Alanis Harris
Prof. Kim Liao
English 1121-Section D447
2-5-19
My literacy journey
I use literacy everyday in my life, especially being a college student. I’m introduced to new pieces of writing almost everyday, and I use literacy to understand and properly respond to what I just read. Literacy also greatly plays into how we communicate with one another, Such as texting a friend, reading something from the media on our phones, and writing a status. Being apart of todays youth, with most of us only staying in touch with cellphones or other forms of technology, without literacy it would be hard to stay connected.
Literacy is a extremely important skill to obtain. It is Important because it also can hinder your chances of going far in life. Most likely nobody would want to hire a person who can’t write a proper report much less read or write.Nobody wants some who carry out orders, comprehend and just all around do their job. More opportunities would be available to someone who’s literate because what they can accomplish and achieve. If two people are pinning for the same job position, the one who’s literate would defiantly get it over the other who not literate, and that person would defiantly go farther. With literacy it helps your ability to comprehend and therefore learn more. We as humans need literacy because thats how we stay connected, share and express our thoughts and feelings.
From the second a child is born, they use a form of literacy. I first was introduced to literacy as a child first from my mother, hearing her speak and others around me. As a baby I was already using some forms of literacy in order to explain to her my needs, if I was hungry, tired or wanted attention. My mother wanted me to be ahead of the other kids so she would always talk to me and as a baby and read me books. When I first entered school my ability to read was slightly higher than my peers due to my mother being a teacher and her starting my love for reading. Growing up I loved to read “diary of a wimpy kid books”, they kept my attention because they had little interesting doodles on the side and as a child that was very helpful. It was interesting and helpful because the doodles would act out and explain what the text was saying. If the text said the main chart “hopped and skipped” it would have that exact drawing right next to the text. It helped me comprehend and understand it better, I didn’t know it yet but even that was a form of rhetoric.
Earlier within in my school years, a couple of friends of mine introduced me to a children’s card game named “Yu-Gi-oh”, this is a game that requires immense reading comprehension skills from each player, as for each card contains an advance level of vocabulary. The words at the time were advance for my age. This helped my vocabulary grow because of the complex card description for each card used in every came. As a 4th grader my friends and I were ahead of our grade, as we knew the definitions of words such as “ adjacent, banish, archetype, equipped, consistency” and many more. This game helped with my strategizing, word choosing and thinking skill. The game was all about defeating your opponent so I had to constantly think of way to get the upper hand, over do them while using the right words and remembering the definition of them at the same time. In order to keep up with my friends who were already established in the game I had to make sure I always was one step ahead of them, fueling my need to read and understand more.
Eventually graduated from doodle books to wattpad a site where people can upload stories that they wrote, share and read other peoples stories. This site also helped broadened my vocabulary because there was very talented people on there and I couldn’t understand most of the words they were using so I had to search up mostly everything. I soon felt inclined to write my own story and add to the website. I began writing my own stories and constantly thinking about more ideas for books I can write. Unfortunately my author career was short lived because I lost interest in the site. My English teachers throughout the years encouraged me to look into the meaning of an authors words so they introduced me to literature. Literature in my opinion, at least then was just very confusing and hard to understand writing. It took a lot of practicing and time to understand what the writers were even saying. I’m much better at understanding now but it will take some time before I hone that skill.
I aspire to be in the medical field when I get older and although I’m still not so sure what branch I want to be in, no matter what branch I pick I know I will be using literacy. Communication between doctor and patient is a very crucial part of the health process. In order to understand what the patient is trying to communicate to you, in surgery when the surgeon abbreviates something to you, at the pharmacy when the pharmacist scribbles your prescription. Those are all forms of literacy and it is a extremely big part of the medical field.
Without literacy it would be generally impossible to get anything done. Literacy has a big role in our understanding of each other and us understanding whatever’s going on around us. I use literacy in order to communicate with my peers. I use literally to ask them a question or to ask them for help if I need it. I also use it in order to communicate with my professors.Over the years I have adopted new methods to help me succeed. These methods include annotation, my understanding of foreshadowing and many more.
In the past I wasn’t challenged as much due to my love of English and my want to always be ahead, however coming to college has been a new ball game , its very competitive, everyone has the same want to be the best there its and the best they can be. So far I have been given extremely long texts to read where the meaning isn’t so clear which means you have to think a whole lot harder. Also making me dig down inside myself to dig a little deeper.It also heightened my exploration and has made me want to learn, read, and understand more.
