Rachel's Blogs

    It is hard to believe that my first semester of college is halfway over. The past six weeks in my English Composition I class have been very eventful. So far we have read a novel, given group presentations on the novel, given individual grammar presentations, and written a memoir paper. Each aspect of the class has had its pros and cons.
    The novel we read was The Kite Runner written by Khaled Hosseini. The book was about a friendship between a rich Afghan boy and the son of his father’s servant. It took place in a time when Afghanistan was under attack, and was being destroyed. The novel was also about the power struggle between a father and his son, their love for each other, and the sacrifices they make. When I found out that we were going to read this book, I was very excited. I had heard nothing but great reviews, and after reading the novel, I completely agreed. I have never liked to read. However, this novel kept my attention, and once I started to read it I could not put it down. Every Friday we gave group presentations on each chapter of the book. I looked forward to these days. I enjoyed being able to talk about the book, discuss my feelings on it, and I liked hearing everyone’s opinions about it. It was also interesting to find how the author’s life paralleled with the book. During the group presentations I was able to ask questions about anything I did not understand. This was very helpful because, at times, I would get very confused, especially since throughout the book the author used a lot of Afghan language. I really liked everything about this book and the way it was presented in class.
    Each person in the class was assigned a chapter in our Quick Access Grammar book. We had to give a presentation in front of the class on our chapter. However, we were supposed to only focus on one part of the chapter. I felt that this was difficult and pointless. My chapter was very short and each part of it related to the other. This made it extremely hard to focus on a single point. These presentations were supposed to help us become better writers. But, how are we supposed to teach one another if we cannot do it correctly ourselves? I know that these presentations have not helped me nor have they made me a better writer. If they did help I would of received a perfect score on my memoir. Also, some students were more prepared than others, and yet everyone has been given the same grade. We were supposed to dress professionally. Most people did; however, some people wore jeans and received the same grade. A point was made to dress up, so I feel that those who violated this should have been penalized. It just does not seem fair to the rest of us. I think the only good thing about these presentations were that they gave us more practice with public speaking. I do not think that these presentations were worth doing, and I do not think they accomplished what they were supposed to.
    For the most part this English class has been a positive experience. I enjoyed being in a small class. It gave me the opportunity to meet a lot of new people. The Kite Runner was a very interesting novel, and I really enjoyed everything that we did with the book. I look forward to going to the reading and lecture by the author. I am excited to hear what he has to say about his book. I felt like the grammar presentations were a slight waste of time. If the same topics were presented by the teacher or in a different way, maybe they would have more of an impact. But, as for the students presenting each topic, it just does not seem to work well.

posted by: rachie1147 at 10/07/05 18:42 | link | comments (1) |

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