Looking back, I most enjoyed reading Cupid and Psyche and the Ancient Egypt units. Both were full of intrigue and deities. Cupid and Psyche was pretty easy to read, which made the storyline easy to follow and that much more interesting. The Ancient Egypt unit was considerably harder to read, as that style of English is no longer widely used, but once I got used to it, I didn’t have too terrible of a time.
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| "Psyche entering Cupid's Garden" by John William Waterhouse. Source: wikiart.org |
The thing that slowed me down the most was going to look up the gods and goddesses and even some of the places they mention. I just really wanted to have the full context of the story, but sometimes that took a lot more work than I thought it would. I think maybe a reference page with a short summary of each god/goddess/location (perhaps with a map!) would help students make sense of the stories over the course of time.
Looking back over the reading diaries definitely helps me recall the readings that I focused on, but it definitely washes out the others that I didn’t write about. Often, I used the ones I mentioned in my Storytelling assignment, so that helped reinforce that as well.
Lillian- I agree with you that some of the stories could use a better introduction. I have even thought an appendix could come in handy, with definition and other helpful information. There were a lot of words in some of the readings that I was not sure of the meaning. Most of the time I could figure it out by the context but sometimes that was not the case. There are a few units that have great introduction though, and those have been very helpful. Hopefully you’ll find some of these for your future reading units :)
ReplyDeleteI understand how the language of that section can be difficult at first. I've read a couple myself that I've had difficulty following and one that (because of the difficult language) I had to stop reading and choose a new section. The story of Cupid and Psyche sounds very interesting! I liked that you said your reading diaries helped reinforce your storybooks. I think that repetition will allow for better learning on those topics.
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