Wednesday, August 26, 2015

Week 1: Storytelling: The girl who studied all night

THE GIRL WHO STUDIED ALL NIGHT 



The studious girl, by  the Limayre Gramajo selfie collection 



"Why would you prefer to go out than study all night?" said the studious girl to her roommate. "You should really focus on school rather than spend the weekends with your friends. You came to the University of Oklahoma to learn and to get an education so that you can make your family and friends proud. Do you just pay thousands of dollars in tuition so you can pretend to be 21 and go out and drink with your friends?"

" Oh, so you really study every single night every single week? How do you not get bored and tired of staring at your textbooks and doing so much homework?" answered the roommate, " Show me how to stay so focused, I want to change my ways. I know that I need to make the grades to stay in my college but no matter what I do I just can not seem to focus and going out is the only thing that makes me feel free and less stressed."

So the studious girl stayed in her dorm room another weekend, once again, but then became bored and got ready and headed out instead. She looked around to make sure her roommate was gone, she knew she had all night since her roommate hardly ever came home after going out all night. She looked back at her books and smirked and walked out. It was 2 am and she came back home and to her surprise her roommate was sitting in bed. "I thought you studied every single night, every single day.” said the roommate. The studious girl was ashamed.  “You have caught me red handed, I just wanted to feel better myself. I try to study but I too can not. I only wanted to justify my own actions by pointing out your flaws. Please forgive me for I too am flawed."

Talk the talk only if you can walk the walk. 

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Original Fable 

"Why in the world do you walk sideways like that?" said a Mother Crab to her son. "You should always walk straight forward with your toes turned out."
"Show me how to walk, mother dear," answered the little Crab obediently, "I want to learn."
So the old Crab tried and tried to walk straight forward. But she could walk sideways only, like her son. And when she wanted to turn her toes out she tripped and fell on her nose.

Do not tell others how to act unless you can set a good example.








Authors Note:

The original fable that I chose is from     Aesop for Children, by (anonymous), illustrated by Milo Winter 
(1919) . I chose this fable because I can really relate to it a lot. I have encountered many people in my life who have decided that they can critique my actions and ignore their own. Often times many of these people have done exactly as I have or worse. I made this fable my own but adding a lot more detail to the story and changing the plot to make it a situation that students can relate to by writing about study habits and how different habits are criticized.  In the original story the Mother Crab was very critical of her child and kept criticizing him but in the end we see that she could not walk straight forward either. One of the biggest differences between the two stories is the fact that the character who is being critical of the other apologizes in my story. Whereas the mother just tripped and fell but there was no apologizing. I wanted to portray that a person who is judgmental should apologize as no one is perfect in this world.  I chose the image that I did because I wanted a picture that showed someone studying (but not really studying). I chose the image of myself because you can see all the Ochem behind me but instead of studying I am taking a selfie. 



3 comments:

  1. I like how you were able to turn one of Aesop's fables into a more relevant and modern day tale for a college student! Although the plot line was altered, I do appreciate how at the end of your storytelling one of your characters apologized, since that is something that the mother crab did not do for the little crab. Even though you changed the summary line in your retelling, it still gets the point across that your actions speak louder than words, and so does leading by example. Great job!

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  2. The lesson of your fable is a good one, and one that people need to learn. Not everyone is perfect, we all have our own ways of doing things. You used something relevant to our everyday lives, and I think that shows even more how it effects us especially when we are judging others for their actions. I really liked your end quote "talk the talk only if you can walk the walk".

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  3. This was a very interesting retelling! You retained the overall message of the fable very nicely and put it in a modern sense that most people today could relate to. The only thing that I would suggest is using a different manner in which the characters spoke to one another. This was a story told from a modern stand point although the way these girls spoke to one another was certainly not the way two girls from this era would speak to each other. The language should have been more flowing and utilized jargon that is typical of college students today. The language you used makes the two girls seem as though they are characters from biblical times. Other than the language I thought this was a good retelling of the story. Different word usage between the girls would have made it much more relatable and an easier read though.

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