Literacy Autobiography: How Reading Has Affected My Life

Have you ever read a word and pronounced it completely different than its actual pronunciation? Well I have! As a student, I have experienced many aspects of reading and writing. I am currently a junior in highschool so I haven’t experienced it all. English is a crazy language and the rules for the language are also very crazy. In this literacy narrative I will introduce my experiences in reading and writing and how they have impacted my life.

As a kid, I was always really shy and spent much of my free time reading books. In 4th grade, the teacher required that each month we read a certain amount of short stories or books and write a summary for each. I always completed the minimum requirement and read plenty extra books. Throughout the year, I always had the most stars next to my name for top reader, not because I wanted to collect as many gold stars as I could, but because I really enjoyed reading. I had my eyes glued to a book even when I was at home. I

My earliest reading memory was when I was five with the little golden book series. I loved getting new books and reading them. But most of all I loved when my mother read to me so I could look at the pictures as my imagination went wild with stories about Jack climbing up the beanstalk or a king searching a kingdom for a worthy princess.

It was sixth grade and an advanced English class was chosen. I was discouraged because I actually enjoyed reading and writing but found out I wasn’t smart enough to be in that class. However, I would say that seventh grade was my favorite year of English. We still had vocabulary, which I wish we still did because I always have boring essays because I don’t remember the words we learned. I wouldn’t say that I disliked reading yet in middle school. I’d even say the most exciting part of middle school would be reading The Hunger Games with Mrs. Young, especially since she was kind of a nerd and got overly excited about all of our

The story of my history as a writer is a very long one. My writing has come full circle. I have changed very much throughout the years, both as I grew older and as I discovered more aspects of my own personality. The growth that I see when I look back is incredible, and it all seems to revolve around my emotions. I have always been a very emotional girl who feels things keenly. All of my truly memorable writing, looking back, has come from experiences that struck a chord with my developing self. This assignment has opened my eyes, despite my initial difficulty in writing it. When I was asked to write down my earliest memory of writing, at first I drew a blank. All of a sudden, it became very clear to me, probably because it had some

As a girl growing up around a group of bikers, boys and two parents who listened to eighties hair bands and metal, you wouldn’t think that I read or was read to frequently before starting school. I pursued in reading quite often, actually. When I finally started school, I had the tendency of keeping to myself and staying quiet. There never have been very many friends in the picture of my life. I learned at a young age that there often are going to be cliques, even when you’re an eight year old in girl scouts. I stood out in more ways than one, but for now I’m only going to elucidate why reading is so salient to me.

As the years went on, I continued to read. I would read books any time I got the chance. Sixth grade was one of my favorite years. We were able to read for half an hour every day. We also read in book club. We were required to read two books a month, but I usually read four or five. I loved to find new series that I liked.

Books open your perspective about life, they give you different perspectives and points of view. They carry knowledge and it

My experience with literature started when I was in the first grade. My first-grade teacher was named Ms. Young. Every Friday, all the teachers would come together to have story time and read the children a book. I would be so excited for story time because I would sit down with my best friends Ashley and Jordan, and we would listen to the teacher that was assigned to read to us. During story time, all the children would gather around in a big circle and the teacher would be in the center in a big brown rocking chair, and read. Over time in the school year, the children would read bigger and longer books like the Junie B. Jones series, chapter books, and the extreme level, which would be the Harry potter series. Sometimes I would fall asleep because the book that was read was very dull. I remember Ms. Young read to us the “Very Hungary Caterpillar”9 by Eric Carle. I loved that book as a child. It had great illustrations of the caterpillar turning into a butterfly. This book made me love reading for the rest of my life. Now in college, I love to read books. I only

The first book I remember reading was Go Dogs Go by P.D. Eastman. I would read that book once a day with my mother, and never get tired of it. Then other books like The Cat in the Hat, Green Eggs and Ham, Horton Hears a Who, and many other Dr. Seuss books came next. I couldn’t read enough of them growing up through kindergarten and first grade. Then all of a sudden I moved to Chelan and forced to read to meet my AR goal. Now, I am not trying to blame Accelerated Reader for my lack of motivation to read today, but I do believe it played a role in how I began to hate reading in elementary school.

There is a beauty in books. Each book opens up your mind to a world unknown. Each page of a book makes you think to yourself "what's going to happen next?". Books give you thoughts and opinions. Books teach you things you never knew. They allow you to escape reality and enter someone else's world. Books

The beginning of the end of my reading days can all be traced back to a young, childish eighth grader receiving the brand-new iPhone 4S. As I sat there in awe of the gadget sitting in front of me packed full of brand new features such as the always useful Siri, I did not realize that within all of the bright flashing lights and constant buzzing there lay hidden a plethora of distractions called apps. I quickly lost myself in the world of the app store. Night after night I stayed up scouring the market for the latest games. Night after night I neglected to glance at the books stacked on my dresser. I stopped reading altogether. Something that had seemed completely impossible a few months prior had very much become my reality.

A book that I have read that has impacted my life is Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling. Many years ago during elementary school is the time period when I began reading this book, as it was necessary to read one every nine weeks. After the completion of the first book, I rushed back into the library to acquire the second, and then the third, and so on. Upon finishing this book, I loved the Harry Potter series and decided to finish the heptalogy.

Throughout elementary school I loved to read books, however this all changed once I got into middle school because reading became my least favorite thing to do. Throughout these years of schooling my classmates and I were given books to read and we never had the option to read what we wanted to read. The moment Mrs. Kuper told us we would I have ten minutes a day to read books of our choice I was very excited. This year my goal was to read eight books in total and I was able to achieve that goal! I read Just Mercy, Devil in the White City, The President has been shot, Courage and Defiance, Adrift, All the Light We Cannot See, 1984, The Book Thief, Fahrenheit 451, and To Kill a Mockingbird. All these books have helped me not only grow as a reader but also as a person. Each book had a unique message that I will carry throughout my life. Even as the year is ending I am still continuing

They can leave a profound influence upon our minds or even dramatically change our insights into various aspects of life. If you go into a room filled with books even without taking them down from the shelves, they seem to speak to you, to welcome you, to tell you that they have something inside their covers and they are willing to impart it to you. Any good book will teach you many wise things directly or indirectly. That`s why I think that books are the best guides and philosophers for all of us.