My Literacy Narrative

As a student, reading and writing plays a major role in my day to day activities. This has been true for most of my life as well. Early in my life, my parents started to read to me. I was immersed in the world of reading. Whether sitting and listening to my parents or reading myself after I learned, I became fascinated by books and stories at a young age. After I became active in soccer, baseball, and later track, this sentiment changed; I no longer had the time or desire to read independently for enjoyment. In recent years, this is again changing as I start a slow return to reading for enjoyment. Because of my early exposure and continued association with reading throughout my life, both reading and subsequently writing have played major roles in my academic and general development.

 

Starting Early

My introduction to reading came early in my life, at or possibly even before the age of one. My parents read to me almost every night, as they did with my older brothers when they were younger. My parents read to me so much that they can almost recite my favorite books from this age, Goodnight Moon and The Hungry Caterpillar. Not only did my parents read to me, but my mom also took me to storytime at the library, where I would sit with her, sometimes drifting off to sleep as the librarians read stories to the children and their parents. When I was three, I began to attend preschool, where the teachers continued this pattern of reading. This early exposure established the foundation for reading throughout my life.

 

After preschool came kindergarten, where I learned to read. The process took time, but came at a pace that could be considered normal. I was neither a late learner nor was I an early one. For me, the first step in reading was recognizing brands and other familiar images associated with words. This soon developed into being able to read words, sentences, and eventually short books. Certain books have had a significant impact on my life. I can still remember many of those that were my favorites: Go Dogs Go, Green Eggs and Ham, Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, Where the Wild Things Are, and The Hungry Caterpillar. These books created an early interest in reading that carried into the future.

 

Elementary School

In elementary school, I continued to enjoy reading and had my first major writing project. In early elementary school I read a variety of material including Magic Treehouse books, medieval books, and Garfield comics. For a few summers I participated in summer reading programs offered by the library, but this did not last long. As time went on, soccer and baseball took the place of independent reading, making the reading done by teachers to the class my main exposure to books. I still remember many of these books including The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Ella Enchanted, Killing Mr. Griffin, and Frindle. I enjoyed the majority of the books the teachers read to us, not just the ones listed, as well as the projects and activities associated with each book. I also remember working with Stories with Holes in gifted and talented class, which provided a new and interesting twist to reading that required me and my classmates to think creatively. Despite numerous positive memories associated with reading, not all of my memories of reading in elementary school are positive. While I do not recall the details of the book or the reasons why I despised it so much, I know that to this day the book Hatchet brings feelings of irritation and disdain.

 

In addition to reading, my first major writing project came in elementary school. In fifth grade My classmates and I were tasked with researching our heritage, both our family and a country of origin. To this day the project remains one of my favorite school assignments. I was fascinated with learning about my family history as well as the history of my country of origin, Germany. My experiences in elementary school built upon the foundations of reading and writing that I had established earlier, preparing me for higher levels of education.

 

Middle School

Middle school proved to be the time where writing became equally as prevalent in my life as reading. In seventh grade English we wrote journals with most of the assignments being creative writing. In eighth grade, as I began to write more essays, my formal writing began to develop in greater depth through better structure and organization, more varied and advanced diction, and improved grammar.  In addition to essays, I also completed a major research paper on the Holocaust. This was both interesting and somber to research because of the events that occurred and the images depicting them. Reading continued to play a role in my life, but it was mostly an educational one due to the heightened level of importance of soccer and track. I continued to develop my reading and writing skills, learning how to express and communicate ideas effectively in order to become better prepared for high school.

 

High School 

High school has continued the trend of formal writing and predominantly educational reading. Freshman year brought Greek mythology in the form of the Odyssey, while sophomore year expanded upon it with the Iliad. Shakespeare has been explored in a variety of works including his sonnets, Othello, Macbeth, and Romeo and Juliet. Numerous novels and plays including Pride and Prejudice, Night, Lord of the Flies, of Mice and Men, Inherit the Wind, The Great Gatsby, The Crucible, Pudd’nhead Wilson, The Body, Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption, and The Importance of Being Earnest have been read and discussed in class with accompanying essays. Each book, play, or poem examined in class has provided me with an understanding of a variety of tones, themes, and symbols used by authors as well as information about the time period in which the piece was written.

 

Combining the insights attained from analyzing a variety of literary works with practice from writing assigned essays has helped me to hone my writing skills and develop a formal style supplemented with necessary details. This is especially true in my science courses as evidenced by Mr. Lebrun’s claim that I’m a “detail man” and that I could handle his money because of my attention to detail. The writing I have completed in AP biology and other non-English courses, including chemistry and AP United States history, has strengthened my ability to communicate analyses and interpretations of various types of information.

 

Further work on research papers has helped to improve my writing. These papers encompass both literary topics, such as archetypes in Star Wars, and nonfiction topics, such as stem cell research and applications. Reading and writing in high school has been a process of significant growth. I can now read much higher level pieces of literature than I could before entering high school. Reading AP or college textbooks and other higher level sources of information, while still challenging, is no longer the daunting task it would have been before. My writing has continued to build upon previous improvements including the use of better grammar, structure, and word choice. Essays and research papers have become opportunities to communicate my ideas in an organized and coherent manner.

 

Since shortly after I was born, I have had close ties with reading and writing. I started off being read to when I was young and later began reading many of those same books back to my parents. While I currently only read for entertainment on occasion, its importance cannot be overstated. I now realize that my early exposure to reading was not only a source of entertainment, but it was also a source of many academic benefits that would become more evident in the future. These include expanding my vocabulary, improving my memory and concentration, gaining better critical thinking skills, and obtaining general knowledge. Perhaps the most important result of reading, as well as continued writing practice, is an overall improvement in the quality and lengths of my essays and research papers. Combining these skills with others, I have been able to become a successful student. I plan to continue to improve my writing and reading skills in college and take what I have learned and what I will learn with me into a professional setting.