Week 8 Reading and Writing

Reflection

As week 8 offers an opportunity for reflection, I look at my work as a glass half full. While this week allows me to look up, I notice just how much work we have done for this class. I am proud of meeting all deadlines, creating two web pages to display my work and growing in my ability to retell and recreate stories.

At first, I truly thought that this class would be too big of a burden for me, however, as I went into week 4 I found myself in a routine of completing all my work. My reading notes used to take me two hours each story, but as I got into week 5 I was able to zone in on information I felt was relevant. I did not even gear my focus towards only relevant information, but rather writing trends that stories followed and how to use dialogue and narration effectively.

Overall, I like both my blogs and my portfolios layout. They both follow different formats but keeps all each post clean thus making both web pages easy to operate. I have enjoyed looking at other student's blogs and portfolios/ storybooks as they have already inspired small changes that I made previously in the semester.

An aspect of the class that I enjoy is the StoryLabs. Honestly, I was quite bummed the first week a StoryLab was assigned because I was excited to retell a story that I had just read, but when I explored the StoryLab options I found it relieving. I was able to gain much-needed advice on how to properly write a story and included multiple articles I found interesting in my week 6 post.  The picture below was the image I included in my first story lab that covered tips on how to tell a story. I found the illustrations on the books surface to be a strong representation of the goal of storytelling.

Week 6 StoryLab: Telling A Story

I look forward to becoming even more fluid in my storytelling as the course goes on. I think that the portfolio revision process will prove to be an invaluable experience in expanding my self-awareness in writing. So far I have been able to pick out a specific area that I must work on, so I look forward to it all coming full circle at the end of the semester. Also, I look forward to exploring the cultures of the different readings that we are presented with. I have found the readings to be fun as they offer a glimpse into the origin of many other tales, so I cannot wait to see what else I stumble upon as the readings go on.