Literacy Narrative

     For some reason, I have random little memories from when I was younger about how I learned to read, write and communicate (in other words, literacy). So beware, I am literally going to be going through random memories, but I’ll try to put them in chronological order. 

     I know for a fact, I was obsessed with the “Reader Rabbit” computer game. It had a different cd for each “grade level” and I had be so proud (maybe a little too proud) of myself when I would finish the cd for the grade level above the one I was actually in. I had no problem bragging about it to my other four siblings, which now that I think about it was a pretty harsh thing to do. Who wants their younger sibling to be bragging about how she is (according to Reader Rabbit) at a higher grade level than you? But at the time, I didn't think about that kind of stuff, I was just happy and having fun.  

     One of my earliest memories was reading with my mom at night. She basically was my only source on how to read and write before entering school. Later, she would let me read every other page. Eventually, I would read an entire book on my own. My mom always had me read aloud to her, which I helped to better form and correctly pronounce words. I specifically remember her always making me "sound out the word" so that she did not immediately tell me how to pronounce the word. This tactic allowed me to gain knowledge about literacy prior to actual schooling.
  As a student, my favorite book was Junie B. Jones. I would go through the Junie B. Jones books like it was a race to the finish; for some reason I just loved those books. Every night, after finishing a chapter, I would run into my parent’s room and summarize every chapter to them. Little did I know that they really did not care about every little sneaky trick Junie B. Jones would do in each chapter, but I genially thought my parents wanted to know everything about the book. So as good parents do, they just let me summarize (more like ramble on) about my nightly reading.

     My writing and pronunciation background started when I entered the first grade. We would write on dotted lined paper every day. Also, we had these “pipe phones” and we would speak into them saying the different vowel and consonant sounds. We would be able to hear ourselves pronounce each letter and, if we pronounced them wrong, we would be able to fix the problem on our own.

     In fourth grade, we had the freedom to write short stories and letters to other students. I specifically remember telling my peers that when I grew up, I wanted to be a writer. My teacher told me that she thought I would be very good at that job and that I should start writing for fun and on my own time. So, every night from about fourth grade to seventh grade I would write in m diary. Yes, I was one of those girls that had a diary, but I didn’t just write my “feelings” in them, I actually wrote stories (really short stories, might I add). Who would have thought I would turn that love for reading a writing into a job, and teach others my love as an English teacher?