The Edugame Project

Remember when I said that I was going to share my experiences on the earlier years in Pinteraktif? So, here we go:

Where were I? Oh, the Permata CSR project.

As I shared before, on my third month, I moved from LPM in ITB to Pinteraktif office in Batik Agung. Days gone for adapting with new place and colleagues. Until one day my boss phoned me and asked me to join a meeting with PermataBank for a newly briefed e-learning project.

Basically, they (CSR division of PermataBank--professionally, we call them SME which stands for Subject Matter Expert aka the client who holds all knowledge necessary for the e-learning) wanted to make an aid to help their employees in an annually social work. It was a mandatory activity and financial education for children was the current topic then. They already had books, laptops (for read e-books), board games, but they wanted something breakthrough. And apparently an educational digital game was the answer for it.

So, we developed the educational game (edugame for short) from the beginning. We were only given a book from BI (Bank Indonesia) for reference, the client trusted us to construct the whole gamifying thing. I wrote the script and others drew characters, backgrounds, buttons, then animated all together with sprinkles of jolly back sound. It was of course not a short-duration project because it involved a lot of follow-up meetings (means me went back and forth Bandung-Jakarta), revisions, refinements, not to mention the bugs which occurred several times when we (beta)tested it.

Long story short, the edugame was finally ready to be launched. Before all set, me and the team tested it first to local elementary school which was actually owned by my aunt. The aim was to examine kids' response and acceptance to the game.

We had teachers tested it too! (that's my aunt who wears floral hijab)

The game itself was a simple adventure first-person game designed for children aged 9-12. User's accompanied by a key character named Bintang and together they'll explore places and collect points. Each place delivers the financially important topics in a fun way; puzzles, coloring, matching, spot-the-differences.

All and all, what I like about this CSR PermataBank project is the public engagement. I really love seeing people get excited about something I made. I enjoy delivering something fun to public, educating them about something. You may think then I should be a teacher for good. But no, I don't like teaching.

When finally it was released officially by the director of PermataBank, I felt so proud because it was very much appreciated by all. It might not be as grand as national project or something that is politically important, but it's always be my (and of course, Pinteraktif's) significant milestone and portfolio. Oh, and it's featured also in our web, check this out. If you find some similar sentences between this post and that webpage, that's because I wrote the copy for the web. :))

Cheers!

The Ultimate Truth (Part 2)

One time, my friend and I had a chat about confidence. He said 'if he cannot convinces himself first, how can he convinces other?'. We talked about someone that night but I think that sentence is applied to all of us, me especially.

Last post was really an emotional one. Well, in my defense, aren't we all emotional? That's what humans do. The thing is, yes I feel depressed but life goes on. Allah wont test a person beyond his/her capabilities, right?

That motivational poster says it all. That is basically what I am doing right now.

Right, okay. Back to business.

This is a continuation of the truth about my job and how people perceive it and how I cope with it. It came to me that actually it is my family who really need a proper explanation about my job. Because I've been receiving most of doubts from them. My close friends are pretty understand with what I do right now and my not-so-close friends are probably just don't care. But since I can't talk overtly with my family, well yeah, I guess I'll write it down here. It's also for readers who have a slight attention on what I do (saha oge sih haha).

Question #1: "Kok (kerjaannya) gak nyambung sama kuliah?"

Alasan kenapa gw mengambil pekerjaan ini karena gw hobi menulis dan membuat cerita. Walaupun pusat utama seorang instructional designer (idealnya) tidak di bagaimana membangun cerita dan merangkai kata yang indah, tapi dalam prakteknya ranah inilah yang banyak gw pegang sampe tahun ketiga ini--sampai akhirnya selama setahun belakangan gw dibantu seorang copywriter.

Memang pekerjaan ini tidak secara langsung berhubungan dengan mikrobiologi. Tapi, yang gw lihat dan rasakan menjadi sarjana S1 Mikrobiologi lulusan ITB itu bukan hanya bawa bekal ilmunya aja, tapi juga cara berpikir logis yang ternyata nggak semua orang punya. Gw pikir apa yang gw punya ini orang lain juga punya. Ternyata nggak juga. Fokus, bertahan baca materi panjang dan mengolahnya lagi jadi sesuatu yang bisa dipahami, dan detail untuk kualitas ternyata jadi kekuatan gw di Pinteraktif. And I feel grateful for that. Tidak ada yang sia-sia dari kuliah 4 tahun di ITB.

Question #2: "Kok kerja di tempat seperti itu?"

Betul, "kantor" kami bukan gedung tinggi yang indah dengan kerlip lampu mahal. Kantor kami "hanya" berupa rumah kecil yang tidak berada dalam kondisi terbaiknya. I'm sure my dad is the most disappointed person with it because he built a spacious house for a nice living but his daughter works 8 hours a day in a small damp place.

Hal ini sebetulnya juga dirasakan oleh beberapa rekan, nggak cuma gw. Yang kami tahu adalah konsep rumah ini adalah keingininan CEO kami juga. Sengaja konsep rumah karena beliau pengen auranya nyaman dan ga terlalu formal. Fun fact: kebanyakan kantor-kantor "kreatif" di Bandung juga ternyata memiliki konsep yang sama loh. Dan apa yang Pinteraktif punya ini dalam beberapa aspek lebih established kalau dibandingin sama yang lain (dalam pandangan gw). Ini kemudian nyambung sama apa yang gw tulis di post yang sebelumnya tentang melihat sisi kehidupan yang lain. Kondisi ini gw anggap sebagai blessing aja karena nggak semua orang punya kesempatan yang sama. Bahwa jangan melihat rendah sesuatu hanya karena lo merasa lebih baik dari sesuatu itu.

Satu hal lagi, Pinteraktif itu perkembangannya lumayan pesat. Perkembangan dalam hal penambahan karyawan, perbaikan produk dan jasa, jumlah klien, dan bisnis lainnya yang mungkin board of directors yang tahu. Yang selalu gw inget dari Mas Hendi (CEO kami) adalah lini bisnis Pinteraktif ini akan menjadi booming dalam waktu 5 atau 10 tahun dari sekarang. Di jaman internet of things, pendidikan berbasis teknologi akan menjadi tren dan Pinteraktif menjadi salah satu pionir penyedia jasa tersebut. Kami memang belum mencuri spotlight dan belum diliput koran, tapi kami bergerak.

Question #3: "Memangnya susah ya dapet pekerjaan di perusahaan besar?"

Before judging me as a lazy piece of shit, I want you to know that I had applied to many many companies before I decided to take the job as an instructional designer. Details here. Susah dapet pekerjaan di perusahaan besar? Well, ya, tentu saja! Mangga cobain sendiri.

Walaupun gw mengakui sih kalau ada faktor emosional di balik "ketidaksuksesan" memasuki perusahaan besar. As you may know, gw terbelah dua antara kerja dan S2. Hal itu juga yang membuat gw tidak mengerahkan semua kemampuan yang sebetulnya mungkin kalau fokus sih harusnya bisa nembus gitu.

Sekali lagi, ini adalah salah satu blessing yang nggak semua orang dapet. Rejeki temen-temen mungkin di perusahaan besar, rejeki gw di perusahaan start up bikinan alumni ITB yang passionate sama educational technology. I'm not them, they're not me. Stop comparing.

Question #4: "Nggak lanjut sekolah (S2 di luar)?"

Here's a frank answer: yes, I want to study abroad because I want to f- show it off on my social media. Hahahaha *insert evil laugh here*.

Oke, serius. Ya, gw mau sekolah lagi. Ini bukan jawaban wawancara beasiswa sih ya, mind you, this is my personal thought. Pertama, because my dad wants me to. He explicitly said that I should go study abroad before I get married. I'm not the very best of daughter so this is my chance to make him proud of me. Kedua, kenapa pengen di luar karena gw melihat dan merasakan bahwa hidup di negeri orang itu akan luar biasa mengembangkan karakter. Terpapar beragam budaya, menjadi masyarakat global, dan menghadapi tantangan yang mungkin nggak ditemukan di Indonesia yang pada akhirnya membantu kita menemukan diri sendiri *cailah, ngemeng. Ketiga, despite the strength points that Pinteraktif has, it's not all shiny. It has flaws. Dan kondisi itu yang sangat mendorong sebetulnya untuk mendapatkan lingkungan yang lebih baik. Why academic? Why don't you just resign and find other company to work? Silakan lihat alasan pertama. Lol. No, no, I have reasons, of course. Let's not discuss it on this post.

Bonus question: "Ngapain sih di Bandung?"

Ini mungkin lebih ke kekhawatiran pribadi sih. Hanya karena temen-temen gw yang terlihat sukses itu banyak yang di luar Bandung dan gw teh sirik jujur aja lah, jadi ada pikiran bahwa yang kerja (kerja ya, bukan sekolah) di Bandung itu kaum marjinal. Nggak salah juga, karena toh banyak perusahaan besar dan bergengsi ada di luar Bandung, Jakarta dan sekitarnya terutama. Kita ini masih Jakarta-sentris, apa-apa pusatnya Jakarta, apa-apa yang keren itu kerja di Jakarta. Well, gaji juga pastinya lebih besar disana.

Tapi, lihatlah. Keberadaan gw di Bandung ini mungkin untuk menjadi rejeki untuk orang lain. Rejekinya para tukang parkir, rejekinya pedagang baju di Baltos, rejekinya penjual martabak dan kue balok, rejekinya Vika yang gw traktir sushi kemarin, haha. Gw gak mau lanjut nyebutin satu-satu sih karena bukan hal-hal besar juga. Tapi yang gw pahami betul adalah ada sesuatu di gw yang menjadi rejeki bagi orang lain selama gw di Bandung. Juga berada di Bandung ini artinya masih bisa bertemu setiap hari dengan orang tua. That's a privilege. Though it's not all summer days. But, once again, I thank Allah for all of these.

You think I'm making up these reasons just to comfort myself. I don't know. Maybe you're right. But if I can't have a grip hold on myself, who should I rely on? If I can't be confidence with myself, how can I convince other about me? It is tough. Being me is not easy. I'm 10000% sure being you ain't easy as well.

Phew, that was a long reading, wasn't it? There you go, you have my confession, my ultimate truth. Now, let's work to get what we want, people! Semangat!

Cheers!

Hormone Talking

I've been so quiet lately. I rarely talk, even with my family. In that case, I'm not the type of person who easily talk about everything with my family. I know what you are thinking, "family is everything, you should be close to them, emotionally". Well, apparently I don't. Kinda sad and feel different. Well, I've been a different pattern since I was born so I guess it lasts til today. Probably not succeeded (yet) like my two sisters. I'm a mess: a 26 years old girl who still live in her parents house, work in a "questionable place", no decent guy attached to her life (which is also questionable), and still struggling on to get her ass out to study abroad (um, yeah, this is questionable too).

Bitter, I know. I do feel lonely but sometimes I like it this way. I keep life updates, plans, and feels to myself. This is why I blog, honestly. I am talking to myself right now. For you who read it, thank you, you are very kind to reach this sentence.

I probably have to strengthen my faith. Talk to Allah. Pray properly. Because by remembering Him, one will find peace.. is that right? Is it the hormone talking? Yes, it is time of the month, by the way.

Thanks to science, I have a explanation why I am so silent. It's called an introvert (sarcasm). I've taken several psychology tests and the result were similar. The word 'introvert' occurred most of the time. I'd like to elaborate it on my own words, but I feel like I'm emotionally exhausted so if I proceed, it'll be a long babbling.

So, hopefully this helps:

'

Cheers?

The Ultimate Truth (Part 1)

Pertanyaan paling malesin selain "kapan nikah" adalah "kerja dimana". Karena bahkan setelah dijawab pun, pertanyaan masih berlanjut dengan "apa itu?", lengkap dengan kernyitan dahi.

Ya bukan salah mereka juga sih. Karena toh Pinteraktif bukan perusahaan besar kayak tempat teman-teman gw bekerja. The thing is I feel annoyed with that fact. Bahwa dengan itu, orang seperti berkesimpulan (walaupun ini mungkin hanya terjadi di kepala gw aja sih); "kok nggak nyambung sama kuliahnya?", "kok kerja di tempat seperti itu sih?", "memangnya susah ya dapet kerja di perusahaan besar?". Belum kalau yang tahu sejarah keluarga gw, pasti ada celetukan; "nggak mau lanjut sekolah?"

Just shut up. Sorry, I know you guys probably being nice but can we just appreciate what is and not pointing out what isn't? Don't you think I would aware of those questions from the first time I got this job? I mean, yes it is not directly related to my major. Who realized it in the first place? Well I don't know, let's see.. it was me, yay! (That's sarcasm, fyi).

Cukup kesel-keselnya. Itu yang gw rasakan sih selama ini. Tapi, tentu gw punya alasan juga kenapa sekarang masih di Pinteraktif. Bahkan, dalam beberapa minggu terakhir ini mulai bisa melihat hal-hal positif dan menghargai diri sendiri atas apa yang sudah dilakukan sampai tahun ketiga ini.

Apa sih Pinteraktif? Ngapain aja tuh inst-- ins-- insttrurrbussstnel designer?

(My job title is surely a tongue-twisted. It is considered so complex that I can use it for a password. It is instructional designer. We'll get there.)

Pertama, Pinteraktif itu adalah semacam educational technology company. EdTech, you can call it. Bisnis utamanya adalah di teknologi dan bagaimana teknologi (terkini, tentu saja) mengoptimasi proses pendidikan yang sudah ada. Bagaimana caranya? Support kami terletak di 3 bagian; software, hardware, dan konten.

Software kebanggaannya Pinteraktif adalah Pinteraktif Suite, sebuah LMS (Learning Management System) yang dibesarkan seperti anak sendiri (kok kayak iklan kecap). Itu tuh kayak software yang bikin manajemen pembelajaran jadi terintegrasi (nilai, ujian/konten online, bahan materi yang bisa didownload, kuis, jadwal, progress belajar, dsb).

Di hardware, Pinteraktif punya infrastruktur untuk mendukung proses belajar. Ada LED touchscreen yang nyambung sama Smart Podium. Bit tricky to explain this. Gampangnya kayak yang kalian lihat di acara Mario Teguh lah. But it's more than that (takut dijitak sama marketing :p).

Last but not least; konten. Ini adalah wilayah gw. Kami memproduksi konten-konten yang dibutuhin untuk belajar (mostly e-learning). Karena salah satu keyakinan kami adalah learning should be fun, jadi e-learning yang dibikin juga sebisa mungkin menarik. Tim konten menyulap materi yang penuh teks menjadi gambar, cerita, animasi, dan suara.

We have this video for a visual aid. Go check:

Nah, hal yang kedua, si instructional designer (ID) ini bertanggung jawab untuk (ambil napas):
menampung curhatan klien tentang urgensinya bikin e-learning,
menerima dan membaca bahan materi yang panjang (dan seringnya amburadul),
menyaring dan merapikannya sampai bisa dilihat seberapa banyak yang bisa dimasukkan dalam satu konten,
semedi merancang jalan cerita/alur penyampaian yang logis dan bentuk interaktivitasnya,
menyusun dokumen instructional design dan storyline,
mendiskusikannya dengan tim konten,
meeting follow up sama klien (dan mencatat keluh kesah klien; "yang ini kok gitu? saya maunya gini"),
kontrol kualitas skenario dan final content (bawel revisi).

Begitulah kira-kira.

Oke, terus?

Dengan beragamnya kerjaan gw sebagai ID dari hulu ke hilir produksi konten, gw jadi terlibat di beberapa titik krusial. Dan itu menjadikan posisi ini ID ini cukup signifikan di Pinteraktif sehingga kadang gw merasa menjadi ikan besar di kolam kecil. Ini bukan sombong, tapi toh ternyata ini mah memang pengalaman hidup. Lagipula, karena Pinteraktif ini kecil jadi sebesar-besarnya ikan, masih mirip-mirip juga ukurannya. Ibaratnya, kalau beberapa dari kami resign, ketimpangan pasti kerasa banget, karena kami sama-sama punya peran membesarkan Pinteraktif. Dulu, gw bukan mahasiswa cemerlang yang outstanding, so being a big fish in a small pond ini kaya takdir berkata "lu dulu gitu, sekarang cobain gini deh". Dan prinsip itu jadi membuka mata aja, bahwa ada juga loh lapisan kehidupan yang begini.

Gw juga jadi kenal sama orang-orang "kreatif" di Bandung. Pake tanda kutip karena bukan berarti kreatif secara seni tok, intinya sih orang-orang yang dulu pas kuliah sama sekali nggak kebayang bakal kenal. Dan ini membuat gw yang "oh ada yah yang kaya gini di Bandung". Seumur hidup nggak pernah jauh dari radius Bandung Utara dengan ritme sekolah-rumah jadi emang rada cupu :p. Bahwa kemudian gw jadi ikut-ikut acara "ke-Bandung-an" jadi bikin mikir kalau mungkin gw ada di sini sekarang adalah suatu kesempatan melakukan sesuatu untuk kota ini. Jadi bon cabe doang sih, tapi bon cabe di bawah denyut pemerintahan Kang Emil jadi bawa pengaruh beda.

Oke, ini harus segera dibagi dua (whaat, there's more?) sebelum jadi curcol berkepanjangan.

Poinnya adalah gw disini mencoba menjelaskan apa yang sebetulnya gw kerjakan selama ini. And it may not a perfect, "decent", shimmering-gold, spotlight-stealing job, but being not okay is okay, you know? Life is all about imperfection. Tugas manusia kemudian: pertama, bersyukur atas apa yang dimiliki; kedua, terus mencari cara agar apa yang dimiliki menjadi lebih baik dan lebih baik.

The creative director, instructional designer, and illustrator

Part 2 akan menggarisbawahi bagaimana gw (pada akhirnya) mengatasi segala pertanyaan-pertanyaan annoying itu. Bear with me. ;)

Cheers!

Family Goal

Hi!

You fellow 9gagers must have known a GIF that shown an over enthusiastic girl who breaks a glass plate (I don't know, is it a glass?) when she and her family are celebrating new year. I was surprised and I thought she was really that hyper active and the parents were really astonished of her daughter's act.

Turns out it's staged for their Vine video. Again, I found this from someone's shared link in Facebook (I didn't even care remember who shared this, lol). They called themselves Eh Bee Family, and they're all that comical and amusing. Check out their Vine compilation:

As you see, I think the mastermind of these acts is the father. I mean, just look at that face :)). Good thing that he got a wife and kids who are as humorous as he is. And I love how they are cooperated with each other. A wonderful funny family coming to my bucket list!

Cheerio!

Feed Your Brain

Cool shelf! Future husband, can we get one? Source from here

If you, by chance, find my Facebook page and see nothing but tagged photos, that's because I keep it that way since ages--guess I've stopped updating Facebook since 2012. But I'm not entirely inactive. I almost sign in Facebook every day. It's the media where I can observe some of my friends' life achievements which end up make me miserable about mine and not displaying any response to it. I like to be invisible, a judgemental silent reader. But, I think the foremost reason why I sign in to Facebook on a daily basis is because I can find some interesting links (news and updates) which my friends shared. Some are stupid, some are hilarious, but there are considerably number of enlightening information too.

From the links they shared I did an "exploration" and found the official homepage of the information bits. I simply wanted to know what kind of website that hosts this interesting topic. So I found I fucking love science (damn cool the name!) and Vox. Later on, I also found New Scientist and Futurity. These add my reading list after TED (both TED Talks and TedEd). Beside the websites surfing on my (office) desktop, I sometimes read articles in Flipboard science section on my tablet (I chose style, home, travel, film, and celebrity to appear in my homepage Flipboard, aside from science, though).

What I am going with this is that sometimes I read too much I can't write. Haha, that's just an excuse. No, I mean, it is important to keep myself, yourself, ourselves--to feed our brain as often as we feed our stomach. I don't know how to put it because now part of my brain is booing me because I may be wrong (considering some readers' response). But for me, personally, I do it to keep me sane. To keep my brain well-fed. To maintain to not stupid while I entertain myself. And I'm pretty much enjoy myself who love to seek some new knowledge, and science is a part of it.

Nerd? Good.

Weird? Brilliant.

Oh, and what I wanted to share with you is that just minutes ago, I found an article titled Scans Map The Brain As People Read Harry Potter.

Interesting fact number one is the technology can be used in the future to know what exactly the problem in one's brain with dyslexia, stroke, or learning trouble. Interesting fact number two is (wait this is what I implied, not stated in the article) reading is paramount. It activates a lot of brain cells to comprehend something we read, as I quote from the article: "Those findings suggest how words are integrated into memory--how the brain first visually perceives a word and then begins accessing the properties of the word and fitting it into the story context.".

Source

That is one of the reasons why this year I'm excited for "a book a month" project. So far it has been going pretty well. This is, like, the first year I actually read a book a month and that feels really good. I want my future children to be smart. Since intelligence is inherited from the mother, I'm responsible to not make myself stupid in order to produce clever offspring. Aaand, of course, their father should be intelligent too so he can teach and show them profound life values.

Ookay, that was a long rambling passage. 

Here's a point: I do realize that there are many kinds of intelligence. I'm maybe good at linguistic and existential, but very sloppy in logical and intra/interpersonal intelligence. I guess the best thing for us is to embrace and maximize it as long as we live. Those what I wrote about is simply my way to add and sharpen my existing knowledge of science. Go find yours. ;)

Cheers!