Reflections: Looking Back

Out of all the stories I have written for the class so far, I still think my favorite is the story from Week 1, Keebler's Journey Into the Wild.  I wrote the story before school started so I had a lot of time to being as creative as possible.  I think the combination of a map story and continuing a Dungeons and Dragons game gave me powerful constraints that let me write a really good story.  I also am very proud of Aarabhi and Angga.  I was able to adapt the original story into a story about ants.  When I first started this semester, I expected to write more stories like this, where I invented my own characters to retell the story.  But as the semester has gone on, my stories seem to get closer to the originals.  I think this is probably due to an increase in the amount of work I have, so I have spent less time and creativity on the stories.  I tried to be slightly more original with my Week 7 Star Wars-inspired story, but I think it lacks a lot.

For some reason, the most interesting part of the readings so far has been the genealogies.  I really enjoy looking at how the characters are related and how they interact with one another.  There are so many stories in the epics that relationships tend to get complex fairly quickly.  I've found that drawing a diagram showing relationships helps me understand the stories better.

I love the format of the class being entirely online.  In some of my other classes, I've found that I have trouble paying attention during class.  Then, when I need a piece of information, I have trouble finding it because I can't go back and reference the lectures.  I am also taking another online class, and while it is better than a normal class, there are a few things that get on my nerves.  The Indian Epics class is extremely well organized, and since there are a lot of redundancies in the assignments, it is very easy to find he information I need.  My other class has information scattered about, so it is more difficult to find what I want.  One of my favorite things about this class is the grading system.  So far, I have not missed a single normal assignment, and I feel much more motivated to work on Epics of India than my other classes.  The participatory system removes almost all of the stress, and I probably learn more than I do in my other classes.

I do almost all of my homework at my apartment, and I have no set schedule.  I've tried to get a week ahead on my work, but so far I have been unsuccessful.  When I work hard to get ahead, I tend to neglect my other schoolwork.  I then spend the next few days trying to catch up in my other classes and I end up nowhere.  It is extremely frustrating, and I wish I could just be ahead on everything and work stress-free.  Unfortunately, I feel like there is always something I should be doing for school, which makes my school-life balance tricky.

This class has improved my writing by forcing me to write constantly, but I still enjoy the process.  Retelling stories in my own words is actually interesting, unlike most academic writing.  I also now use bookmarks, which has made my Internet experience much better.

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