What's your story?

Happy May!


Can you believe it?  By the end of this month your life will (probably) be very different than it is now, in many ways.  You'll wake up on June 1st and wonder where it all went.
That's exactly why we're taking the time to pause and think, before it's all over, before the final steps on this path are taken and the first steps on the next one begin.  Of course there's no true moment of that - many of you have been making that transition for a long time now, others of you still have no idea what that even means for you.  So take a moment to examine what you have and what you are thinking.


Today's goal is to do just that - Step 6: Determine which “personal experience” you will write about. As I noted in my commentary on the handout:

• Many of you already have a sense of the personal story you will be using for this essay, but you should spend some time thinking about which elements of it you will use.  Think about the sub-questions you have created, and how your comments about your own experience will “engage in dialogue” with your analysis of the literary text and philosophical essay.

Remember the goal of section one is to take stock of where you are at the outset of this project - what do you think about your question? What led you to it? What experiences of yours or others shaped your understanding of it? What other questions come to mind as you think about it? What are you unsure of, or want to know more about?

This section can be messy - tell stories, ask questions, explore possibilities, show uncertainty, be emotional, share your beliefs, discuss examples, and more. All of it adds up to a sense of where you are at the start of your journey - you're not proving a thesis here - you're stepping back and giving your reader a clear picture of you and your thinking to bring them into your project.

While this is not necessarily a public document, parts of it might appear in the dialogue you'll be having about your topic on Thursday.


And if you've actually read this far, here's a link to a great mix of new music from Gorilla vs. Bear, one of my favorite music web sites: April Mix