Literacy Narrative - Winnie Ngo

My Literacy in English

Literacy in English began for me at a very young age, but it was something I had difficulty keeping up with. When I was about three, I still wasn’t talking like other children so my parents had someone come in to help me. My parents had a middle age Chinese lady who would come in for a certain amount of time to do some interactive activities with me. She would communicate with my parents in Chinese, but she encouraged me to speak English. I personally don’t recall my first word but according to my mother it was “apple.” Hence this was the beginning of my journey in acquiring literacy in English.

English in school was never an easy subject for me. Talking in English wasn’t a problem for me, but when it came down to reading and writing it just never clicked. I would always wonder why reading and writing wasn’t as easy as speaking. I could never focus when I’m reading making it feel long and boring. When given a book that was difficult to understand it made me more hesitant to read. Writing is something I didn’t quite like before high school. Every time I handed in a writing assignment there would always be something I could fix or improve on. It was never like math problem where you could just follow the exact steps and get one final answer. Every written assignment returned would always have a ton of corrections and comments, which left me the impression that I would never get better. In middle school my grades improved greatly but English was still lagging behind. My seventh grade English teacher, Ms. Hiller, would always hand us a textbook and ask us to do questions on grammar. I found it extremely difficult to focus and understand the material because I learned better through listening. English in elementary was like a simple house chore to do, but in middle school, English was like a horrible job at McDonalds; I always dreaded to go to her class.

My freshman year in high school was when things started to change. Mr. Zwerling was my English teacher and I had him first thing in the morning.  Before the first day of class I felt extremely annoyed to be having my least favorite class so early in the morning, but after the first few weeks it became a class worth going to. Every works of literature he taught was interesting and the writing assignments he gave were clear. For the first time ever I got back a paper was worth more than an eighty and after the rewrite it became a high ninety. This was when I began to believe that English wasn’t as bad as I thought. I found myself writing about the interesting works of literature was as something I needed to do. They always say that practice makes perfect and in my case it was true. As I kept writing my thoughts began to clearly flow on to the paper and my grammar began to improve.  Not only did my writing became better and more enjoyable, reading was an activity that became something I could do on my free time. When Mr. Zwerling read a wide range of literature he somehow explained each of them in a way that made it interesting.

This specific time of my life opened a different mindset and attitude toward English. It allowed me to give my self a chance to take English more seriously. Mr. Zwerling’s assignments taught me how I should layout my essay, express my ideas, and include supporting details. When I’m writing in other classes, I would plan my essay through my introduction, continue to the body paragraph with my ideas and supporting details. I soon discovered that I’m not all that bad at English and there is hope for me. Now I feel more confident in writing and less hesitant in reading. It has helped me come a long way since then and it allowed me to do things I would have never done before. With my newfound confidence I was able to take the extra mile to write essays for my college application and scholarships opportunities. Although I didn’t get accepted or awarded, I’m still happy that I tried. Now that I’m college, I’m able to complete my writing assignments without too many problems and I’m more willing to write about any topic I’m given.