Observation Reflections

When I found out about the assignment, I thought it would be interesting since I had just assigned my freshmen to write an observation paper.  I had never actually done one, though.  Even so, I thought it would be an enlightening experience, and one that would go quickly since the time constraints were for two sets of 20 minutes each.  So I chose to type my observations on my laptop, as I can type faster (and more legibly) than I can write.  Plus it would save time in transferring my data to my writeup if it was already typed.

I found when I concentrated on my reactions during my observation I got a lot more out of it–if I would go back, I would do more on the reaction side than on the observation side.  My reactions, such as when I noticed that everyone seemed to know each other, led to learning more about the site.

I think I hindered myself by choosing a place I had been to before and had preconceived ideas about (Grounds for Thought).  This limited my observations, as I already knew how to describe the front window, the tables, the bookshelves.  Once I got to observing and reacting to the people, though, I began to notice new things.  It also was more exciting as people were constantly coming in and out of the place during the breakfast rush.

I realized that I respond more to the actions of people and find more interest in how people interact in spaces than the physical attributes of a space.  I seem to find more to observe, and definitely have more to react to when I’m observing people than when I’m observing spaces.  It gives me more help in how to observe a space, to think of it as dynamically as I consider people.

I think I observe a lot of details–but one place I got hung up was on language.  Sometimes it hindered me when I couldn’t think of the right noun to describe the thing.  (Is it a “book tree”?)  That held me up from doing more observation, when I had to think about how to express my visual observations in language.  Translation was sometimes difficult or awkward, at the least.  My notetaking skills are OK–better on the computer than on paper, as I mentioned before–although still I was observing more than I had time to write about, specifically when I was observing people.  I wished I had a videotape of it, so I could watch the scene over and over and find new things about it.

–ejfleitz