Cai Yanjun Professor Jan Rieman English 1101-119 September 16, 2012 Literacy Memoir Assignment I remember that

the first time I could completely understand a whole piece is the moment I listened to the tape telling stories. Thanks to these stories, I started to comprehend paragraphs, which helped me learn to express my feelings in a more completed way. Later, I learned PINYIN in class and started to spell Chinese character by PINYIN. Till now I still remember that I struggled to pronounce gourd in Chinese by spelling. Although I knew how to speak it out naturally, I could not spell it as a whole like g-u-a to gua. This experience gave me a deep impression of being good at PINYIN is the cornerstone to be a Mandarin Chinese speaker. I found out books with PINYIN
Comment [i2]: What kind of books? Books that taught you how to read PINYIN or story books written in PINYIN? Comment [i1]: What is gourd?

corresponding to each character to expand my volume of recognized Chinese characters.

Meanwhile, since my books were related to natural science and the animals, I accumulated knowledge in the domain of natural world and developed interest in this field, which I benefit a lot from the law of nature. Sometimes I would share my reading

experience with my parents and they encouraged me to log down my own thoughts about these pieces of stories. I was gradually led to the world of writing by logging down my daily life.
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At that time, the Chinese famous literary work: Pilgrimage to the West, was published by cartoon books. With lively and vivid pictures and some simple dialogues, the series of

52 books adapt the piece of work presenting a popular literature, which children could be readily receptive to. It was the first time that the books gave me exposure to the literary world, through which I was initially conscious of the way people performed their writing through brilliant structure and the splendid threads of a story.
Comment [i3]: This is a great sentence, I like the way you stated how you engaged in this book and you enjoyed it.

Gradually, I got accustomed to the activity of writing and set forth to keeping diary, which is the best format to reflect on myself thinking logically and expressly. my diary time, I just kept writing without pause to relief myself. During
Comment [i4]: What did you write about? Hard times you were having? School? Family life? I think you should add more detail about writing in you diary.

I would take risks

occasionally to explore some genre to adequately deliver my sentiment.

As I was in Middle School, our Chinese teachers introduced the narration to us.

Every
Comment [i5]: Do you remember any of the names of the articles? What they were about? What class was this for?

semester in the middle school, we not only read plenty of narrative articles to practice our comprehension on narration, but also practice completing narrative related to various of themes. In the meantime, I was hooked on the fairy tales written by Zheng Yuanjie, the In his short story, the plot was simple and the conversation However, it was the mirror of some

tales magnate in China.

between two characters was uncomplicated.

negative phenomena in the contemporary community, which led me to deep thinking. From his full-length novel, the descriptive statement was detailed, which was required element to attract readers. I learned a lot of skills applying to my narrative writing, such
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Comment [i6]: What kind of detail did he use? Maybe you could give us an example of a line from one of his books?

as dedicated description, dialogue or some make-up stories to reflect on my thoughts. Through the interaction with the stories by Zheng, it has sharpened my understanding on the principle of who, when, where, what and how to make adequate arrangements for my articles.

Argumentative writing never seen before appeared at the spot of High School.

During

the whole page of argumentative writing, I am required to establish my own point of view concerning certain event or a saying by famous people, as well as convince other people my perspective by argument that carries convictions. thinking, but also the explicit expression. confuse the readers. It is not only the excellent logical

Stringing together ornate phrases could

Hence, I expand my readings to all sorts of materials, which could Step by step, I learned

provide me a border thinking when comprehend a certain case.

how to form my standpoint and explain my position differ from the common view, which can make myself conspicuous.
Comment [i7]: I like where you are going with this paragraph. I think you should add maybe an experience you had with a certain paper you wrote? Did your teacher make argumentative

Required reading exists side by side.

I made good use of them as chances to know It

writing boring or did you just not enjoy writing it?

about other countries cultural background through these famous literary masterpieces. is amazing that the characters existed hundreds of years ago is interlinked with peoples personalities today. From their tales, I could find the reflections on current life, which

Comment [i8]: I agree! The only way to learn about other cultures and things you want to know about is to read about them!

instructed me how to extricate myself from a difficult position as well as how to overcome in straitened circumstances. On the other hand, the textbook reading
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experience is totally different from the leisure reading above.

When reading the

textbook, I have to be absorbed in the subject, and constantly looked upon on knowledge I gained as the basis to interpret new knowledge. Deepening my comprehension on specific definition is crucial, which could be the shortcut to further study. Every time I
Comment [i9]: I agree with you here, that you have to want to learn the subject in order to want to engage in the text. What kind of subjects did you enjoy reading about? Which ones did you not enjoy?

reread some definitions I omitted or misunderstood, I got a better insight into the chapter. The habit I gradually forming in high school was taken into my university study, in which courses required solid foundations for further research.

When it comes to my learning experience on English reading and writing, it is dissimilar to my Chinese learning. Due to the limitation of atmosphere, our English learning is

mainly focus on the reading and writing but neglect the importance of listening and speaking. The English examinations lay emphasis on reading several passages with
Comment [i10]: Maybe you could give a personal experience of why English is different from learning Chinese. Did something happen in school?

multiple choices based on the comprehension. Through this form, we developed the habited of reading for answers without having a conversation with the author. We missed plenty of good pieces for the limited-time reading task. And the writing section

requires some arguments concerning social issues, which we just followed the format and used some phrases and sentence pattern to complete our composition without creative thinking. Although I was tired of this way of learning English, it did help me
Comment [i11]: Did you look words up in the dictionary to help you? How did you learn to speak English? Through reading programs? How did you learn to write in English? With practice

accumulate words and instruct me how to write a simple essay at least.

The time I enjoyed most studying English was the travel to University of Queensland,
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English books?

Australia. In the daytime, I had English classes introducing culture and talking to the undergraduate in UQ from all over the world. At night, I had dinners with my

Comment [i12]: How long did you stay and get to practice English?

home-stay family with chat. They were curious about my hometown in China and the Chinese culture, so that it was a good chance for me to practice my oral English. Sometimes it could be embarrassing that I forgot the words, but they were patient to guide me using another expression. Whats more, I completed my presentation with the
Comment [i13]: Im glad that your homestay family was patient and took the time to try and help you learn English orally.

help of my host, who introduced me several significant festivals or some local specific holidays in Australia. I gradually adapted to communicating with others using English, as well as came into contact with many new ideas.

Comment [i14]: What kind of ideas?

As for some special reading experience in English, the instruction of installing DVD occurred to my mind. It is one of the most exciting things I have done ever, for I could

understand the guidance instructed in English, and I temper myself through the assembling. Verbal expression in the instruction is totally different from the piece of So

works, since its objective is to make people understood and follow the steps easily. the whole process is like a class advising my procedure.

However, it could be frustrated

and upset reading this kind of expression filled up whole pages, for readers could not catch the authors emotional activities either his logical thinking. From my perspective,

I will pay more attention to writing in a lively style in order to keep touch with my readers.

Comment: I like where you are going in your paper! I think you should add some more personal experiences to your ideas. Also, I think you should add some characters of PINYIN in your paper. I can see that you have had some trouble speaking English but you know how to read and write it better. I had that same problem when I was learning Spanish. I think maybe you could include what you like to read and write and what helps you to read and write and English. Joey Mottola