Best of Week: King Lear Writing Assignments

I cannot say whether I actually consider this writing assignment to be a good or a bad thing. A blessing in disguise, perhaps? Sure, it adds untold amounts of stress to my life (especially when my grades are faltering), but in any case, i see it as an opportunity to learn. An opportunity to truly get to know the book.

And yes, perhaps Siddhartha was right in saying, "You are your best teacher", because I felt like I learned more about King Lear in these past 3 days than i would have in any other sort of situation. I don't even think I would have learned as much from a 6-hour class discussion (which usually tend to stray from the main point anyway).

Working alone for a few hours on Sunday night allowed for plenty of brainstorming, and i believe this really opened my eyes to some of the elements in King Lear. The whole aspect of good vs evil, for example, was something that i wouldn't have even noticed if i hadn't taken the time to think about it. The fact that i was so freaked out about this essay essentially forced me to think. And i'm glad about that. Isn't that basically how our school curriculum works? It's all about instilling fear to the point where students are actually forced to think. Most students probably wouldn't study, or even learn for that matter, if they didn't have that loathed 100-point quiz looming over their shoulders.


But enough of that, anyway. I just felt like this assignment simply proved that ideas often come from within yourself. After all, we as a class had never even truly discussed the medieval/renaissance aspects of King Lear. It reminded me how good it feels to work alone sometimes- I was delighted in being able to move so smoothly between ideas. It also reminded me of my favorite passion, surprisingly enough. I myself believe there are things you can learn from just watching birds on your own. You may notice how two birds interact, how they behave, and perhaps see deeper into their lives' meaning. There are so many other things that you just wouldn't notice if you were traveling with a group of birders. You may see more birds with a group, but that's something different.