1st draft literacy memoir

8/2/2019 1st Draft Literacy Memoir

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Kristin Hollifield

Mrs. McAmisThursday, May 3, y

The great Dr. Seuss once said, The more that you read, the more things you will know.

The more that you learn, the more places you'll go. Reading can have a variety of meanings and

purposes to people. Some may enjoy reading for pleasure while others may only read when

mandatory for school or work. To myself reading is an escape, a vivid movie in my head that I

experience no matter the book. I place myself in the book and watch right along with every word,

simulating that I am right there in the script. Reading is more than just words on a page to me,

reading is an adventure and changes with every book I read. Thats what pulls me in, thats what

makes me want to continue to read all the time. Reading not only is pleasurable to me but has

helped extend my vocabulary, complete many school assignments but has also helped further my

education.

I cant say that I have always loved reading, I have had many times when reading was

boring and hard to get through. Behind every book I have read whether a good experience or bad

has taught me something. I remember when I was in the third grade my teacher Mrs. Carson called

me to the front of the room and announced that I had broken the school record for a third graders

reading level and was already almost to the fifth grade Accel level. I can remember like it was

yesterday smiling from ear to ear taking my certificate home to my parents. Every year after that

my teachers pushed me harder and harder in the books I was reading, by fourth grade I had

finished all the fifth grade books, including the Harry Potter series by JK Rowling which I would

finish in less than three days. Books indulged my time and it seemed like when I began a book the

time flew until I was finished. It was something that was a part of my every day routine as a

elementary age kid. I never remember my mom ever having to force me to read only an occasional

reminder if she thought I had forgot then I would immediately read.


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Kristin Hollifield


Whenever I started middle school I was placed in a private classical academy with a strict

curriculum unlike elementary school, separating me from all my friends and placing me

somewhere that I absolutely did not want to be. At my new elementary school we could choose to

read whatever we liked. In middle school we had certain books that we were required to read and

then respond to. Books that I did not want to read, I didnt want to read for any class. We read

things like Iliad and the Odyssey by Homer the Greek poet, To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee

and other books that were not of any interest to me at the time. The books began to be painful and

turned reading into something that I hated, something I never thought would happen. We soon

began reading these books, discussing them in class and taking tests on the material. I began

neglecting reading and replacing my reading with other activities. My teachers became concerned

with the fact that reading was no longer something I relished. My own definition of how I felt

about reading through this period was like hearing nails on a chalk board for me. It was something

that I avoided at all possible times, I did not read for fun, for school I did only because it was for a

grade. My personal love for reading had diminished.

My stage of detest for reading continued until I started my junior year of English. My

academic counselor knew through my records that I had been in academically accelerated English

classes until ninth grade when I chose to be placed in normal English for the first time since second

grade. She suggested that I should try Honors eleventh grade English. I looked in to it and found

that one of the best English teachers at our school was teaching it that year. All my friends that had

taken her class loved every second of it. Whether they enjoyed reading, writing or English they

specifically encouraged me to take her class. The first book assigned to read was A Scarlet Letter

by Nathaniel Hawthorne. I dreaded the reading because that was just my mentality that had

developed over time. After reading the book in a littler over two days I had indulged myself into a


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Kristin Hollifield


world with a girl exiled by her community, pregnant and lonely. I had did the unthinkable by

reading a book and enjoying it. This book was interesting to me and spoke to me through this girls

story. Mrs. Parker made us a write a two four page paper on what we had just read. Going in to the

paper I was nervous as to the outcome but when I began to write the words flowed out. I wrote a

story through the adventure I had depicted in my head. I had created the movies in my head that I

used to do when reading was one of my favorite was such a huge factor in my life. After that every

book I read I enjoyed and every paper I wrote about what I read just seemed to come easy.

Through out all the phases that I have went through Mrs. Parkers seeing me struggle with

reading and pushing me to be passionate to read again not only rekindled my love for reading but

taught me all the things that I have learned over the years through reading. I saw that the movies

that I made added details and made words be easier to remember and descriptions easier to

account. If I applied that to any thing that I needed to do with my reading I could envision up the

story and write down everything I imagined. Writing became another thing that I could do without

many problems. Reading at such a young age also helped with my vocabulary, using large words

was easy to me and knowing the correct ways way to place my words was no longer as much of a

problem. I still continue to increase all these skills day by day through reading. Reading not only

was a interest of mine but laid out all the bricks for my pathway to help my writing skills mature. I

am continuing to read, respond and just to write. This quote by Stphane Mallarm explains how

through my stages of figuring out what reading did for me is easily described through this

statement. In reading, a lonely quiet concert is given to our minds; all our mental faculties will be

present in this symphonic exaltation.

1st draft literacy memoir

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