Name: Parth Patel
Instructor: CGR
Course: ENGL 1103
Date: 2/11/2013
Narrative: The Canterbury Tales
Every English class has some good and some harsh memories attached to it. It was the same
way for me as well. As a student, we have to cherish those memories and shape them to be a
successful student in class. This is a story about how a group of students fails to finish an
assignment given by an English teacher. The group includes me and my team members, and the
English teacher is Ms. Kirkman.
It was a cold but sunny day outside. A cool breeze was coming through the crack in the
window of the classroom. A group was presenting their project. I wasn’t paying attention to what
the group was presenting. My attention span was that of a two year old at the moment. Why was
this happening to me? I think I have a fear of presenting. A team had just finished presenting their
project to class and the class applauded as the group approached to their seats. It was a nice project
and one commendable presentation. It was our turn now. As time came for our presentation, my
legs started shaking. Even though it was a breezy afternoon, I felt a sense of warmness running
through my body. My stomach started to feel strange. I think I might have skipped a heartbeat or
two. It was mid-winter but my body was still sweating. All this happened in a glimpse of a moment
between the class stopping to applaud and another us getting ready to present.
Bizarre and abnormal things happen to me when I am in English class and it is a
presentation day for a project. Even in a class of no more than twenty five students, a series of
unnatural thoughts capture my mind and make it paralyzed for a second when it comes to
presentation. The fear continues to grow as presentation time approaches and diminishes when it
is over.
Let us rewind back in time a little bit. After my second period at in school, I was headed to
my English class with some of my friends. Ms. Kirkman had a habit of putting class schedule for all
of her classes. Today, under our “To Do List” were three goals: Vocabulary quiz, SAT Question and
Canterbury Tales. The class started as usual with vocabulary quiz. In reality, those quizzes were
actually very helpful and productive. Learning new words every day was fun, unless I was not
tested on them. Next in list was SAT practice question. One question per day was not very stressful
but 150 questions a semester sounded like a great deal for us.
Ms. Kirkman seemed to be a lady who was a distant thinker. Next thing on list was
Canterbury Tales. As a fresh learner, I was always curious to learn English and read new books. This
fact always made English fun. I was excited to start reading the book as a class. But the excitement
did not last for a long time. Explaining the assignment, Ms. Kirkman said, “For the next two weeks,
we are going to read a new book by Geoffrey Chaucer called The Canterbury Tales. The book was
written in Middle English...” and she went on explaining the book. “There will be groups of four.
Each group will be assigned to read one tale from the book.” I was glad because I had some friends
in the class and we could work in a group. “I will be the one assigning the group,” she said. It was
still a good idea for me. “I don’t mind making some new friends” I said to myself.
“At the end of two weeks, every group will have to present to the class what they read, in
some form of entertainment. For example, making a video or performing the story live in front of
the class.” Suddenly, the happy expression on my face vanished and it turned pale. The excitement
of reading book was no longer present in me and weird thoughts ran through my mind in an
instance. She went on explaining the assignment while I sat there with an expressionless face. As a
group, our assignment was to read “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” and make a presentation that will
explain the whole story in less than five minutes. It sounded a bit tough to explain the story in less
than five minutes but the fact that we had about two weeks to finish it cheered me.
I started reading the book the same day to avoid last minute rush where I would just read
the book summary. As it was written in Middle English, I realized how tough it was to interpret the
book. Reading was stressful and time consuming because I had to read every line more than two
times. This doubled the amount of work it would normally take to read a book. Reading the book
was tedious but I actually enjoyed the way story went. After a long and tedious week, I finally
finished reading the book and so did my group members. It was time we decide the theme and
content of our presentation. After a long and hasty thinking process and a period long discussion,
we came to conclusion that we will record a puppet show representing our story and show it to the
class. We decided a strategy. Since I was not a good writer, my team members would write
dialogues and make a script that can be used as a story. I was in charge of making puppets.
I was satisfied with the work distribution and at the end of the day I was happy that our
group is pulling off the assignment really well. We had plenty of time to record our puppet show, or
at least that is what we thought. Days passed and the final presentation was due soon. I was on the
verge of building my puppets. Before the presentation day, I called up all my group members to get
together so that we can record the play. Out of three other people, only Daniel responded back.
Presentation was starting to fade before my eyes as time passed and none of the group members
showed up for recording. I had done my work with full dedication and responsibility. I had the
puppets ready and Daniel had the script. It was not possible for only two of us to finish the project
by ourselves.
I was frustrated and angry at my team members. I wish I could go back in time and tell Ms.
Kirkman how my team members would bail out on us at the final stage. “What do you think we
should do now?” I asked Daniel. Daniel was either calm or he was pretended to be calm but he
kindly replied, “I think we should just finish recording the video for now.” He had the confidence
and patience to finish the project unlike me. But things like this demotivate me and I just want to
give up. On the other hand, Daniel’s confidence motivated me and I was ready to record the project.
While he wrote the dialogues, I called some of my friends to play rest of the characters. With the
help of Daniel and my friends, we successfully finished the project. But this did not decrease my
aggression towards other team members. I was still angry at them for abandoning us at the last
minute. I am sure they had their own problems but there should be at least a sense of responsibility
among big high school students.
Next day was presentation day. I was not happy to see the faces of people who betrayed us
at the last moment. Daniel, on the other hand, was too excited to see our presentation. He did not
even care about them. As usual, we took a vocabulary quiz for Ms. Kirkman and she gave us an SAT
question. It was time to present the work. Turn after turn, groups were presenting. It was our turn
now. Daniel’s confidence and my friends help was the reason we could see the video running on the
smart board.
After the presentation, I went to my teacher to confess about what happened last night. “It
was all mines and Daniel’s work Ms. Kirkman. Other group members did not help us with anything.
I also have to tell you that my friends helped me with the video.” I felt bad when I told Ms. Kirkman
about this but I had to do it for me, Daniel and my friends who helped us. I mentioned everything
what happened the other night. She was kind enough to understand our situation. Our group
members did not receive full grade for that project. When Ms. Kirkman notified them about their
grades, my team members didn’t seem to be happy. But they had no reason to be sad.
From that day onwards, I am always afraid of working in groups. When a teacher assigns a
group task, the whole incident runs through my head in an instance. Before the project starts, I start
being judgmental and assume that my group members would backstab me. But the experience I had
with Daniel gives me enough confidence to trust my group members.