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Jaime Paredes
Miss E.
UWRT 1103
November 20, 2014

How I Read: A Personal Literacy Narrative

One of my earliest memories I recall is my parents reading to me as a child. They would

let me pick a book and from there they would read it to me as I would slowly fall asleep. This is
one of the best memories that I have with my parents spending time with me. What I did not
understand at the time was that they were actually laying down a base. This base, I used to step
off and improve my reading and writing skills as I progressed throughout elementary, middle,
and high school. Your individual literacy level is affected by your experiences, memories, and
your environment. Close friends and family also plays a crucial role in how you have developed
your literacy skills. Every persons literacy has been shaped and molded in a unique way by how
they have come about in life and who they have encountered along the way.
I struggled with learning the English language. It took me a while to understand the
complexity of it. It was new to me as a child, due only to the fact that all we spoke in the
household was Spanish. My parents moved to the United States in the 80s from Ecuador, a
Spanish speaking country in South America. In my infancy, I was spoken to and taught in
Spanish. I didnt even learn English until I had to attend school. My first day of kindergarten I
walked into my class without knowing a word of English. Alarmed, because I did not understand
what the teacher was saying to me, I quickly panicked. In the first three years of elementary

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school, I was enrolled in a specific class where the main focus was to learn English. Over those
three years I would become frustrated trying to understand many different words, none the less I
picked up on the language fairly quickly after the 3rd grade. I kept getting better and better at
pronouncing words and common phrases. Soon you couldnt even tell I had an accent. I believe
that the way I learned and was taught the English language affected how I write and pronounce
words today. It could have affected the way I communicate with other people or how I say
different words or sayings. While other students where taught how to write in English, I was
being taught how to speak it. This could have had a big impact on how I read and write. The way
I was taught could have even been the difference of whether I had a southern accent or not. Most
people learn to speak English through their parents but I learned through a teacher, in a class,
with people who had difficulty speaking English as well.
Finally out of the third grade and out of those English classes, I was eager to enter the
fourth grade. Reading was a very big part of the fourth grade as well as a fourth grade state
writing test that had to be taken at the end of the year. My parents knew about the big state test
and were worried that because I did not attend the English classes anymore, I would do badly on
the test. My dad decided to make me have thirty minutes of silent reading every day after school.
This would help me with pronouncing words and to have a better vocabulary for the state test at
the end of the year. As a child I hated this idea. I already got enough of reading at school. Why
do I have to read more at home, I would constantly tell my dad. My dad told me it would help
me with my reading and writing as well as help me prepare for the writing test. Every day after
school I would dread coming home to have to read for thirty minutes. Sometimes I would try to
pretend to read and wander off and other times I would fall asleep. From time to time I would
hide my Gameboy behind my book so it looked like I was reading, when I was actually play

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Super Mario. My dad eventually told me to try to find something that I was into and to read
about it. This way I would actually be engaged in reading. I began to search my school library
for fiction books and grew a liking of novels about mysteries and horror. About every week I
would take home a different book to read and actually read them. Soon I would read not only
when I had to but during my free time as well. I became interested in reading different genres
and authors. Reading became a very important aspect of my life. By the end of the year I have
had to have read about forty chapter books, which to me, as a child, was a pretty big deal. By
making me do this my dad was helping me better understand the English language as well as
expand my vocabulary. By reading every day, I did not only pick up on the words but also the
dialogue and sentence structure each author preferred to use. Reading everyday benefited me
greatly. It shaped how I pronounce words, how I write my sentences and how I communicate
with other people. Reading each day helped improve how I write as well. I read after school, for
thirty minutes a day, up until I entered high school. Thats when the way I was reading books
and writing essays changed completely.
I did not started learning to write in depth papers until I reached high school. The ninth
grade was a difficult year for me, not only because I was just getting used to the new school, but
also because I had a tough freshman English class. My 9th grade teacher wasnt exactly the best
of teachers. During the school year my original English teacher became ill and could not teach,
therefore the school brought in a new teacher who was particularly lazy. This new teacher taught
us nothing. Day after day she would walk into class and sit at her desk while she played a movie
of a famous Shakespearean play or English novel. Now as a freshman in high school, I did not
necessarily have a problem with that method of teaching. I came to class every day that year and
played on my cellphone that I would pull out at the beginning of class. To make matters worse,

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this class was the first of the morning which allowed me to nap very often. While other students
complained about how many English papers they had to write or by when the next book had to
be read, I would just cruise on by, easily making As in that class. I should have known it would
have caught up with me, but as an immature freshman I didnt really care. Soon enough exams
came along. Everyone passed as usually, while our class struggled to make the grade. None the
less we moved right along without a care in the world. Sophomore year came around and after an
adventurous summer, I was ready to get back on with class. First day of English class we have to
write an essay. Not too bad, I thought to myself as I handed in my paper. The next week the
teacher returns the paper to us. I had so many corrections on my paper. Grammatical errors,
syntactic errors, punctuation errors where everywhere. On top of that I had the lowest grade in
the class. Thats when it hit me that I was a year behind everyone else. All my time used play
games and sleeping in class could have been used to, at least, read a couple novels. Sophomore
year I truly struggled with that English class. Which could all have been avoided by making an
effort to learn my freshman year. At this chapter in my life, I probably was a pretty awful writer.
We all have had bad teachers but this one in particular affected my reading and writing skills in a
negative way. I was behind all my peers in English and had to catch up quick. My reading and
writing abilities had deteriorated since I chose to slack off my freshman year in English class.
Luckily, not all hope was lost. I ended up getting the best teacher that has ever taught me my last
two years in high school.
I dont recall why but my consular decided to stick me in AP English my junior year of
high school. She told me it would improve my GPA as well as give me college credit. I was very
worried by this. I could barely pass my tenth grade honors English class, much less a college
level English one. Luckily I was fortunate enough to receive a great teacher. Mr. Egan always

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had something funny to say. He would always make jokes in class or have jokingly sarcastic
remarks he would respond to students with. The first time I walked into his class he looked fairly
intimidating. He was very tall, had no hair and a very long gray beard, he kind of looked like a
giant sorcerer wizard, all he need was a cape and a staff. My thoughts of him quickly changed as
he began to teach the class. He would make jokes and actually engage the class when he gave
lectures. Mr. Egan would always have this Chewbacca mask that he would wear from time to
time while he gave lectures. From time to time he would make corky weird sounds and just often
get side tracked talk to students right in the middle of a lecture. One time Mr. Egan taught us
things in a fashion that made the class want to pay attention to him. In the middle of lectures, Mr.
Egan often would pull up a random YouTube video or he would become side tracked with a
funny story from college he would tell us. The way he kept us wanting to read, wanting to study
and learn more was impressive, but the way he taught us was genius. He would make us write
papers every week, starting from week one. We also had in class essays about twice a week,
which ranged from two to three pages. He would teach us techniques and ways to become better
writers and gave us a list of vocabulary words we would have to memorize by the end of the
year. We would often watch movies about novels we had to read in a weekends time. It was a
challenging class but we enjoyed learning with him. Whenever I struggled he would work with
me one on one or see if I could come after class to receive feedback on my paper, which was
very helpful to me. I learned so much from Mr. Egan that I passed both AP English exams my
last two years I high school. Mr. Egan had a big impact on how I read and what I read today. He
played one of the most crucial roles how I improved my reading and writing skills.
Looking back today many factors had to be put in place to get to where I am. My parents
and various instructors played a key role in how I speak and how I write. All the times that I

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have had to read long novels and all the times that I have had to write extensive essays have
made me a better writer and have formed my literacy. My parents reading to me, My ESL
teacher and Mr. Egan all shaped my literacy skills and have helped me become educated and
communicate properly. All my experiences throughout my life plus the people who have
surrounded me along these eighteen years have affect my vocabulary and how I read and write.