Thursday, March 3, 2011

Blog Assignment 7

Randy Pausch
Randy Pausch talked about many different things, in the beginning he talked about how his dreams of being in the NFL when he was a kid shaped him into the person he is today. He said that he is most comfortable on the football field. He also talked about how when he went to Disney World as a kid, it motivated him to create rides and become an engineer. He worked on virtual reality and got an in to work for Disney with an Aladin "magic carpet" ride. He also stated that "brick walls are there for a reason to let us know how badly we want something."
The next section he talks about how to enable the childhood dreams of others. He went to Carnegie Mellon University and created a course called BVW with 50 students and get projects in teams.He spread his course to five different departments. He stated that the students did an amazing job, and displayed some of there work. He also told his favorite moment was his "roller-skating ninjas" who's project didn't work so they had to go to videotape.
He stepped down and said that the way to leave something great is to leave it to someone greater. Randy and his partner Don then created the Dream Fulfillment Factory. It was a two year masters degree program about technologists working in teams to create new things. All of their time was spent making projects in teams. He said the key to their success was making people work in groups using feedback from the students in the course.
Finally, he talked about Alice...his way to teach computer programming. Randy also said that teaching kids something hard while they are having fun is the best way possible. He also said the best "head fake" comes from learning from your students. He also states that you can't get far without the help of someone. Randy tells the audience to focus on other people instead of focusing on yourself. He then rolls out a birthday cake and calls his wife on stage to wish her a happy birthday. He concludes with telling everyone to find the best in people, and to keep waiting to find the good side in people. In the end he said the ultimate head fake isn't about achieving your dreams, it's about living your life.

3 comments:

  1. I liked when he talked about how the coach pushed him hard because he didn't want to give up on him. If we have a brick wall in front of us then we need to get through it or around it and that's what you do in life. Head fakes work and have used them in football during practices when teaching life's lessons. When you push your students through troubles in life then they will be better for it.

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  2. Hi Kayla! My name is Sheena Nettles! I really enjoyed reading your post. Randy Pausch said a lot of good things. I liked it when he talked about brick walls. I was in total agreement with him, when he said "a brick wall is there to let us know how badly that we want something." This is very true. A person has to run into a brick wall in order to see if what they really want is worth anything.

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  3. How he taught is as important as how he led his life!

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