Flat World Project Reflection Questions

1. What did you like best about the project and why?

I would have to say I liked getting feedback from others the most because it allowed me to see what other people want in a story and all the mistakes that I couldn't see myself. All the different kinds of feedback I got helped me write a story that I could be proud of.

2. What did you like least and why?

I wasn't so fond of the times when I had to read a story that was blatantly plagiarized or that obviously had no thought of creativity (or effort for that matter) put into it. Reading those are a real drag at times.

3. What was something surprising that you learned about the other students (from other schools)?

I learned that different students from different areas of the world all tend to value different things, for example reading the stories from Korea really showed me how much the Koreans value family and education in their everyday lives.

4. How do you think the project affected your writing?

The project changed the way I write for the better. I can write overall better sentences that are more interesting to read and I now better know what readers like in a story.

5. Describe the most challenging aspect of the project.

The most challenging aspect of the story was by far coming up with a good story to begin with as your first draft.

6. Offer some advice to future participants.

Make sure you are interested and enjoy your own story and like to read it. This ensures that when you go to make revisions you are actually trying to make the story better and have a motivated form of thinking rather than just trying to finish your English homework. Plus it makes it a more fun experience in general, especially when you see how others respond to your story.

7. Other comments.

The project was an overall good experience and helps you get a worldwide opinion of your writing and how to better that writing. This should be implemented in all high school English classes. It also gives you a brief taste of what real life is like in the sense that there are time deadlines that need to be met not just for yourself but for others and how others depend on you.

2nd Character Analysis: Robin (The Hobgoblin)

In this segment of A Midsummer Night's Dream, Robin is seen throughout the scenes. He is manipulating much of what goes on from scene to scene with his love flower nectar, causing all sorts of trouble and making people fall in love with those they truly do not. He exhibits signs of sociopathic behavior in the sense that he plays tricks on people and plays with their lives in order to please himself and to do his master's(Oberon) bidding. With caulous disregard for the feelings and well-being of others he does as he is commanded and whatever catches his fancy. He is simply a trickster at heart gaining pleasure from others folly.

A Midsummer Night's Dream: Character Analysis on Theseus

Out of the many characters in A Midsummer Night's Dream, one of the first ones we are introduced to is Theseus. Theseus is a famous and heroic character in many other stories concerning Ancient Greece, however in this story you can't help but dislike Theseus sightly. As the duke of his town, he is the leader of the things that goes on, more importantly marriages. Hermia is a girl that loves a man named Lysander and he loves her back, but is promised by her father to another man named Demetrius who also "loves" her (she does not share the same feeling). Athenian law states that the daughter must obey the father and marry whoever the father wishes regardless of what she wants, or else she is allowed to be killed by the father. Theseus knows that Hermia doesn't wish to marry Demetrius and wants to marry Lysander, however Hermia's father has the law on his side and therefor has Theseus on his side. Even when Lysander tells Theseus about Demetrius' incredibly shameful abandonment of Helena (another girl he once "loved") for Hermia, Theseus simply dismissed it and ignores that fact and continues to support Demetrius and Hermia's father.
Theseus is a man of the law and therefor must follow the rules and cultural traditions. One such tradition is that women really have no say in what goes on in their lives. They are married off and treated somewhat like objects of men. Theseus simply disregards Hermia's wishes and supports the father fully because the law states that the father has final say and even the right to kill the daughter if she disobeys. He offers Hermia a nun's life, the life of a single woman who is to be chast for her entire life as the only alternative to marrying who her father wants. Theseus seems too caught up in his own awaiting marriage and affairs to really hear out Hermia and Lysander's side of things and simply goes by the book enforcing the law to his full extent, in which case is not such a good thing.