Day 6

Today was actually a relatively normal session. Our productivity was about the same as last week, if not a little better. My greatest strength today were some of the questions that I brought to the table; I could tell that they were good because each one sparked an interesting conversation. Sometimes, these conversations would even erupt into passionate debates. One of the questions that did so, was did Papa know he was going to die last year? Is that why he left money with Sissy so far in advance for Francie's graduation flowers? As I was reading this passage it confused me when it said that Papa had left $2 for roses last year, yet Francie's graduation wasn't until this year. Our group discussion on this question quickly turned into a heated debate. John argued that Johnny was afraid that he'd be too drunk to remember to buy flowers for Francie's graduation, so he gave money to Sissy in advance just incase. I argued that he was predicting his own death and making future arrangements for his children. We ended up going with John's side, because he had textual evidence to back it up, plus Miss Hart agreed with him.

My greatest weakness was  probably the fact that I tended to drift off topic from time to time and carry the whole group with me. We would always get back on topic once we realized how far off we were, but a future goal would be to be a little bit more focussed. A few risks I took involved trying to get the group back on task; it was difficult for all of us, but i managed to bring them back to the main topic a few times. I answered 2 of Christina's questions and I offered my insight on Alison's quote. Christina agreed with my opinion on Alison's quote.

I believe that our group used used class time pretty productively today. Yes, we have some room for improvement, but I believe that we'll get there by next week. our focussing problem has been improving ever since that one week when Miss Hart was absent. We made some good progress today, and overall this session wasn't half bad. 

Day 5

Today, I believe that we were far more productive as a group. As an indivivdual I also did much better than our last session. I contributed more ideas and started some really interesting conversations. I helped out our other group member by answering 2 of christina's questions and offering my insight on both Alison and John's quotes. We got into a trend from a session a few weeks back where we would relate situations from the book to situations that are in our lives. We would search through the book for textual evidence to prove our points.
One example of this particularly was when we talked about how back then, parents didn't really talk to their kids about sex. We were trying to decide over whether it was because they didn't know the correct terms, or they just didn't want to tell their kids. As the discussion intensified, we went to the book to try to find evidence for each of our sides. After proving the point that it was indeed because the parents didn't know the correct words to explain to their kids, we related this to our lives. We talked about how once we grew up being educated on sex since four grade. Just another example of how our two worlds are so different.
I asked how one would be able to maintain a horse in New York City. Christina answered that New York City was a different place back then. It may not have been as densely populated, and horses may have been more or "the norm" where as these days, the only time you'll see a horse in New York City is when it's pulling a carraige for people's mere entertainment. This was also another example of how we related this to the real world. I believe that our group used class time very well, and definately better than last week. We were focused and we all were motivated to get some work done. Everyone has a posotive mindset and it worked out for us in the end; we had a great day!

Day 4

I don't believe that today was one of my strongger days as a discussion member, or one of our more productive days as a group. It could've been that Miss Hart wasn't there, or that we might not have managed our time well; regardless, I think that we couldv'e gotten more work done than we did. I answered one of John's questions and one of Christina's. My questions were pretty good, and the one that seemed to spark interest in our group was why did Francie want to travel 48 blocks to school every single day? Alison answered this that Francie loved education, and we tried to find quotes in the book to support this point of view, one of the quotes we found actually happened to be the one that I chose to analyze. That was the beginning of our quote sharing, which though it began a tad late still was a deep discussion.

There were a few more times that our group stalled today opposed to past weeks, however we did our best to get through them. I found that we were a little more off topic than usual, but we learned to keep it under control as the discussion progressed so that we could get some work done. I definitely may not have taken as many risks today, but I offered my insight at many points throughout the discussion. Overall, this was not one of our more productive days; we still accomplished some work, but we could have finished more if we had been a little bit more focussed. I think that in future discussions I should try taking more risks, such as possibly taking charge when we get a little off topic and redirecting our group in the right direction. Also, we might want to manage our time a little better; we used up the majority of our time for questions, so unfortunately we didn't have a chance to analyze everyone's quotes together. This week may not have been a superb session, but i wont dwell on the lack of productivity. I look forward to next week in hopes that our group can get back to its normal productive self. 

Day 3

Today I was the Scribe for our group. The main focus of our discussion was how things in society have developed into becoming more socially acceptable between the time of Francie's life, and nowadays. The question that sparked this deep discussion originated from Christina; while we were sharing questions she asked what had been in that pack of cigarettes that Sissy gave the children. After some tough debating, we decided that it would be best to ask Miss Hart. She explained to us that the content inside the box was in fact condoms. 

After figuring that out, we discussed how back then, condoms were promiscuous and frowned upon, yet now they are encouraged and marketed openly. We then started to brainstorm other ideas that had evolved over time into being socially acceptable. We concluded that over time, as people evolved into more intelligent beings, they learn to pick out the things that should be discriminated against, and let the rest go. For example, it's no use wasting your time and effort discriminating against condom users when you could be trying to stop drug use among teens. Mankind has grown wiser over the years. 

This conversation dug pretty deep. It involved relating real life situations to Francie's experiences throughout the book. Our group maintained a stimulating conversation throughout the period and awkward silences seldom fell upon our circle. We always had a positive, productive discussion taking place, thus the high productivity within our group. We did a great job managing our time and we just seem to get better and better each week. 

Day 2

I believe that today as a discussion member I brought a lot to the table. The only problem was that some of the material wasn't so well thought out, thus making it difficult to discuss. During my preparation for the literature circle next time I should probably consider quality over quantity, because what good is a ton of information if only some of it makes sense? I do think it was a good thing that I took some risks though. By putting my ideas out there, it opened me up to the discussion, and made the entire discussion more of a group effort. 

My group members did commend me on my quote though, which I considered better than the questions that I came up with. Our group didn't really have any awkward breaks in discussion, which I consider a great thing because it means that our group has good chemistry, and that we can work well together and use each others information to collaborate ideas. This leads to a focused and productive group which I believe is very important. 

Most of the questions that I had involving the book were based on the time period in which the story takes place. I think that now it may still be a little bit foggy, but as I read on it'll start to make more sense as most novels tend to do. Today was yet another productive day and I look forward to the next literature circle.  

Day 1

I believe that on the first day, I substantially participated in both group discussion and group activities. After Alison and I went to retrieve the books for our group, I divided the chapters within the book into equal intervals so that we could effectively tackle the novel; the last interval happens to be a little bit shorter because the book's chapters weren't evenly divisible. I don't see this as a bad thing though because this way, we'll be able to finish off the book quickly and have more time to generate an overall opinion of the novel. 

Our group managed to get all of the technical aspects of the novel finished relatively fast, so we proceeded to read the forward. The forward gave me negative view of the novel that we haven't even read yet. Prior to reading the forward, I questioned my group members if they shared any of the same apprehensions. They all agreed that the forward to this book paints a negative picture of the novel before the reader even gets a chance to read it. It almost makes you not want to read the book. I thought about this strange style of writing for a while and then concluded that there may have been a point to all of the negativity. I think that we're going to have to read the whole novel before we can truly understand the meaning of the forward. 

I think that overall, our group made sufficient use of  our time by accomplishing to both set up a plan for the novel as well as read and analyze the forward. We're off to a good start, we just need to maintain productivity.