First, here are the number of ratings and the average of those ratings — with so few ratings, though, I wouldn't make too much of the averages, but over time this is going to be incredibly helpful to me as I learn more about which units are proving more successful, which units need improvement, etc. So, 5 is "excellent," 4 is "very good," 3 is "good," 2 is "okay," 1 is "did not enjoy."
Asian units: 37 total
| 4.6 (7 ratings) | Tibet |
| 4.5 (2 ratings) | Laos |
| 4.3 (4 ratings) | Japan (Lang) |
| 4.1 (7 ratings) | Monkey King |
| 4.0 (6 ratings) | Japanese Mythology |
| 4.0 (3 ratings) | Filipino |
| 4.0 (2 ratings) | Japan (Ozaki) |
| 3.7 (6 ratings) | Chinese Fairy Tales |
African units: 10 total
| 5.0 (1 rating) | Jamaica |
| 4.7 (3 ratings) | Brer Rabbit |
| 4.3 (3 ratings) | Congo |
| 4.0 (2 ratings) | West Africa |
| 4.0 (1 rating) | South Africa |
| 2.0 (1 rating) | Nigeria |
Below are some responses to the comments people made, and I am SO GRATEFUL for all this feedback. Because the comments you make in the Google Form are anonymous, I cannot reply to people individually, and I'm thinking these replies might be of general interest anyway — and you might want to check out my replies to previous comments too. There were not a lot of new types of comments different from last week's comments, but a few stood out:
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE leave comments as you read. If you notice broken links or if a story is confusing, anything at all like that, leave a comment on the story page. These are Blogger blog posts, just like the blog posts you have in your blogs, and you can leave a comment on any of the posts, just as you leave comments on the other students' blogs. So, for specific story-by-story feedback, please leave comments! When people say in the Google Form, "some of the stories were confusing," it would be so helpful if I knew which ones. Leaving comments as you read the stories would be perfect for that! :-)
South Africa. Thanks for letting me know about the broken link there - I have fixed it! That's exactly the kind of thing that you can let me know about by leaving a comment there or sending me an email. Especially if there is a broken link in the navigation, I'll get it fixed as soon as you let me know about it!
Names in foreign languages. I definitely should write up some tips for coping with long/unusual names in stories, and I will try to make up guides for the units in which people found the names especially confusing, which seem to be the Japanese Mythology unit and the Chinese Fairy Tales.
Summary pages. Someone asked about pages that list the summaries for all the units to choose from on a single page. There are summary pages for each module, and you can find those links in the sidebar of the UnTextbook. For example, here is the link to a page showing all the African Units. It includes the summary plus the titles of all the stories, all on one page, so as you scroll down you can learn all about the different units. I've linked to those in the Table of Contents page, but I should find a way to make those more prominent in case people have not noticed them!
Length of units. The reading units are all appx. 15,000 words (and I stuck very closely to that). The only exceptions are the Brer Rabbit and Jamaican units; because they are in dialect, they are considerably shorter than the regular units. I know the dialect is harder to read because you really do have to read it out loud, so that's why I made those units shorter than the others already!
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE leave comments as you read. If you notice broken links or if a story is confusing, anything at all like that, leave a comment on the story page. These are Blogger blog posts, just like the blog posts you have in your blogs, and you can leave a comment on any of the posts, just as you leave comments on the other students' blogs. So, for specific story-by-story feedback, please leave comments! When people say in the Google Form, "some of the stories were confusing," it would be so helpful if I knew which ones. Leaving comments as you read the stories would be perfect for that! :-)
South Africa. Thanks for letting me know about the broken link there - I have fixed it! That's exactly the kind of thing that you can let me know about by leaving a comment there or sending me an email. Especially if there is a broken link in the navigation, I'll get it fixed as soon as you let me know about it!
Names in foreign languages. I definitely should write up some tips for coping with long/unusual names in stories, and I will try to make up guides for the units in which people found the names especially confusing, which seem to be the Japanese Mythology unit and the Chinese Fairy Tales.
Summary pages. Someone asked about pages that list the summaries for all the units to choose from on a single page. There are summary pages for each module, and you can find those links in the sidebar of the UnTextbook. For example, here is the link to a page showing all the African Units. It includes the summary plus the titles of all the stories, all on one page, so as you scroll down you can learn all about the different units. I've linked to those in the Table of Contents page, but I should find a way to make those more prominent in case people have not noticed them!
Length of units. The reading units are all appx. 15,000 words (and I stuck very closely to that). The only exceptions are the Brer Rabbit and Jamaican units; because they are in dialect, they are considerably shorter than the regular units. I know the dialect is harder to read because you really do have to read it out loud, so that's why I made those units shorter than the others already!
