Reflection

When you asked us whether or not you should give this assignment to next year’s class and everyone immediately replied with a resounding yes, I noticed that you seemed to think it all a matter of revenge. However, I do not think I am alone in feeling that this project was fun and challenging. It forced us to work closely with a fairly large group on something most of us are unfamiliar with or not very good at. The strengths and weaknesses of each team member became obvious even though the time we had was fairly short. I found out that I really enjoy the company of some of my group members that were only acquaintances before. Our late, night-before song revision at my house was really fun, and amazingly enough, productive as well.

Though normally I do not like performing in front of a group, and I must admit I was extremely nervous before and during the performance, I was actually looking forward to it. I felt that the time we spent on this project paid off and our song was something I could be proud of. The fact that all the other presentations were also well done and amusing only made this a better experience. I learned that when it really comes down to it, anyone can defy their normal tendencies. When you gave us this assignment, I felt that reading the ten books would be infinitely better than singing and dancing. I can not understand why you would think reading and analyzing on your own would be boring. Personally, I feel that is the best way to deal with books. Add to it some class discussion afterwards and the situation would be perfect. Nevertheless, I gave all that I had to this assignment. Of course, that meant choosing the summary and analysis for myself and letting someone else do the hard parts. That is, until we found out how incredibly lacking our product was when we saw the first three groups perform. That night, I called a meeting at my house. In two hours (possibly a little more), we chose a new song, completely rewrote the lyrics, this time with three of us putting our heads together, and sure enough three heads are better than one. I was satisfied with the song and after figuring out all the choreography to go with it, I was entirely satisfied with out end product.

I thought our performance was a success. It was far from perfect, but it was a good job for us. Everyone worked hard and did her best. It is always immensely satisfying when one person does not have to pull the entire group along. This time, there were several of us that took the initiative and really got everyone cracking. I really enjoy the Odyssey, especially this time around because I have never read it in the poetry form before. It is shortened so I feel a bit cheated in its lack of detail, but the wonderful story is still there. I really like that we have to analyze each portion we go through because there are a lot of new things, especially about Odysseus as a hero, that I find very interesting and I did not notice before. This project eerily reminds me of the music video that junior AP English students have to do at the end of the year, but I would be more than happy to do something like this again. More time would definitely be helpful given that all the students are involved in extracurricular activities and have great difficulty arranging a time to get together. All in all, this was a very rewarding experience and I would definitely encourage you to give this project again next year and not because I want revenge on next year’s students.