Paragraph Reflection

My love of reading blossomed when I was a child, because my parents showed me how wonderful reading is. There were countless nights when I remember myself as a little girl refusing to go to sleep before ‘tucking dad into bed’ by reading him a picture book. Not only did I uphold that tradition though, but my mother is a preschool teacher, so she gets really into reading out loud, and she would help me read books such as The Boxcar Children set, The Secret of NIMH and The Chronicles of Narnia weekly until I didn’t need help anymore.

I have always loved to tell stories. When I was six, I would gather all my stuffed animals and recite lavish stories to them. Tales of warrior princesses, ferocious dragons, and handsome knights would pour from my lips as I talked for hours on end. As I grew, I began to write my stories down on the backs of old coloring book pages. Though my penmanship, grammar, and spelling made the stories illegible, there was still something magnetic about manifesting the words onto the page. I wanted to turn the ideas in my head into something tangible. Throughout middle school, I filled dozens of notebooks. My mother was constantly running to the store to grab me yet another set of marble notebooks. Everything from plot outlines to poems were crammed into those lined pages. Though I eventually switched from paper to a keyboard and computer screen, my writing did not stop. As I transitioned into high school, writing became my solstice. I could pour every ounce of stress, happiness, sadness, and exhaustion into a blank word document. The highlight of my day came when I could just sit down and type until my fingers began to protest.

While my love for reading sprouted, I soon became obsessed with writing. My passion for reading only helped my writing skills to prosper. In fifth grade, I had a teacher who very well understood that reading and writing were important. Every day, we had a half an hour to write about whatever we wanted. Boy, my imagination ran wild. I often wrote fiction stories. My favorite part was when the teacher allowed us to share our stories with the whole class at the end of the week. This one activity really sparked the beginning of my love for writing.

Throughout my years of schooling, I have become ambivalent about reading and writing. I have struggled in school to make myself enjoy writing. I didn’t mind reading as much, as long as it was to my interest. It has differed throughout the years I have been in school. Some years I have enjoyed both, reading and writing, and other years I have not liked either. Getting myself to enjoy reading and writing has been quite the adventure.

As a young child in the years of first to second grade I quickly developed my love for reading. I was never a big fan of the outside world. I thought the world around me was boring and tearing everything/one apart, and thought the adventure inside a book was much more exciting. In my childhood home there was a large bookshelf full of different stories. Most days when getting home I would sit by the shelves in my small pink bean bag chair with numerous children books scattered around me. By endlessly trying and sometimes failing to read my children books such as, the infinite number of Dr. Seuss rhyming stories and Winnie-the-Pooh books I felt comforted by the happy feeling the characters within the stories gave me. The pictures within

When I was little, I loved to have my parents read to me all the time. At first, I didn’t learn to read because I didn’t want to read the “Learn to Read” books and preferred for my parents to read to me. I remember sitting with my Dad and following along while he read Harry Potter aloud to me and traced the words with his finger. Then we started to take turns reading aloud. I started to read more and more by myself after I was able to read the first chapter of Harry Potter (with a little bit of help). Then I worked my way through the rest of the book. I loved how reading let you explore new worlds and different points of view.

Let me tell you how I became the reader and writer I am today. The early memories I have of reading are back in preschool and early elementary. I used to love to read and especially with my mom at home! Every night, we would end our day with a couple chapters in a book. She would read some to me then I would read some to her. She would usually end up reading most of it. At the end of every book I would ask her if I could read the last paragraph. There was just something I loved about getting the last words in. I had to read it absolutely perfectly and wouldn’t be satisfied if I messed up. If I did I would reread it until I nailed it. Every year that MOE had the book fair it always got me excited. It was one of my favorite days by far. I remember

Reading was the new outlet for my imagination and the stories I read fascinated me. They weren’t too unlike the scripts of computer games or the own stories I came up with on my own, but books actually had the action and emotional aspects written out. And again, while my peers were reading things about growing up, things that had morals and would teach valuable lessons (I remember one book about a shoplifter who had to do community service at an animal shelter), I read real fiction: Jurassic Park, Dragonriders of Pern, Lord of the Rings… Stuff of fantasy and science-fiction that let my mind stray from reality. Stuff that kept my imagination alive while I was being forced to learn multiplication and the names of countries. Of course, my teachers encouraged me to keep reading, as long as I wasn’t doing the reading in the middle of their lectures. But it wasn’t because of their influence, however, that kept me interested in books. It was because I loved it. It put pictures into my head and made me think. So I kept reading. But even then I knew reading wasn’t enough… Yes, the stories were fascinating, but they weren’t what I wanted. Back then I wasn’t sure what I wanted, but as middle school came to a close, I found it.

Do you remember the first book you learned to read? Well, I do and it shaped me into the reader I am today. During my early years in elementary school, I began to learn about what reading was and how to read books. I always remember my kindergarten teacher reading “Love you forever” before I would go to nap time everyday. I eventually learned to read my favorite childhood book on my own. However, this was a problem when I didn't want to branch out and read books to better my reading skills. Reading and writing are such and important aspect in our lives that get abused every day. It may sound silly, but as a young child I came in contact with books that impacted me, changed me, and shaped me into the reader and writer I am today.

As Vickie Karp once said, “When we read, we start at the beginning and continue until we reach the end. When we write, we start in the middle and fight our way out.” At an early age, writing gave solace. My first exposure to writing was through journaling. In my elementary years, my parents separated, leaving my brother and me in the eye of the storm. At the age of ten, I only understood so much, but I did know how much my mother and father detested each other on a regular basis. Objects and harsh words established the darkness and fear in the corner of my mind. Once father left home, before I even had a chance to say goodbye, I felt abandoned and alone. The anxiety of my mother leaving me and struck with depression of already been abandoned

I picked up one of the books and fell in love with all the things that it could teach me. My mother who was a special education teacher at the time had always pushed me and my siblings to read. She brought home tons of books for us to read. When I told her I found a great book on horses she was so proud, and from that moment on I have always had a love of reading. My love for reading has grown so much that I now read everything in sight, but reading wasn’t enough for me as it turned out. From all the great books I read I started to come up with ideas about new exciting books people could write, that I could write. So during my eight grade year my burning desire to write a book compelled me to finally do so. I used three notebooks and a ton of lead and wrote my story. When I was finished, I typed it up on my computer and printed it out to show everyone I knew. When people saw that I wrote a book they were proud of me and this pride made me want to continue, but sadly school activities took up all my time and I was unable to finish my second book. My story of how I learned how to love to read and write isn’t quite like Sherman Alexie’s superman moment but it is

Writing a collaborative paragraph was difficult because I had to work with three other people. Before we could get started, I remember that all four of us brainstormed

I love reading books and telling stories. I choose stories and books that I can relate to. When I feel a connection with the writer, I enjoy the book more. Using my experiences as a reader, I try to find ways to connect with my audience while writing and I found that story telling is the key to that connection. Storytelling is a great element to use when writing. It is not only a way to grab the audience’s attention; it is also a way to connect with them. I’m a great storyteller, because I always add my personal experiences to my writing and it helps me connect with my

Writing has always been something I dread. It’s weird because I love talking and telling stories, but the moment I have to write it all down on paper, I become frantic. It’s almost as if a horse race just begun in my mind, with hundreds of horses, or words, running through my mind, unable to place them in chronological order. Because I struggle to form satisfying sentence structure, it takes me hours, sometimes even days, to write one paper. It’s not that I think I’m a “bad writer,” I just get discouraged easily. Needless to say, I don’t think highly of my writing skills. When I was little I loved to both read and write. I read just about any book I could get my hands on, and my journal was my go to for my daily adventures. Although it’s

As a child, my interests were more focused on reading than writing. In elementary school I fell in love with books. Initially I read simple children’s books, much like everybody else in my class, but it did not take long for my passion to drive me to read more difficult writings. Fiction books quickly became a replacement for any childhood toys. Instead of blocks or stuffed animals I would ask my parents for books. Since they were aimed at young readers, they tended to be short. I found myself going through them within days, and then soon several hours. Towards the end of elementary school I was reading series like Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events. I was captivated, and reading truly opened up a whole new world for me.