Ever since I was young both of my parents encouraged me to read. My father was first generation college and my mother was second so they knew that in order for me to succeed in this world I needed as much experience as I could get, as soon as I could get it. The best way they found for me to get that experience was through reading. Although most of the important parts of the books I read, like context, motifs, extended metaphors, and information about the author, were lost on me, I still read them and experimented with the structure. I learned new, complex words and read of places I never knew existed. Thanks to my parents pushing me to read books, they helped shape the way I think, talk, write, read, and other way communicate therefore beginning my journey in literacy.
I have had a few memorable teachers and mentors in my life and each one has taught me a skill that I still use in my reading and writing today. The first major lesson I learned was with organization. My sixth grade history and English teacher, Bryan Simpers, used a chart to help us organize data that we found. The data was organized into three categories: Affirmative, Negative, and Interesting. After reading the question, I was taught to organize as much data as I could into the chart. After reading through all the columns, I would figure out which one was the stronger argument according to the evidence. This organization helped me learn how to sift though large amounts of evidence in a short time and write a strong position with strong counterarguments and synthesis.
When I reached high school, one of the first classes I took was Latin 4. My teacher, Kari Tudor, emphasized the detail I had to put into my work. The main assignment of the year was to read, translate, and rewrite De Bello Gallico by Julius Caesar. For each word I read I had to identify every aspect that word could have held. I had to take in where the word was in the sentence, what ending it had, the context of the text so far, the different meanings it could have, and why Caesar would chose that word. The process of translating into English was difficult. I seemed to run into issues that I could not quite explain what Caesar was saying in the exact way that he meant it. I asked my teacher and her response was to “Learn more words.” I went through my Latin-English dictionary and wrote down every possible meaning for each word. Even with a vast vocabulary in the language, I couldn’t get the literal meaning of the Latin to be represented in the English text. After Latin 4 I had skills to learn new definitions, apply the meanings to the appropriate context, and to identify and recreate the authors tone.
The next skill I added to my list was the ability to synthesize. The Ap U.S. History had essays on the exam that focused solely on how the art of an era was the perfect place to find what issues were starting to arise. The music of the 80s had the happy beat with the sinister meaning, such as Bruce Springsteen’s “Born to Run” which has a fast tempo beat but discusses suicide of every kind in small town America. My teacher, Ms. Sandling, focused heavily on how to look past the literal words of music, art, and cartoons and be able to pick apart who the author was, why the piece had been created, what their beliefs on certain issues were, and what they were trying to accomplish. One DBQ I remember writing was on a cartoon of Richard Nixon. The white was seen as being crushed by a large tape. Obviously this referred to the tapes that held all the conversations that Nixon had recorded and thus had the incriminating evidence. But from that picture I had to write a full essay on the meaning. I had difficulty trying to pull a full essay from just a simple image. My teacher taught me to look deeper. What was gong on in the image? What did these things mean? Surely the white house being crushed was a bad thing but why was that so bad? Why did I care about that? I can assume no one got hurt. Why is it a tape? What can be figured out from this image? There were the obvious ones but it wasn’t obvious if the reader didn’t know any history of Nixon or if they didn’t know what the tape was or what the White House was. By basic knowledge I was able to detect that this was from post-Watergate but before the resignation of Nixon. The tapes were an allusion to Nixon’s recording. But that wasn’t enough to write a full essay. I needed to identify how the author felt and what they were trying to suggest by the image. I determined that the author was probably a general American, without any political bias too evident; except that they weren’t far right. The author was disgusted by the actions that the president took during times of peace. The suggested course of action by the author was the most difficult. There were no words attached with the comic and no action was being completed. The biggest meaning I could find was that the tapes were used by Nixon to ruin his career. But there was more, my teacher told me to keep going and it finally came to me. I had to look to what came after, the presidency of Ford and Carter. I noticed a large change of trends. Voter turnout decreased, studies showed less trust of the government and that’s when I discovered what was really being said. Nixon’s betrayal of privacy destroyed the reputation of not only Nixon but the image of the presidency and the image of the government as a whole in the eyes of the people. My AP U.S. History teacher helped me to gain the skill of how to take into the consider the author and the author’s situation in order to determine the meaning and the it ended purpose.
Most of the papers that I wrote in high school were usually only one to two pages and for exams or tests. I didn’t receive my first real paper until my AP Government class in my senior year. I received an assignment of a ten page research and position page on the issue of gerrymandering. I had two months to prepare and write this paper. I had never done research of that magnitude before so I consulted with a familiar teacher, Mr. Weigand. Weigand was another government teacher at my high school and was also one of my swim coaches. I asked him for advice on how to do research of this extent. Following his remarks, I spent the next two weekends doing only research with websites, the constitution, and library books. I gathered pages of sources of information, laws, and court cases related to the question. After gathering the information I went back to consult with him. He told me that I now needed to go through and create my thesis. And after creating my thesis he told me that I needed to now sift through the information I had and decided what to keep for my thesis, for my counterargument, and for my synthesis at the end. I had already used my ANI chart that I learned to you in sixth grade. I finished my paper comfortably with two weeks until it was due. I was able to have my teacher read it over as a rough draft and suggest corrections. In the end I was able to receive a grade much higher than I originally expected and solidified a way to research for information in future papers, projects, and paragraphs. Through the better ways of research I am better able to communicate my ideas with concrete, proper noun examples.
Since I’ve graduated and picked up creative writing as a hobby. Most of the stories I write, similarly to Ray Bradbury, are based on things I notice throughout the day or dreams I have at night. In the past three months I’ve written seven stories. Ranging from reiterating a dream I’ve had and connecting to my life to having an idea crossing my mind and writing about wat might happen if I follow through. I do not use all of the skills I learned during my k-12 education but I do use some. I use the vocabulary I’ve used, the ability to apply the different connotations for the different contexts. I use the creative writing to get issues off my mind. The creative writing I do helps keep my skill in practice. I may not always write as formal as I do for school
My literary process has been helped by many of my teachers, my peer, and both of my parents. All of these people made it their job to make sure that I was prepared to enter the world of college writing and for life as a whole. From learning organization to new vocabulary to the deeper research and analysis, every step or form I learned was to benefit me and my process into becoming a productive member of society and of the literary community.
Works Cited:
Ben-Veniste, Richard. “Watergate Lawyer: Trump Is Going Full Nixon on Mueller.” The Atlantic, Atlantic Media Company, 12 Apr. 2018, www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/04/watergate-lawyer-trump-is-going-full-nixon-on-mueller/557759/.
UCtelevision. “An Evening with Ray Bradbury 2001.” YouTube, YouTube, 1 May 2008, www.youtube.com/watch?v=_W-r7ABrMYU.