremely satisfied with how both my article and book came out.