Epics of India

Image: That Sweet Summer Feeling by Rudy van der Veen via skitterphoto.com As far as progress towards my grade I'm a little behind where I'd like to be but not much. I will have to do some extra credit in the next couple weeks and over spring break to get caught up. My routine has been kind of all over the place because of time consuming group projects every week in other classes, but I'm hoping now that I've gotten into a better routine in those classes they won't interfere as much with my other work. I've used the extra credit reading option, but I'm planning to explore other extra credit possibilities in the next couple weeks. I've enjoyed working on my portfolio a lot. It's been nice getting helpful feedback on my writing and working on stories I'm proud of. For the rest of the semester I would really like to get better at doing the reading earlier in the week. Even though I like the readings, I don't read quickly and the reading ...

( cheezburger ) The overall quality of the feedback I've been receiving has been pretty good, but there are a few that are more helpful than others. Those comments are the ones that present a very specific observation. I like having a clear idea of what the commenter thinks can be improved. When I've given feedback I try to give specific suggestions since I've found comments like that the most helpful. Sometimes it is hard to find something really catches my eye like that to comment on and I revert to posting somewhat general comments about their writing.  The blog comments work better than I was expecting based on my experience with other classes discussion boards. I think this process works better because we see more of the work that other students are putting in and read more personal stories instead of very forced interactions about a limited topic. It has been fun to find some students who's blogs I look forward to reading each week. I think it w...

So far I've enjoyed the reading assignments, but I feel like it takes me much longer to finish them than necessary. I don't know why it takes me so much longer than an hour each for the reading assignments, but it makes it more difficult for me to stay on schedule. I've found that for the PDE versions of the epics listening to the audiobook helps me keep moving along while still understanding what I read, but there are still some sections that I need to read/listen to more than once to get what's going on. As for the notes, I've found the most helpful notes have been plot summaries because it gives me something to reference without looking at the source when I start my writing. After a plot summary I have been adding research on interesting cultural aspects from the story that I might want to work into my storytelling. I'm actually very happy with the state of my portfolio right now. I like the two stories included so far and that they are told in different ways...