Literacy Narrative
Patrick Gregory
ENGL 1105 – 2
Professor Neil Carpathios
May 23, 2013
Literacy Narrative
Reading: Enjoyment to Loathing I remember distinctly sitting in the back of the classroom at the reading table with my reading group. Two oak tables situated side by side with twelve small blue plastic chairs surrounding them, filled with my cohorts and I. We were first grade students. The teacher had distributed the shiny new textbooks to us. She was going to teach us a life changing skill that we would use every day for the rest of our lives; a skill that would change our futures forever; a skill that would open the doors to lifelong learning. She was going to teach us to read. Reading was fun when it was newly acquired skill. I was excited to read to my parents when they returned home from work. I remember reading my favorite book series by R.L. Stein (Goosebumps) while in the second and third grades. The series was about hauntings that affected teenagers. I remember my favorite book in the series was Piano Lessons Can Be Murder. I could relate to that because at the time, I was taking piano lessons. The newness of reading had worn off by junior high. My leisure reading had decreased significantly due to sports and increase in textbook reading assignments made by our teachers. The textbook reading assignments changed how I felt about reading. When in elementary school, reading was learning, but what we were reading were nothing more than stories made up by a publishing company. There was usually a lesson learned at the end of the story. Textbooks didn’t have that same story like nature. They were full of facts and what seemed like complex analogies and theories. Reading was not fun anymore. Things did not get any better in high school. The reading assignments became longer. The theories became more complex. More and more of our learning depended on textbook readings instead of in class lecture. It seemed like the instructors only hit the high points
ENGL 1105 – 2
Professor Neil Carpathios
May 23, 2013
Literacy Narrative
Reading: Enjoyment to Loathing I remember distinctly sitting in the back of the classroom at the reading table with my reading group. Two oak tables situated side by side with twelve small blue plastic chairs surrounding them, filled with my cohorts and I. We were first grade students. The teacher had distributed the shiny new textbooks to us. She was going to teach us a life changing skill that we would use every day for the rest of our lives; a skill that would change our futures forever; a skill that would open the doors to lifelong learning. She was going to teach us to read. Reading was fun when it was newly acquired skill. I was excited to read to my parents when they returned home from work. I remember reading my favorite book series by R.L. Stein (Goosebumps) while in the second and third grades. The series was about hauntings that affected teenagers. I remember my favorite book in the series was Piano Lessons Can Be Murder. I could relate to that because at the time, I was taking piano lessons. The newness of reading had worn off by junior high. My leisure reading had decreased significantly due to sports and increase in textbook reading assignments made by our teachers. The textbook reading assignments changed how I felt about reading. When in elementary school, reading was learning, but what we were reading were nothing more than stories made up by a publishing company. There was usually a lesson learned at the end of the story. Textbooks didn’t have that same story like nature. They were full of facts and what seemed like complex analogies and theories. Reading was not fun anymore. Things did not get any better in high school. The reading assignments became longer. The theories became more complex. More and more of our learning depended on textbook readings instead of in class lecture. It seemed like the instructors only hit the high points