I really enjoyed working with my group on our literature circles.  I love the Harry Potter books, and it was fun to sit and talk about them with others who have read them.  Everyone in the group seemed to like the books, and I loved the way our conversation just roved and wandered from the role sheets.  The role sheets were helpful as conversation guides and starters, though, and I will definitely use them when doing literature circles with my students.  The literature circle discussions add a new dimension of meaning to the text as well.  I have read and discussed the books occasionally with friends and family, but this discuss has changed the way I look at the text.  For example, there is a scene where Harry, an orphan, looks into a magical mirror and sees his entire family standing behind him--parents, grandparents, etc.  I liked the scene because it warmed my heart for Harry to be seeing his parents for the first time (he was an infant when they were murdered).  Danielle chose this passage as one of her favorites, and revealed that she cried when she read it.  Danielle's experience, colored by the death of her mother when she was young, will always influence my reading of this scene in the future.

One of my favorite group discussions was the standards discussion.  Everyone in my group was adamantly anti-standards, agreeing that they are harmful to students.  It was definitely fun to present a unified argument to the rest of the class, and social action can only happen with groups of dedicated citizens working for change.  When I was at the NCTE convention, a woman in a presentation suggested that we should unify for greater power in effecting the change we wish to see.

Overall, this group experience was positive.  I didn't worry tremendously about discussing clinical experiences with my group, which I think was supposed to be the original purpose, but we had a productive experience nonetheless.