My Twenty-Percent Project: A Brainstorm

Have you ever heard of a "Twenty-Percent Project"? 

(and no, it's not a class assessment that's worth 20% of your grade :) 

I hadn't before this semester started. The idea behind our 20% project is based off of what Google does with and for their employees. Basically you allow people to dedicate 20% of their time to work on personal projects of their choosing, with the hopes & premise that whatever they're working on will benefit the company in some way. Along with that, if people are working on a project of their choosing that they're passionate about they will produce better work and be happier on the job. All sounds awesome to me! And logical and innovative!

Since our class is called Learning & Technology our job is to "learn something new using technology." I can do that :) The problem is limiting it down to something I am passionate about, want to learn, and feel like I can accomplish/produce a product by the end of the semester. Here are a couple of the ideas I'm tossing around for my project:

Image via http://www.collingsguitars.com/

Learning how to play the guitar
I know it's one of the examples that we were given in class, but it's something I've always want to do and haven't really had the time to dedicate to it. I LOVE the sound of an acoustic guitar and my husband even bought me a guitar a couple of years ago for Christmas. I started to teach myself how to play but gave up early on once the pressures at work because too much to keep up with. I'd love to try it again, this time around really focusing on it and actually remembering what fingers to use to make what chord :)


Become Google Apps for Education Qualified Individual

This goal seems more lofty and yet doable at the same time. To become a GAFE qualified individual you have to go through a six-part training course using online modules and then take a certification/qualification test. (Click here for more information). I could see this being challenging and yet really fun & exciting--I love Google Apps and can see a huge benefit to using them in the classroom! But I will openly admit that I am far from knowing enough to be at "qualified" status right not. One of my worries with this one though is not completing the modules or the test before the end of the semester, and being able to produce a "product" demonstrating my knowledge. Even so, I'm beginning to like this idea more and more.

Cooking & Baking
If you ask my family, I am the WORST cook hands down! Though recently I have been working on honing my skills and trying to create edible meals for my hubby and me. I've got a few new dishes down pat but I would love to have the time to research some new dishes, with processes I haven't tried before, and put them to the test. I think this would work better with baking since many of the cupcakes and desserts can be multi-day, multi-step processes that have been too scary and time consuming to try until now. Maybe even have a hand at making homemade ice creams and fro-yos? It all sounds delicious to me and something I would really enjoy doing. And the performance/product would obviously be bringing some goodies in to class for testing/tasting. :)


Ok, so what do you guys think? Any of these stand out as better than the others?  What would you do? Please feel free to comment below with any/all opinions and suggestions!