Category: Literacy Narrative

   Life is like a wave,It has its high points and it low points.During these low points you tend to experience failures and disappointments, however if you continue riding the wave the lessons we learn can lead to future success and prosperity.One personal experience that affected me is the challenge of starting a new school, especially when I came from a different country. For me it was like I was an alien arriving on a new planet. 

   I arrived to this new world in the summer and it was wonderful.I went to many places with my family and it was a fun adventure. Coming up to my last couple of weeks of summer, it crossed my mind that school was on its way. Then I realized the quote “time flies when you’re having fun” was true and school came around.I instantly became nervous.I was worried I would not fit in or be looked at differently. 

     On the first day of school, my mom walked me there and when I was walking it was like I was having a nervous breakdown. There were butterflies in my stomach and I could not stop talking about things like “what if I don’t fit in”, “ what if I make no friends” or even be alone. However when I got there it was completely different everyone was nice except for two girls that made fun of my accent.Which really didn’t make me feel that bad since that’s how I met my first friend.He stood up for me when they made fun of my accent and showed me around. 

    When I just thought I got over the hard part, class started.It was not what I expected.All my classes were insanely hard for me and it was completely different from my school in Guyana.I especially struggled in English a lot since in Guyana we spoke broken English.I had a hard time writing, reading and speaking it. When I got home I was so embarrassed to ask my family for help.Since that day my family sat down with me every day and helped me with my homework.When I gave up and didn’t want to do it they would motivate me.Even when I didn’t have homework they would find me some kind of book or call my teacher and tell them what I needed to work on.English was my weakness. Since my family knew this they signed me up for after school tutoring which I hated. This tutor was crazy ,she gave me so much work and was always pushing me to do more .However it helped, after a long month of blood and sweat, my grades improved.I didn’t need help from my family and now English is one of my favorite subjects. 

     The experience of the first time starting a new school taught me a lot of lessons and was a good experience.I learned that not everything new and different is bad.It also taught me that if I put my mind to something I can do anything. I turned my weakness of English into my strength. 

Saif Ali

I live in New York City, and in the city when you don’t have a car, the subway system is your best friend. I also love being on my phone and just browse or play games. However, whenever I am on the train I can’t use my phone to the extent I want it to because I don’t get signal inside the train. So I can’t play most of my fun games, browse social media, or watch videos to pass the time. I just have the ability to listen to music. I use the train a lot and for long periods of time most times so I always have nothing to do. That was until I downloaded an app called Webtoons. 

I was able to download and read manga from this app on the train which helped me pass time and emerge myself into different and crazy worlds. I told myself I will only use this app when I am on the train to pass time because I never really liked reading and to me it felt uncool and a waste of time. That was until I started reading this manga series Magician. This 400 chapter long story blew me off my seat and I found myself not only reading it on the crowded train while washing away all the unnecessary sounds and distractions and making an hour train ride feel like ten minutes, but also at home eating dinner or when I am about to go to sleep. I felt a whole new connection and feelings toward this series. 

It took me two months to finish reading this series and once I finished reading it, my perspective on English literature has changed dramatically. I learned to appreciate the effort authors put into a piece in order to control the emotions we feel while reading a piece. I learned to understand different aspects of storytelling. For example, Magician does a really good job at making everything come back in a circle. All the events and characters in the beginning chapters would make the reader think that they are not important in the story but in fact towards the end play a big role which left me shocked. This experience also showed me how important character development actually is. The story starts off with the two main characters as little kids and ends with them being adults. This may not seem too important but it really set the tone on how this series would play out. In the first season the story seems joyful and fun with a lot of adventures and exploring but in the later seasons take a dark turn where almost every situation is a life or death scenario. Every single one of these life threatening events has shaped the protagonists into something much more serious and mature and us as readers have seen every single step of this happen which also connected us with the protagonists in a spiritual level. 

After reading Magician I realized that there could actually be a lot more English literature where the plot can be exciting and the reader grows a connection with the characters’ hardships and fun moments they each face. Because of this typical manga piece I believe I can open my eyes and be more understanding about the deeper meaning in English literature.

Jevon Williams

ENG 1101

Navigating Writing

Throughout my early education, my literacy classes always had inspired me. However, I grew up not reading many books, newspapers, or articles. I believe reading is one of the most important aspects of education. Students that can’t read effectively fail to grasp important concepts. As an adult, I’ve acquired reading and writing skills that allow me to seek out information.

In a way, reading was and, still is, an integral part of my life. My mother would always press my younger sibling and I about the importance of reading more often. I never read a lot during my childhood and, even now, I don’t read many books or newspaper. The first time I realized how interesting writing was in the 4th grade. My teacher, every marking period, would make us choose a book to read from the class’s reading bookshelf. At the end of the marking period, we would have to write about it and a creative story to go along with it.

On its surface, Mark Twain’s the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is a straightforward story about a boy and a runaway slave floating down the Mississippi River. But underneath, the book—which was published in the U.S. on February 18, 1885—is a subversive confrontation of slavery and racism. Huck, who grows up in the South before the Civil War, not only accepts slavery, but believes that helping Jim run away is a sin. The moral climax of the novel is when Huck debates whether to send Jim’s owner a letter detailing Jim’s whereabouts. Finally, Huck says, “All right, then, I’ll go to hell,” and tears the letter up.

After I chose the book I was going to read, the teacher handed out little “receipts” to everyone, so that when the marking period ended, the books we returned would be recognized as original by her. When school ended, I took the book home and read 4-5 pages a week. In the beginning, I had no idea what I was getting into. Before reading huckleberry finn, I’d often read short stories and little articles in the newspaper whenever I felt like it. This book marked the start of my fascination with writing.

I wasn’t a scholar of English or literature, but even I could tell, just from the first few pages I read that this book was well written. It wasn’t easy trying to read unfamiliar words, sentence structures, and more while simultaneously writing. As I struggled to read this in different environments, I began to get distracted, so I just started writing whatever stuck in my head on paper. My job was to only write a 1-page report on the book, so I just focused on key points and major details. I had no intention of reading the entire book, so this was a win for me.

After my job was accomplished, I put my report in a folder until the marking period was over. I spent 3 months on the report, leaving only the creative story to do. The creative story was optional and was more of a free write to help us develop our writing skills. I didn’t realize it at first, but there was more to reading than just reading. You are reading to learn about writing.

When I returned to school, I compared my report with those who also had finished early. Some of the other students’ reports were 2 -4 pages long. I was kind of confused about it, so I just assumed they had more to read than I did. Then they explained to me that they read more so they wrote more. I decided to read more about HuckleBerry Finn, and eventually finished the book. I revised my report and did a creative story to go with it. A week before the marking period ended, everyone submitted their reports and returned their books to the bookshelf. When the marking period did end, all our reports were graded, and I got the 5^th highest score in the class.

Tiffany Muse                                                                                                              Eng 1101 

 

       Throughout all of my years in school from elementary to high school English/ Language Arts has always been my best subject. It was always my highest grade and I was always on a higher reading level for my age. It naturally came easy to me up until my junior year when I joined my mock trial team. When I joined the team I was introduced to a new and different side of language, being legal terminology, and how it is and needed to be used. I knew that I wanted to be apart of the team and compete and was even confident enough in myself to try out to be one of the main attorneys instead of an alternate or a witness. It was well known and believed that having the part of an attorney was more challenging and required more work and preparation than having the part of a witness. Mock Trial was a way of acting and playing a part. Whether the part was as an attorney or a witness, you had to be believable and convincing and prepared in order to win. I tried out and got the part of the attorney, like I originally wanted. I was on the team the year before, but I was not only a witness I was an alternate. This basically meant that I did absolutely nothing the whole competition season and had no need to prepare or learn any of the jargon used. I would spend every single practice of that season doing homework for my classes since it was after school. At this time I lost all confidence in what I thought I could do and felt useless. The following year I wanted to make sure I proved myself before I graduated. I tried again and became an alternate… again, but this time for an attorney. At first I started to have ptsd of the previous year and was about to quit thinking I would not get to do anything for a second year in a row. Luckily enough for me the person I was alternating for neglected his responsibilities and got kicked off the team. I was consistently showing up to practice and was trying to prepare in a way. It was getting close to the first competition and I was thrown into this thing pretty late into the game. I had to write a cross and a direct examination which I have never done before and also had to learn different objections and other legal terminology to sound remotely like I knew what I was doing during competition. Standing in front of a courtroom with an immense amount of eyes watching my every move and ears listening to any possible mistakes that may be made. Standing in front of a judge, who was actually just a practicing attorney, the power they still possessed over me and the validation they owned I needed and wanted in return. This was my thought process in preparation for a competition that I had very little time to prepare for. I was asked to write my own direct and cross examination for the case we were competing as well as an opening statement, which what is used to introduce your side of the case. Needing to be aware of the proper legal terminology to sound legit required me to learn these words and phrases that were being used that I was not aware of which made me feel unfit and in over my head about being able to succeed in this competition and overall field. As a result I would go on quiz let and review certain terms that were frequently used such as the different types of objections and certain wording that was more proper to use when determining what was needed in the case whether it was civil or criminal. I would go over the terms constantly until I remembered what they meant and how they are supposed to be used. During practice I would have to focus on many different aspects of the language I used having to emphasis every point. Not being aware of these terms put me at a disadvantage since it was my first year actually competing and everyone else on the team had experience from the previous year. This discouraged me at first because of my struggle to learn these phrases for the first time when it was just a refresher for everyone else. Nonetheless I was determined and continued to work hard on learning, practicing, and perfecting what I needed to in order to compete. I focused and prepared and my team won our round in the competition. I received praise from the judge as well as the attorneys and coaches that worked with my team. This made me feel that all the hard work I put in was worth it and I was able to achieve my goal of proving myself and my abilities being on the team.

My personal experience with reading and writing came from when I used to live in Maryland. I lived there for well over half my life and was also born there but for some reason for the first 5 years of my education I was placed in special classes for children who didn’t know how to speak English. My parents had always questioned why I was placed in those specific classes given the fact that I knew how to speak English. Honestly being in those classes changed my view on education because the work was so much easier than what was really expected of other kids in regular classes. When going into middle school I was placed in regular classes but since the workload and curriculum was so different from what I had been given, I ended up struggling and having to repeat the same grade the following year. From that point on the educational experience just kept getting harder and harder. As time went on I honestly felt like I was learning nothing but the bare minimum because my grades reflected that passing everything with 65-70%. Then 8th grade came and here I am sitting with a group of kids that weren’t gonna graduate in June, just the feeling of t being able to walk across the stage with my friends made me want to try harder and to see if I could actually accomplish what I wanted. Went through summer school moved onto high school and here comes the first few weeks I feel like I got the hang of things but as time goes on it comes back to me and what mean by that was the feeling of drowning in my work and all the stress was coming right back and I honestly didn’t know what to do I actually stopped going to school mid way through high school and was planning on dropping out because I was so far behind. Over the course of me not attending school my principle came to visit me with the intention of trying to get me to come back to school which eventually worked. When I came back I was receiving additional help in all my classes which obviously helped me a lot but also made me realize that I could actually do it on my own I just needed some support, the last year of high school, I had completed so much by the first half of the year that I only had two classes where I actually had to do work in order to graduate, which was very surprising for everyone given the fact that they knew I had tried to drop out and now a major come back. So I guess in a sense that reveals something good about my personal experience and also the educational system, which would be that you can accomplish whatever you want and with the right support in this case the educational support that I was getting helped me accomplish something that I honestly didn’t believe I was gonna do.

 

a kid having a learning disability like dyslexia can definitely be a factor in how ur educational experience turns out. As a 6th grader coming into my first year of middle school I wasn’t sure what to expect, I walked into my first class (english) and everything seemed fine until we got an assignment where we had to read this book and write a short essay response. while other kids finished around me I was still struggling to read and understand the book so eventually I gave up on reading and the writing and just sat there till the class was over. This kept happening and it wasn’t just in this class but every class that involved any kind of reading and or writing. This frustrated me to no end, it got to the point where I would start finding excuses not to be in the class room and then when that wouldn’t work I would just put my head down and waited for the class to be over. my personal experience is a pretty common one but not much is being done about it. I know that this might not seem like that big of a deal, people would always tell me things like “you need to study more” or “sit in the front so you pay attention” and “this shouldn’t be this hard for you”, all of the things that my teachers and parents would say to me made me feel like I wasn’t capable of doing things that I shouldn’t have any problem with doing and that it was my fault that I was like this. This lead to me ultimately stop trying at school in every way I could. I stoped doing my homework, would come to school and class late or not come at all, if something was hard I would give up instantly, and I stoped raising my hand because I didn’t want to get the answer wrong. As I got older things kept getting worse I was failing classes, going to summer school, and getting into trouble at school. because of all of this education wasn’t my main priority I put it aside for things I found more important such as sports and video games. however, now things are a lot different but my past experience still stays with me to this day. its hard for me to come in and participate in class because I don’t wanna say the wrong thing when called on or I really don’t wanna read to the class out loud because I don’t wanna sound dumb and get stuck on a word. When it comes to assignments like reading a passage or writing if its hard I tend to give up early or just do the minimum for the work. this has impacted my education so much because I wasted so much time not going to school and falling further and further behind feeling sorry for myself and thinking that I couldn’t do anything good in school. In the future though What I think should be done and what can be done in the for kids with learning disabilities is to not treat them like they are dumb but to give them extra help if needed and try and understand them and not get frustrated when they cant do something others can do.

 

 

Make America Great Again

Also known as “four legs good, two legs bad.”

 

I am a recent immigrant of America and I came in the year of election of the current sitting president. The importance of this time exponentially increases due to my exact location. I was a university student in the heart of the south, Tennessee. It was home to country music, good barbecue and most importantly, the confederate flag flying high alongside every American flag outside of each suburban household surrounding the campus. I was in the middle of rural predominantly white America and Trump’s strongest base. I was a black foreign person living in a space that was not mine and I realized that I was living Animal Farm in my daily life.

Animal Farm, written by George Orwell, gives the view of the animals on a farm and in the beginning highlights the hard work and terrible living conditions they undergo while the farmer is “lazing around”. The animals bond together and execute an uprising, thereby removing the apparent user. The changes in the power dynamics and the idea of who is deserving of power comes to the forefront and the way the book illustrates the new oppression resounded deeply in my spirit. I was twelve and my worldview of my country’s class structures and communities that I existed in changed. I was twelve and I could see that words not only carry weight but creates emotion and every day one must actively choose to reject herd mentality that creates more oppression so when I continuously heard the mantra “ Make America Great Again” I instantly remembered Snowball’s intentional reduction of the Seven Commandments of Animalism.

“Four legs good, two legs bad.”

A phrase repeated several times until it was the only thing the sheep remembered from Old Major’s speech on the need for animal unity in the face of human oppression and devolved into the simplicity of its very words. Orwell portrays this repeating example of how the elite class abuses language to control the lower classes. Although the slogan was at surface level helpful at first, enabling them to clarify the essential principles that they were fighting for, it soon becomes a meaningless sound bleated by the sheep (“two legs baa-d”), serving no purpose other than to drown out dissenting opinion. By the end of the novel, the pigs changed the mantra to “ four legs good, two legs better” in so doing, reverting to what the problem was once more. This was my issue with Make America great again. It was reductionist and incendiary and I could not do anything but exist in the farm.

I was boxer the horse, with my head down and since I was not personally affected by the issues African-Americans faced, I continued not noticing the issues with the community I lived in. this was until it directly affected me. The racism and unsheathed hatred that came with this mantra did not affect me within my micro ecosystem of my campus because I was foreign before I was black t those people but I was faced with this reality when I went hiking with my friends. We stopped at a gas station on our way to the hill and I didn’t get out the car along with my Muslim and Spanish friend because as we pulled in a couple of men on a truck stopped washing their cars and went to stand in front the store. My two white female friends went in and got our supplies but the tension for those few minutes was thick with aggression.

“All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others” perfectly describes what I experienced that day. There was a sense of entitlement and superiority laced with the aggression of these men’ actions. The word “equal” becomes a relative term rather than an absolute one, meaning that there can be different degrees of “equal”-ness. The small, almost imperceptible changes within the core ideals of Animal Farm allowed for gradual corruption. The speeches of trump allowed for this seeming uniqueness and self-appointed superiority of these men. This is our reality living in today’s society. History repeats itself but it’s a shame that there will be an animal farm part two.

Yasminah Carmela Jn Baptiste Raymond 

Profesor: Ms. Jewell 

Date      : 09/17/2019 

  Direction: Write a literary essay that talk about your writing and reading experience

        Learning to read and write in whatever language is crucial. However, I considered it as a basic skill in school education. When I was in first grade, I applied myself to be able to write and read in French. As a result of I became aware about what I read in books, and whatever sources in that language. To sum up, based on my writing I was able to enhance my reading comprehension.  

        Therefore, my native language is Creole.  However, I made a great stride to be able to write in French. When I was in kindergarden, I didn’t acquire any knowledge of it. Even the alphabet seemed unfamiliar to me. I became fascinated with writing in French when I was in first grade. The reason was because I saw my cousin creating foreign words with beautiful handwriting. So, I imitated him. I sought assistance from my French teacher. When he taught me French he first began to show me how to do the letters of alphabet. I remember my right hand trembling with holding it to help me did the letters. I also remember that I cried when I didn’t know how to do capital Y. However, as an eight years old girl I experienced resistance. Even it was difficult for me to write, I kept doing it until I could make words with the letters. In summary, my love for writing helped me go farther. 

       According to my own experience in reading in first grade, it was a little bit burdensome for me to read in French. The cause of that was while I learned to write I sometime combined letters to make words with them. As a result of when I was reading a book I was familiar with some words. But, sometime I didn’t understand what I red.  

      Unfortunately, words like basketball, and volleyball were strenuous for me to pronounce they were words that French borrowed from English. I knew they came from English because my French instructor told me that. To solve this issue I  asked my nephew to teach me how to articulate them. Then, while he taught me how to utter them I had some difficulty to say them correctly. However, after many practices I was able to pronounce them perfectly.  

     All in all, the reflection of my writing upon my reading made me to understand French. In my own experience, I made a lot of efforts to to be able to write and read in French. Moreover, my curiosity made me knew to items. Firstly, after those two experiences I learned that writing is related to reading. Secondly, after I crossed the boundary from learning to write to learning to read I discovered that some terms in French derived from English. 

      

 

Due September 19–Please post your revised literacy narratives!

Think of a title that encapsulates your piece. Please click on the “Literacy Narratives” category when posting.

Peruse your classmates’s posts. What can we learn about reading and writing as a result of these shared pieces?