Project Description
As a part of Banned Books Week, we each researched and chose a book that has been challenged or banned at some point in history. For a few weeks we read our books and analyzed them through a series of journals with different prompts and responses that pushed our thinking. After reading the books we came together to talk about the books that we had read with our classmates in a pseudo-book club style as well as bringing foods that symbolized the book. Finally we created videos detailing why the book was banned or challenged and our experience with the book including an optional passage reading from the book as a final analysis.
Reflection
This project wasn't very challenging for me in all honesty. I thoroughly enjoyed reading and analyzing the books that I read, and I got an opportunity to read some classics that I had yet to read so that was very fun to dissect. If I had to say one challenging part about this project it would be keeping up with the journal entries; I completed all of them but sometimes I had to do them last minute because I hadn't read the proper quota in the time allotted. The easiest part of the project was reading the actual book; I got into the stories that I read and thoroughly enjoyed trying to understand all of the hidden symbolism in the book. I understood why the books might have been banned or challenged for the language and references they use but that makes it all the more engaging because one must look past any controversial language in the story and really understand and find the true meaning of the story and the artistry with which it is crafted.
I felt very at ease filming the video for my book. I had to redo it many times and edit it but I came at it with a well written script and help from my family to film it. I think it turned out pretty well and I said all that I needed to say about the book in a clear and concise way. During the journals I received some feedback from my peers on my entries. These pushed my thinking because they were outsiders to the book for the most part and so they went off of what I told them in the brief summary and my analysis on the entry, therefore bringing new views and thoughts to the discussion. In those same feedback sessions I really enjoyed reading and learning about others books; I tried to give questions that invoked thought and comments that furthered their thinking with a bit of analysis from what I had learned so far. For me, those journal workshops were like reading the shortened book because I got key points in the book as well as some analysis to start my thinking off. I most certainly read the book that I chose because coming into the project I was very excited to read these books that I hadn't read before and not only analyze them to understand how and why they were banned, but also for the sake of analyzing the book as one of the more popular books in classic literature.
In terms of grading for this project I would say around an A because I completed all of the journal entries with as much thought provoking analysis as I could think of and I participated in adding to others book analysis with my questions and comments, lastly, I completed the video reflection for the book and overall was driven to do this project because of its literate meaning. If I could change one thing I would probably say more share outs of books in a discussion form throughout the project because it was fun to hear other people talk about their books very enthusiastically. Overall a very fun project taking a look at some amazing books.
In terms of grading for this project I would say around an A because I completed all of the journal entries with as much thought provoking analysis as I could think of and I participated in adding to others book analysis with my questions and comments, lastly, I completed the video reflection for the book and overall was driven to do this project because of its literate meaning. If I could change one thing I would probably say more share outs of books in a discussion form throughout the project because it was fun to hear other people talk about their books very enthusiastically. Overall a very fun project taking a look at some amazing books.