English Writing

Example 1

Student Example

Professor C.N. Myers

English 1010-E01

5 May 2009

Don’t Ever Let Someone Tell You That You Can’t Do Something:

A Literacy Narrative

I will never forget learning how to read and write for the very first time. I used to closely

watch my sister do her work for college. Then, I would innocently sit by her and read a book to

mimic her. This memory immediately comes to my head when I think about how I learned to

read. I remember my sister getting me ready for a bath on one warm summer night before my

first day of kindergarten. I told her how excited I was for the next day and asked her, “Will I

learn how to read and count?” She replied with “Yes, you’re going to learn your ABCs and your

123s and everything else.” I went onto to ask her, “But what are ABCs?” She said, “You’ll find

out.” Then, I washed up quickly and continued to get ready for the next day.

Ever since that first day, I would annoyingly show my sister my books and worksheets

and ask her about every word I couldn’t pronounce. She would tell me to just sound them out

instead of telling me every one of them. So I did exactly that. I would patiently sit there every

day and analyze words that I couldn’t say. I broke them down word by word, never giving up. I

would divide the words up by their letters as if they were math problems. I built word upon word

every day. I was fascinated by books series such as Arthur and The Bernstein Bears. I loved

everything about them from the way they felt in my hand to the world that they took me into just

by reading. I also mimicked my brother when he did his reading for school. I loved being

around my siblings and doing everything they did, no matter what it was. So while they were

Example 2

reading to accomplish goals in school, my earliest recollections of reading and writing were

simply for the enjoyment of being closer to the people I loved the most.

As I went through elementary school, I always especially enjoyed reading books and

writing. I used to read books such as Dav Pilkey’s Captain Underpants and Jeff Kinney’s Diary

of a Wimpy Kid. I would read the books then rewrite my own version of a certain chapter

because I thought my version would be more interesting and whimsical. I had composition

books full of my imaginative writings. They also had different cartoon sketches I would make

up. Those books were amazingly colorful due to the fact that I wrote mostly with colored

pencils. I spent months upon months perfecting those composition notebooks that I called books.

Page by page, I would fill them up. I remember also asking my friends for help along the way.

They weren’t as interesting; in fact, they may have thought it was a little silly for me to actually

think my writings were real books. I remember days where I used to get in trouble for writing

those things in school without permission. Books that I read through elementary school

fascinated me so much that I would carry them around with me all day to read whenever I had

free time and also to write my different versions to the books. I remember being required to

check books out once a week in elementary school and how overwhelmed I was by the selection;

frankly if it was not a requirement at all, I would’ve still done it. It would take me an extensive

amount of time to actually check my book out because I never knew what to choose.

Unfortunately, we could only check out two at a time.

Along with those positive memories of reading early on in my life, there were also not so

positive memories. There was one specific time where one day we paid a visit to the library as

we normally did once a week. We usually were told to only pick books from a certain section of

books where I guess those were easier. I decided to venture off into the other sections of the

Example 3

library because I was uninterested in the books we always had to choose from. I scrambled

through the books until I finally found one that I wanted. It was a biography about Martin

Luther King, Jr., which was clearly written for kids because it included vivid pictures. For the

life of me, I can’t remember the name of it. I was really interested in the civil rights movement,

even at that young of an age. I took the book up to the checkout station and the librarian

immediately said with attitude, “You cannot read!” I replied with shock, “Yes, I can.” I was

appalled by this because I didn’t understand why I was doubted. I felt as I was being stripped of

my chance to expand my literacy skills. I hated that the school system was trying to make me

into someone who waited for instructions to expand my reading rather than doing it on my own.

This wasn’t even the worst part. The librarian then said, “If you can read me the entire first

page, then I will let you check it out.” I stumbled through it, but I completed the first page and

was able to check it out. By her attitude with checking my book out, I think she felt the

satisfaction of knowing she was right; I couldn’t read the whole thing at that point.

When I got home, I told my mother the entire story. She then gave me words of

encouragement that would always stick with me and would come to me any time I had to read

and write. My mother told me, “Don’t ever let someone tell you that you can’t do something.”

It is a simple statement, but it was very powerful and definitely something I hadn’t heard before.

That motivated me, and by the end of the day, I had researched how to say every single word in

that book. I proudly read it aloud to my entire family as they listened to me cheerfully. With

that, the situation died down, but it always stayed in the back of my brain every week when I

stepped into the library.

I can remember a time in 6th grade where I got in a great deal of trouble at school because

I was caught cheating on a test. After nervously breaking the news to my family, they started in

Example 4

on me. They took everything I had that entertained a young boy: my video games, my cell

phone, and my access to television. At that point several different thoughts were running

through my head. When will I get my things back? Will I ever have fun again? All of these

questions were answered a day or so after the incident. My parents, who were still furious at me,

told me that the only way I would be able to get my things back within the next week was if I

wrote a two-page letter of apology to them, my teacher, and to the principal of the school. That

idea was insane to me, and frankly I didn’t think that it was possible for me to do it. Then again,

I wanted my things back and I wanted my life to return back normal, so I had no choice. After

minutes of debating and trying to come up with a simpler way, I decided to go ahead and roll

with it. Surprisingly, my parents rejected my first attempt. My dad scolded me saying, “Do it

Over! It doesn’t flow.” The next time I decided to start on it, it took me three whole days to

complete it. My dad was astonished that I was able to grow my work in such a short period of

time. After that, I showed my teacher, and he was just as surprised. After accepting my

apology, he even assigned that as a regular punishment if one of the classroom rules were

broken, pretty much all because of me.

What I learned about literacy through my young years put me on a wonderful path for

how I approach literacy now. I approach it now not as something that is forcefully thrown at me

because of school curriculum, but as something that will advance my mind, body, and soul for

years to come. I came to understand that even though literacy may not be something that I

would like to make a career out of, it will indeed carry me out through life. Literacy ties into

every second of the real world, no matter what path you are on or what field you are in.

Example 5

Works Cited

Brandt, Deborah. “Sponsors of Literacy.” Writing about Writing: A College Reader. ed. 2. Ed.

Elizabeth Wardle and Doug Downs. Boston: Bedford/St. Martins, 2014. 43-62. Print.

Brown, Marc. Arthur. New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1986. Print

Stan and Jan Berenstain. The Berenstain Bears. New York: Random House, 1980. Print

Pilkey, Dav. Captain Underpants. New York: Scholastic, 1997. Print

Kinney, Jeff. Diary of a Wimpy Kid. New York: Amulet Books, 2007. Print