As of yesterday, our group did our presentation. But when this blog post was due, we were pretty much still editing and making our final script. Our final script was different from our final presentation because we had to make some final changes between the time the final script was due and the time the presentations were. For the most part we were behind on this project the whole time because we had trouble from the beginning as far as who was going to do what and who was responsible for what. We all were complaining about what other people weren’t doing and bragging about we were doing but in the end we all figured that we were all responsible for the way our final project turned out. Some people contributed more to the project than others but doing a lot of work and the work not being completely right or even helpful to the project just defeats the purpose of doing it. Some days we were focused and some days we weren’t. I am not going to blame anyone for the way the grade is probably going to be because it can’t change. I would have preferred different people in my group but the people we did get taught me a lesson. And that was not to try and envision the perfect group and dismiss the people I did get. Also I learned that the same problem I had with my current group could just as well have happened with those “perfect group members”. Our final presentation was a reading of the script we created.
The expectation of the group members heightened as the project deadline was coming closer and closer because of lateness our group already was facing. It was especially difficult to get things in at the last minute because this was the type of project where we couldn’t really move on unless we had the first assignments done. I found ourselves behind at the point where we were supposed to have the lines on Google docs and everyone wasn’t getting their lines up when they were due. This made it harder to move on to getting the first rough draft of the script done because we needed all the lines to do it. And since we didn’t really have the rough script, we couldn’t move on to getting the final script done when that deadline was coming up. And since the final script wasn’t how we wanted it to be when we needed it, we had a very hard time getting the presentation together.
The choices we made about editing the script were that we went through the book and found the description before every scene, which was an outline of the important things that were going on in that scene. We used that description to get all the plot points. We found out which scenes highlighted our scene and used the lines of the plot points and the lines about jealousy to create our script.

My group and I are just about finished our script. Myself and I think another of my team members have found lines from all the acts and scenes we were assigned. We have them up on the Google Docs, and the rest of my group is just about finished with their acts and scenes as well.

There have been no additional difficulties so far relating to my group and their ability to work together. Our situation has been pretty much a complete success. No one wastes time or gets off task. We talk about what needs to be discussed, then we get done what needs to be done. Everyone is working effectively and efficiently, so there are no problems with my group, as far as I can see.

When adding lines to the Google Docs, my group searches for the quotes that can show off our theme without actually saying it, as well as give hints to the storyline and move it forward. We try to get the juicy quotes that let you easily know what's going on at whatever point of the story the quote is from. For editing, we try to pick out what is unnecessary in the quotes/lines we find and try to get to the point without too much extra information. My group picks tha lines apart and then puts them back together in a way that can be more understandable to the audience and not bore them or leave them stumped.

Now, after finding my lines and looking at those that my partners found, I do understand some of the secret jealousy and character edvelopment to a greater degree. I realized that Brabantio was jealous of Othello almost from the start, seeing as how his daughter was tempted by a "Moor" and not a noble man of Venice. He thinks just about anyone else would be a better choice for Desdemona, but that doesn't seem likely. Also, I've seen how Othello's jealousy was sparked little by little over the course of the story. Throughout Acts 1-3, he gets little nudges down the path to jealousy, but in Acts 4 and 5, he really starts to get "heated" and reveal the jealousy that was created in him by Iago's plan. He goes off on Desdemona about her being a whore with Cassio and giving away his blessed handkerchief, and even questions Emilia's motives. His judgement starts to become clouded near the ending and when the story does come to a close, he ends up dead.

Kiara Thomas

June 02, 2008

Othello Blog #1

My team- Me, Cassy, Julian, Zach

Our theme-Jealousy

So far my team and I have come up with the theme that we are going to highlight in our “mini-play”. We split up the acts in such a way that each person has a certain amount of scenes to look through and find lines. After we found lines, we started putting them up on Google Docs and now all we have to do is rearrange the lines so that the order they are in follows a storyline that makes sense. We were able to get most of the lines done in class but we still have a ways to go in terms of putting them all in order to get the initial script done. We also determined that we were going to do a video for the final presentation.

The difficulties of working in a group as always is the dependency you are forced to have on other people. If your group works as a group and everyone has equal jobs, you have to depend on other people to get the work in on time especially when the work is not separate and it all has to eventually go together. For example, the part of the project where we have to put lines up on Google docs is hard to get past when everyone doesn’t put their stuff up. It makes it hard when the other people in the group need their work to move on. So far everyone in the group isn’t really working as expected so there is a lot of dead weight for others to pick up when other people don’t do what they’re supposed to do. I don’t think that part is fair.

The choices we make in editing the text are going to be to take out all the unnecessary lines about jealousy and keep the main points that really go along with the plot of the play. So we keep the stuff that highlights the theme but also adds crucial information about the text.

My understanding of the plot of the play is getting better since we were assigned the project. When we were reading the play, we only read each part once or twice and had discussions about it, but since now we are going back and taking everything apart this would be our third or fourth time reading everything so I got a better understanding of it since this is not the first time I am reading this. It seems like I am finding out things and getting a better understanding of things that I did not have the first, or even the second time around.

So far in my team we have given out jobs for everyone, who does what section in the book and who makes sure that everything is getting done, and who is in charge of making sure that our presentation of the benchmark is in order. We have also started to look at each others inspiration files so that we can get only the most important lines from each scene. After setting up the Google documents page there have been a few posts with what each team member wanted top put into the sections that they were assigned.
Working in a team has been nice because there would be too much work to get done if this was an individual project, it was also nice that we got to pick about half of the people who were in our group, that way we could take who Mr. Chase thought we would work well with and also the people who we know we would work well with. This way we get a group that is pretty good and will get the work done as planned. It was nice to see that most of the work that we had given to each other was done when we had planned for it with the acceptation of a few things. The only thing that is kind of difficult about my group is that one of the members is on simple finder so he cannot get Google documents to work while he is in school, but that was easy enough to fix and we got over that pretty fast.
As a group we have not gotten around to editing what other have put up on the Google Docs page, but once we have everything up and go over what everyone has put up there that will be the next step.
One part of this project is that I actually have to pay more attention to the parts that I was assigned so I actually get a bit of a better understanding of the book. I had a really hard time figuring out what was going on in Othello and it was hard for me to be able to see what was going on and translate things accurately into normal day language, but now that I only have to focus on a few parts of the text the play is starting to make more sense to me and I can definitely see the underlying themes that are not completely obvious just from reading the book.  

My Group= Mekeda, Lucas, Shannel, Me

 Benchmark Topic= Jealousy

So far, my group has found quotes relating to the topic in Act 1 and Act 5. The project is going wel. We used our in-class time to find the quotes we have so far, and we have already discuseed and decided how we will present the final project. It will be a series of monologues for important scenes involving certain characters, instead of just straight up text reading. Also, we have decided to get more quotes and start editing over the weekend.

Working as a group has not been a problem for us. All members work efficiently and do not waste time. Our successes are that we stay on the same page and don't get off point when having discussions, we work seriously and diligently, and we get along with each other.No one argues or has trouble comunicating. The only difficulty the group has had so far was that we had trouble deciding on how we would present the final project, since none of us really were too concerned about how we presented. So,we all just agreed on and picked monologues.

In terms of understanding the text, I have gotten a better understanding since the project started. I see how characters show their jealousy without saying it. Also, I've seen that the jealousy started earlier than i thought. For example, when the story begins (on the first page, in fact) Iago talks of his disappointment and disgust at Cassio receiving the lieutenancy instead of him. Iago puts his jealouusy out for the audience to see as soon as possible, not exactly a smart move, but it still helped me to understand him a little more, as well as the concept of jealousy in the rest of Othello.