Rayner 1 Dillon Rayner Ms.

Raymond ENGL 1103 17 Sept 13 Literacy Narrative Rough Draft To call the progression of my literacy narrative unique would be an understatement, I would say. The reason behind this is that the way I learned to read, write, and compose actually had no influence by any book or tangible object. Rather, it was through technology that my literacy narrative began to develop. I remember back when I was around four years old or so that I discovered the wonderful device called the computer, and I would play on it every day religiously. My grandmother who babysat me would always worry that I would do something to break the computer but my parents knew that I knew what I was doing, and I knew how to fully use a computer by the time I was about five or six years old. I always played those educational kids games that seemed fun but were really teaching me reading and math skills. I also played this keyboarding game that taught me how to use the keyboard correctly and how to increase my words per minutes so I would say that I had a bit of an advantage over the rest of my fellow students. The community I grew up in was relatively normal in size. It was not exactly tiny, but it was not massive either. We were not really connected with each other until a few years ago when a group of the old men that lived in our community started up a neighborhood association and watch. They held weekly meetings and created an electronic newsletter which was sent out before every meeting. Before this, the community was the farthest thing from oral, but with the

Rayner 2 creation of the neighborhood association, people who lived in the community finally got a chance to speak up about issues they felt needed fixing, and we became more connected with each other. There was not a library in my community but there was one about ten minutes away so we still had access to one. My neighborhood was not the most successful or safest, to say the least. I was always told come back home before the street lights came on and every few houses you would see a dilapidated home with an unkempt lawn that made the surrounding houses look less appealing. My neighborhood also had its fair share of minorities. There was a large number of African-Americans and Hispanics, but the Bosnian gangs seemed to be the main problem. They were responsible for a large number of crimes, such as robberies, vandalism, and breaking and entering. They even tried to get into my house in the middle of the night but my dog scared them away thankfully. My neighborhood was also mostly lower middle class, which probably goes without saying. Most of the families worked 9:00 to 5:00 jobs and barely got by with little to spare, and my family was no different. When my birthday and Christmas came around, I, just like every other kid, had a wish list that was a mile and a half long, but I learned over time the reason why I only got maybe three or four things from that list, and my wish lists became gradually smaller and smaller to the point to where I would only ask for one or two, maybe three, things a year. As much as I know I should do this, I have never really used the writing process; I have always just started writing and hoped to find direction somewhere along the way, which is exactly what I did with this essay. Alongside that, I usually do not even draft, and if I do, I only do it once. I would just rather turn in my first effort and be done with it, and I believe that social networking has a large part in that. Social networks have made society, as a whole,

Rayner 3 progressively slower. For example, Twitters 140-character limit on tweets make tweeters have to consolidate what they want to say, and that, in turn, has an effect on our reading process. We become used to posting and reading short snippets and getting the gist of what people are saying, so when we have to read a novel or a long news article, we would much rather skim over it and just understand the main idea instead of taking the time to read the entire thing. In some cases, people will just skip reading it altogether. We have become essentially lazy, in the fact that we just want the main idea given to us instead of having to read a six- or seven- page long article or a 300-page novel and fully comprehending it. I believe that has had the largest effect on my literacy narrative, and everyone I know would agree with this statement. I do not really use Facebook or any social networking site to help improve my writing process, but I do use class notes and emails to make it better. I can relate with the literacy narrative of Sherman Alexie. I had a love of the Harry Potter novels as a child. I would read every free chance I got, even if it was only a few seconds, such as reading books at recess, then during lunch, and in the few minutes left after I had finished my classroom assignments. (Alexie 2) I can relate to the literacy narrative of Malcolm X as well. We both loved to read books as we were kids. Some people even thought I was in a higher grade than everyone else. Malcolms Xs literacy narrative. For this was definitely humbling; I had no clue what to say in front of a fellow brother when he was around after this happened. I became increasing how would I sound writing in slang, the way I would say it, something such as, "Look, daddy, let me pull your coat about a cat, there is no doubt that I will ever be dreading that, Muhammad. On a positive note, something that had a huge effect on my life as a whole has impacted my literacy narrative for the better. I found out in May that I, along with only 99 other students

Rayner 4 in the state, received the Class II Veterans Scholarship, which is awarded to dependents of a veteran who has been wounded in combat. It is a full ride, so I would not be sitting here typing this essay if it was not for that scholarship. This has had a positive effect on my literacy narrative because in high school I did not really care that much; I sort of just floated by. Now that I am going to college for free and the fact that I will lose the scholarship if my grades are not high enough, I am definitely more motivated for school than I have ever been. This is, in essence, the progression of my literacy narrative. I started out on a huge desktop computer playing kids games, and now I am at college and going to class without having to pay a single cent. I would say that for the most part, it has turned out extremely well for me.

Rayner 5 Works Cited Page

Alexie, Sherman. The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me. McQuade, Donald, Ed. The Writers Presence: A Pool of Readings, Fifth Edition. Boston: Bedford/St. Martins, 2003. 73-76.

Malcolm X. Learning to Read. Smccd.net. Web. 18 Dept 13.