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Works Cited
Alexis, Cydney. "Writing Center." English 500. Kansas State University, Manhattan. 6 Feb 2015. Class Discussion.
Becker, Mark., dir. Pressure Cooker. Non Sequitur Productions, 2008. Film.
Brandt, Deborah. "Remembering Writing, Remembering Reading." College Composition and Communication 45.4 (1994): 468. Print.
Daycare
Without daycare, I would not be the person I am today. It may seem silly or untrue to say, but my daycare provider Kathy, the friends I made, and the experiences which I associate with daycare truly did affect my life. I was encouraged to play, to laugh and share, and perhaps most importantly, to read. One of my favorite parts of daycare occurred on sunny afternoons in which the other children and I were taken to the public library, a fairly short walk away from Kathy's house. We would walk in pairs along the sidewalk, arrive at the library, and spend about an hour picking out books. The walk back was a little more burdened, since we sometimes carried five or six books apiece, but we were excited nonetheless. I was very lucky to be able to have the experience of visiting the library with friends, and even luckier to have a daycare provider who valued the power of literature. I know many children do not have the opportunity to visit the public library frequently, which in my opinion is definitely detrimental for their education. Daycare with Kathy was not only immensely fun and carefree, but also very beneficial in growing my love for learning, all thanks to those little excursions to the library.
Drive
I have been self-driven as long as I can remember. My parents were encouraging enough, my teachers always supportive, but my biggest motivation for anything I have done in my life has been my own desire. Writing and reading started off very similar to riding a bicycle. I was given training wheels, from my parents' tradition of reading to my sister and I, to access to many literary resources. However, unlike riding a bike, once the "training wheels" were off, I continued to try for success on my own. I enjoyed to read and to write, and I chose to learn and grow as a reader and a writer. No one in my life demanded that I read hundreds of books, or write thousands of words, I just desired to. I do not mean to sound ungrateful, or that I was totally on my own as far as developing literacy-wise. However, without my passion and drive for continuing my literary development, I do not believe I would have the abilities that I have today. I do thank my family for encouraging me to pursue my passions, but I had to choose my passions (literature) for myself. Likewise, I had to decide what was not important or fun for me to do, such as riding a bike.
Writing means sharing. It's part of the human condition to want to share things - thoughts, ideas, opinions.
Paul Coelho
Reward
Intrinsic rewards, such as pride and joy, are important for any activity in a person's life. However, extrinsic rewards are just as pleasant, and for a child in school, perhaps even better. In 4th grade, my teacher took notice of my passion for writing, and gave me a booklet of information on a national poetry contest. The contest required students to write a poem of any length, and then draw/paint/create an illustration for the poem. Winning poems were then to be selected for a collection of poetry by elementary students. My competitive drive took over, and I started to work on a poem. Then, a few days later, my competitiveness wore off, and my perfectionism kicked in. I finally decided on a poem I was fairly pleased with, and shared it with my teacher. A drawing created with markers then soon followed to pair with the poem, and it was sent in to the judges. A few months later, a package arrived containing a congratulations letter and a copy of the book of poems, with my very own poem inside! As proud as I had been of my poetry and writing before the competition, I can say that the reward of winning a contest definitely inspired me to keep writing. Even though I am no longer eligible for elementary school contests and most extrinsic rewards (I just do not think I will ever earn a Pulitzer), my pride and happiness I associate with writing still exists.
Discovery
I have been told many times by my parents that they began reading to me very early in my life. My mom was not someone who read "War and Peace" to her extended womb three months into pregnancy, but a few months after I was born, stories were read. A favorite of mine was a book read to me so frequently that the pages began to tear. As letters were learned, and my phonics started to develop, I practiced how to read with that little, worn book about a cow. My parents happened to have a tape recorder at this time, and a love for sharing my achievements with family members, so when I mastered reading the story, I was recorded. I then listened to myself, and a whole new technique of mastering reading was acquired. Years that have followed my first "verbal triumph" have only added to my belief that reading stories out loud, whether they are someone else's work or your own, is beneficial to literacy. As we have discussed in English 500, and I have experienced in a tutoring session, reading one's own writing aids the writing process immensely (Alexis). Although I began this idea of the spoken writing being beneficial by stumbling my words into a little recorder, I still agree today, even as I stumble through my essays to a helpful stranger.
Insecurity
"Pressure Cooker", a documentary following a group of underprivileged kids in a Philadelphia high school culinary arts program, displays the students' feelings concerning their schooling, as well as their lives and futures. Having had the opportunity of watching this film, I began to realize a sort of relation between myself and some of the students. The young adults were trained and taught well, and seemed to succeed in their cooking class and competitions, but were often consumed with a lack of confidence. In my own life, I found the same to be true concerning my writing. My teachers praised my written work, and I even occasionally shared pieces which were not assigned to me, but an insecurity began to grow. I compared myself to my favorite (very experienced) authors, and even with a dream of writing a novel one day, I could not see my future with writing being successful. However, as the students in "Pressure Cooker" found that they were capable and even talented in their craft, I have also realized that my own insecurities do not always prove true. My writing, in short, has benefitted for the better as I have destroyed my inner doubts.
Choice
Out of all of the writing activities I have been assigned throughout the years, one has proved to be more prominent in my memory. In 3rd grade, my teacher Mrs. Gaeddert began a "Writing Workshop" unit, in which we were weekly given the purposes for our papers (to inform, to entertain, to persuade), and then we were allowed to choose the topic. I relished the thought of writing about whatever I wanted, and other students in the class seemed to as well. Comparing other writing assignments during my later years in school, I noticed a distinct difference in the students' attitudes concerning the writing. Although it is not possible to totally pinpoint the ability to choose as the cause for the difference and not simply that the students were younger and more eager to be in school, I believe that a "free reign" sense sparked creativity and positivity. Personally, I feel that these "writing workshops" deepened my interest in writing and storytelling, and I will aspire to incorporate this type of directive, but not too directive mode of teaching into my own future career.
Outlier
American culture highly values play in children's lives. Recesses are purposefully scheduled into school time, sometimes occurring in multiples throughout the day. As writing and reading began to be integral parts of curriculum and homework, a sort of separation was created between my peers and I. The "English" portion of the school day was met with groans from my classmates, and was usually followed by recess in order for the students to have a break from the tedious subject. Instead of leaving all of my literature at the door to the playground, I began to bring books and journals outside. Often I sat against the building, occasionally watching the other children play, but mostly I was engrossed in the story of Narnia, or Harry Potter. I became the "odd one out", the one more interested in reading and writing than playing tetherball or swinging. I do not regret this shift in my social life which was caused by my interest in written art, however I do know that these moments were influential in the rest of my school career and relationships with others.
Building
Before we run, we must crawl and then walk. Writing is no different. Probably my earliest recollections of writing occurred during preschool and kindergarten, as the alphabet was introduced into my active world. We learned an animal whose name started with the letter "A", and a fruit whose name started with the letter "B" and so on. Then the fun part began: we got to practice tracing and then writing our own letters. I do not recall ever realizing that we would one day combine letters to make words, sentences, or even entire essays. I just focused on the building blocks of carefully drawing lines to form the alphabet. Obviously, without the lesson of learning to write, I would not be capable of writing today. I maybe could have learned how to type first, skipping the amazing step of scribbling letters, but instead I highly value this memory. Creating letters was my "crawling", and without it I would not be able to "run" with topics for paragraphs and pages.
Parental Careers
Sponsorships, as they have been discussed in my English 500 class, are not the type of sponsorships which I had originally thought of. Instead of being individual people, or even small companies or groups of people, sponsorships are larger "umbrellas" which influence literacy. In my own personal story, my parents were strong influences on how, when, and why I wrote, and the subjects in which I wrote about. To incorporate my parents into the broader scope of sponsorships for my literacy, I instead look at their careers. My dad was a pastor at a small Presbyterian church, and I spent many Sunday afternoons in his office which was filled with bland religious tomes. My mom's career, however, was probably more influential to my actual reading and writing. As a child of an elementary school teacher, I often arrived at school at eight o'clock in the morning, heard the last bell ring at three in the afternoon, and remained until dinner time nearly every day. I recall spending hours in the library, speedily reading entire series while my mom worked at her desk planning the next day's lessons, and then often recommending books for my mom's "classroom library". After laptops were introduced into individual classrooms, I began to split my time between reading, and writing short stories usually inspired by the fantasy books I had been reading. Writing became a verifiable source of enjoyment during my afternoons at school, and if I grew tired of writing, I simply turned off the computer, and read once again. I believe that these occasions became the turning point for my writing, and I began to see it as a fun activity.
Catharsis
The majority of people, according to Deborah Brandt, author of "Remembering Writing, Remembering Reading", do not consider themselves "writers" (Brandt 468). Personally, I am no exception to this common way of thinking. Throughout my life I have written for school assignments, for my mom on her way to the grocery store, during playtime with my sister, and even to tell stories. As much as I have written in my debatably short years on Earth, I have never called myself an author, or a successful writer. Perhaps the closest point I have gotten to being a self-proclaimed "writer" occurred in my high school career. After being admitted to a hospital in 8th grade for anorexia nervosa, and months and years of striving for recovery, I began penning a blog to document my story. I poured out my pride and my despair, my hopes and my mistakes, and writing aided me in reaching my most successful point of recovery from my eating disorder. Writing became my form of catharsis, and I eventually shared my work with Facebook, and ultimately the World Wide Web. Perhaps I did not consider myself as a writer because my blog did not become an overnight internet sensation, or maybe because I was not completely satisfied with my writing. Whatever the case was, I discovered parts of myself I had not reached before, and I owe that very much to writing and my blog.