Example Student Literacy Autobiography #1

Literacy and my Life

My definition of literacy has expanded over the course of my life.  I used to believe that literacy was just the ability to read.  Although this is a part of being literate, over time I have come to understand that literacy is a complex journey that involves learning how to take the written word and internalize what it means to you.  It also involves the ability to express ones opinions and feelings through the written word.  Clearly, this is not something that is mastered (unfortunately, it is even overlooked at times) in elementary or secondary education levels.  I am about to graduate from college and I still feel like my literacy is evolving. The reason for this slow assimilation is greatly tied to my lack of experience.  I still have a lot of life left.  As I will demonstrate through this autobiography of my literacy, experiences gained through the process of “growing up” really do inform a person’s literacy acquisition.  In this article, I hope to draw some lines between my experiences with literacy and my level of literacy comprehension. I also hope to show how these experiences will influence my teaching approaches.     

My earliest memory of literacy was spending time as a young child, with my mother, reading the Little Critter book series by Mercer Meyer.  I loved these books.  In fact, I still do.  I do not remember many details about these reading sessions, but I’m certain that the funny pictures and everyday adventures that I could relate with were the reason I was captivated by them.  I can deduce from the impression these books had on me that this was the start of my interest in becoming literate.  Entertaining oneself through imaginative reading is certainly a good place to start.  After all, I do not know very many children who read scholarly writings as a starting point.

This brings me to my growing up years.  I watched plenty of movies and television (Saved by the Bell?) but also spent a lot of time in school, learning how to be literate.  We learned our alphabet, how to sound out each letter, how to use these sounds to create words, and eventually how to string these words into full sentences.  “My dog is named spot.”  I don’t remember specifics, but I’m certain that sentences like this one were commonplace in our reader workbooks.  My work at school was further supplemented by reading I did at home.  My parents played a big role (particularly my mother) in making sure that I was on task in my studies.  I progressed and became a very good reader.  In fact (this is not intended to sound boastful), I was “above-average” as a reader.  I could sound out just about any word and retain these words for later use.  I think that my upbringing in a religious home played a big role in this ability.  I often, in church and individually, read theological passages in the old King James Version of the Bible and the Book of Mormon (another Christian-based scriptural volume of Ancient-American writings).  Many of these scriptural accounts are not easy reading.  I remember having the goal or ambition to want to learn how to recite these passages out loud in a convincing manner.  My upbringing in a home that valued the written word in theatrical arenas (both musical and non-musical) further fueled my desire to read these scriptural accounts as I would a dramatic text.

Knowing that I’m the kind of person who would choose a movie over a book any day of the week, I rarely read for pleasure.  The only times I would read novels was in school.  During Middle School and High School, I read a few standards of American literature, including To Kill a Mockingbird, The Scarlet Letter, and Grapes of Wrath.  Although I did not care much for the idea of reading for pleasure, I really did enjoy these books (even The Scarlet Letter!).  Unfortunately, these reading assignments led to little more than some fanciful discussion and maybe a short book report.

I feel that literacy became implanted in me because of all the writing I did throughout my schooling.  When I was in 6^th Grade, I had a caring English teacher who took the time to get some grant money so her students could learn how to write their own short books.  I still have these books at home.  I wrote a short book of poems, a story about Christmas (with illustrations), and many other imaginative works.  This teacher stepped out of the box and looked for ways to interest us in being literate.  It was a great idea.  I also had other teachers, mostly English, who took careful steps to make sure that I was learning how to write persuasively.  At the time I didn’t understand why they weren’t teaching us more grammar, but now I do.  The truth is that grammar is something that is acquired and learned by experience.  The real trick is learning how to organize thoughts and put those thoughts on paper.  That is what many of my teachers were trying to do.  I especially have fond memories of my last English teacher in High School.  Her southern drawl and gentile-like personality made class time interesting.  It was in her class that I received a C+ on one of my papers! This was unheard of! I was appalled and thought she must be nuts.  After all, who wouldn’t want to read a descriptive paper on vanilla ice cream?  It turns out that she didn’t, and I suffered the consequences.  I did recover though, and I’m happy to say that I learned many great things about writing in her class.  Although I didn’t think it at the time, she was a very influential teacher. 

                If I were to name the place where my literacy took off to a whole new level, it must have been in my English 2010 class (a writing class that I was required to take for my bachelor’s degree).  My initial feelings toward this class were hostile, but I found that the course really helped me to learn how to write about current issues.  This was the start of me becoming critically literate.  The course was an eye-opening experience for me.  My writing took on a whole new persona. I am indebted to the teacher of that class (I forget her name now, but her hippy-like personality is unforgettable). She was flexible, knowledgeable, and genuinely concerned about each of us.

I am now a writing fellow for a Music History Class in the music department of Utah State University. This means that I help students, as peer tutor, to revise their papers.  The professor for this course told me that he wanted me to do this job because of how well I write.  My thought was, “Have I really become that good?”  After so many attempts and tries at being a descriptive and interesting writer, it appeared that my forte in writing was academic prose.  How boring!  Nevertheless, I am constantly striving to become an interesting writer.  I have placed a lot of stock in figuring out how to write about musical academia in a way that won’t put readers to sleep.  This is yet another step that I hope to take in my literacy identity.  Similar to my previous experiences with becoming a dramatic reader, I hope to inject a dramatic writing style into my academic prose.  I’m working on it! 

I feel that there is an important lesson to be learned from my childhood literacy experiences. I spent a fair amount of my early childhood investing my imagination into the Little Critter books. Perhaps we, as a society, could learn how to invest our imagination into scholarly writings as much as we do into fictional novels. Such a technique would be tantamount to critical literacy, or internalizing, within each of us, how we could change the world for better.  I didn’t really learn about critical literacy until I was in my English 2010 class!  Imagine how much deeper and poignant my young adult thoughts would have been had I been taught how to be critically literate in elementary school! However, as I slip into my teaching loafers, I realize how difficult teaching critically literacy to young children can be. The biggest hoop to jump through is not being afraid or self-conscious about broaching their students opinions and feelings.  Sometimes teachers are unwilling to ask their students to think out of the box because they are afraid that they will lose control and have a class full of ruffians. This is simply not true.  I believe that students would more than live up to these higher expectations and would come away from such classes feeling greatly enriched.

  As a music educator, I’m always thinking about how arts education can complement other subjects and be taken seriously as legitimate coursework.  Looking at my own literacy, it is clear that my efforts to be dramatic in my reading were paramount in creating my literacy identity. Could one say that this example is a plug for arts education?  I think it could be.  This is particular poignant when speaking o of my emphasis, choral conducting. Teaching students how to project their voice and create real drama (in a musical format) could be extremely beneficial for reading comprehension and retention.

I described in the autobiography above some of the ways I was taught to appreciate literature in school.  Many of these efforts involved a read-through of a novel followed by some discussion and maybe a class presentation.  Many of these literature assignments asked us to glean life lessons from the books we read.  As good as this tactic was, none of these teachers asked us to take it a step further and ask, “How can I make sure I become this kind of person?” or “How can I make sure that these events never occur again?” I realize that, had my teachers taken the time to make us really internalize these pieces of literature, my personal literacy identity would have been greatly enhanced.  I feel like reading a piece of literature without internalizing it is like buying a fly fishing rod, taking private lessons on the techniques of fly fishing, learning how to tie flies, but never stepping into the river to fish.  As a teacher, I really hope that I can help the students to ask the difficult questions.

Writing is the inverse of reading.  When people first learn to write, they inadvertently use what they have read to form their own prose.  However, as time goes on, the apparent “borrowing” of material hopefully starts to dissipate.  What is left behind is that person’s writing style, their own person coming out in the pages.  As I stated above, my literacy was greatly enhanced by my learning how to write well.  I went through this process of becoming my own writer.  It was difficult and required many growing pains, but the end result was and is very satisfactory.  We have already discussed how important it is for each student to become critically literate.  I believe that one of the important steps that must accompany this internalization is being able to decode these ideas, organize them, and then lay them out in writing.  A person with a good idea usually doesn’t orate their ideas to a select few and then leave it at that.  Doing this would not create any sort of permanency.  Only when good ideas are written down do they become invaluable.  What would the world be like if Beethoven’s landmark 9^th symphony wouldn’t have been written down?  Sure, oral transmission is possible, but who knows how many ideas would have been forgotten or lost along the way. It may have evolved into a totally different piece of music!  Although these examples way seem extreme in conjunction with student prose, I can’t ascribe to allowing a student to think critically without asking them to write it down. Anything else would be a half effort. Every teacher should encourage thoughtful discussion and critical thinking, followed closely by assimilating those thoughts into prose.

It seems that my identity as a literate person was greatly influenced by my own desire to become better at it.  This begs the questions, “Where did I get that desire?”  Having reflected on this question, I feel that my desire was greatly fueled by the examples I had around me.  My parents were educated people, my older brothers were educated people, and most people that formed my social circle were educated.  All of them had literacy going for them.  It’s no wonder I had aspirations to become literate. The people who surrounded me shaped my identity.  This makes me think about students who don’t have those kinds of examples surrounding them.  It must be so difficult for them to cultivate a desire to develop a positive literacy identity. This is where a good teacher can really make a difference.  If a student respects their teachers and sees those persons constantly reaching for new literacy levels, they will also start to reach.  A good teacher can change a student’s affective outlook on literacy.  Imagine a student that leaves school having read about, thought about, and wrote about life issues.  Such a student would have a rich literacy identity. This should be the goal of education.