Monday, April 25, 2016

Reflection on project

     During the time working on my project about Pobby and Dingan, I learned a lot and really enjoyed working on it. I chose to write biographies because I think it's helpful to understand deeply about the novel. There were some questions which were not discuss in the class, such as the personalities of different characters, the motivation of one character's behavior, and the relationship between those characters. So I decided three characters to research for. At first, I thought it wouldn't be hard to finish a project, but when I began my work, I found that I had to spend a lot of time to read the book over and over again in order to find the clues.
     For the Ashmol's part, it was the longest essay which I spent more time on it. And it was the part that I talked about both Ashmol's deeper personalities and the main idea of the novel. Since the whole story was told in Ashmol's sight, there was abundant information for me to know more about Ashmol himself. His personalities appeared in the conversations and his mental activities, so it was usually harder to identify which part was more important that I could count it as a clue. At first I tried to focus on the more important chapters to find if there were any hints to show his features. After reading these parts over and over again, I found that they didn't help a lot. Since these parts were really helpful to reveal other characters' personalities but not really help explain Ashmol's, I had to search for the book once again. And then I realized that some chapters which were so-called no that important for the plot were more essential for me to dig deeper into Ashmol's world. There were some short chapters which seemed to be less important but actually helped a lot because they were simply composed of Ashmol's thoughts after an event happened. The longer chapters had to promote important events, so they seldom included what Ashmol's thought toward the events. So I then looked at these shorter chapters and started again. After I explored about Ashmol's characteristics, I realized it was easier to learn the main idea of the book. So I tried to discuss it a little bit in Ashmol's biography, but I didn't do very well. I thought there was a connection between the main character Ashmol and the main point of the novel, but I couldn't really connect them perfectly in Ashmol's biography.
     Kellyanne's biography was the one that I paired more attention on because I could know more about Pobby and Dingan, two invisible but important characters. Actually when I began to read the beginning of the novel, I was like Ashmol, considering Kellyanne as a "fruit loop". Kellyanne was like a autistic kid in the town and didn't know how to stay well with others; as a result, she created two imaginary friends in order to pretend that she was not lonely. When I finished reading the book for the first time, I felt really sorry for Kellyanne. Then I began thinking about Pobby and Dingan. I was confused the reason why Kellyanne created two imaginary friends with some different personalities and appearances. However, there was not much information about Pobby and Dingan in the whole story. The only clues I had were the descriptions and of their appearances and personalities. So I read them again and again. Then I realized that Pobby and Dingan existed for some reasons. So I explained the relationship among Pobby, Dingan and Kellyanne. And I thought it was a success. I was satisfied with Kellyanne's biography
     As for Rex's biography, it was kind of short because there weren't many plots talking about him and I couldn't find more about Rex himself. So I asked myself what I could work on this biography. It was hard to begin it because I failed to think about any ideas. I asked myself again: why Rex Williamson had an argument with his wife? Why there was a chapter talking about how life was when Annie was in England and had a great time with her ex-boyfriend? Then I realized that maybe that was the point I could explore about. If Annie was happy in the England and was not satisfied with life in Lightning Ridge, why she gave up her happy life in England and came to Australia with Rex? This was the point I could reveal because it explained how Rex's characteristics attracted Annie. Thus, I looked for some clues to help me understand this point and wrote them into the biography. I succeeded finishing it and was satisfied with my work.
     In a nutshell, I wasn't regret choosing to write biographies as my project. I learned what I didn't know in class.
     

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