Omar Juma Professor. Rieman English-1101 Sept.

15, 2012 Literacy Narrative (1st Draft) Nowadays, if you are not able to read and write, you will be considered loosing one of your senses. Being literate is a step to success. Literacy is important for many reasons, which I am going to be discussing. Along with how, where, and why I started to read and write? What influenced me to be a better writer? Literacy is being defined as a tool to connect ideas, thoughts, and history within generations. In other words, it is the ability to read and write. There are more than one way where we can gain that ability. For instance, schools, family, and friends are good examples where ones could develop the way he/she reads and write. Each professional writer became literate by going through different experiences. Malcom X, who was born in May of 1925, became one of the most powerful writers in history. He was a leader to Black Americans, because of the fact that he shouted out for their human rights. Afterwards, he converted to Islam and changed his name to El Hajj Malik El-Shabazz and then assassinated in 1965. Malcom X became a role model as a literate person for many people. However, all of that knowledge and education didnt came from Harvard University nor MIT instead it came from prison. He spent 7 years in jail, because of a robbery. Within these 7 years he educated himself and managed to be literate by something he called Homemade Education. So to me Malcom X was a motivation himself!

As a young child, I was not literate neither any one of my age. The thing is that it was not that important to be literate in anything as a child, because your parents will take care of everything. However, as I grew older I recognized an interesting fact that for every age in our life there is a different type of literacy, which will be the most important. So when I was between 4-6 years old it wasnt necessary to be a good writer. However, it was more important that I learn how to express my thoughts with speaking not writing. Then as I grew older I had to learn how to read and write in school and here where it became more and more important. School was the first place where I started to learn how to read and write. I was enrolled in a good private school from grade 1 until grade 12. The school is called Rawd Al-Saleheen Bilingual School. We had an American Curriculum, so weve been taught American English in school. Moreover, the books we had were brought from the United States, such as Math and Science books. Teachers were focused on the way they teach us how to read and write. I found that out by the way they used to assign us a lot of linguistic home works and to practices. In able to learn about other subjects students had to be literate. Let us take Biology for example. We need to have the ability to read so we can gain knowledge and information. We also need to know how to write so we can practice what weve learned in Biology. So, it is significant that we learn how to read and write so we can be taught other subjects in schools. My family was the second reason where Ive been influenced to be literate. The reason behind that was because they valued education. My father is a manager of the Seaport Customs in Kuwait. So he really knew how important is it to be literate. He

always kept reminding me that literacy is the best weapon to fight unemployment. So enrolling me in a strong private school was his idea in the first place. My dad always kept telling me Being literate will bring you success. As an example, when I was a kid my father kept teaching me how to read street signs whenever we pass by one. At the house when I ask my father about a new word he will teach me how it is spelled and then ask me to write its definition. In the other hand, my mother teaches me how to read some words of my bedtime stories as a kid. She always tried encouraging me to literate and well educated. Without a second thought my family tried their best to give me the opportunity to be literate and they succeeded. To be clear enough, when I address the term literate I include both Arabic and English. Arabic is my first language. It is as well Kuwaits first language, my home country. In school I learned how to read and write formal Arabic, in addition to cursive writing. We always read poems, stories, and letters. Then solve comprehension and questions. We also had to prepare a one page writing every week. Beside school teachings, family and friends had the strongest motivation to learn Arabic. The reason behind that is, that I needed to learn Arabic to able to connect with others from my nationality. To sum up, each one of us learned their first language naturally and with no difficulties. On the other hand, I had to learn English in school for my Higher Academic Studies. As I mentioned before that in my school we had all the Mathematics and Sciences taught in English. So it was a must to learn English. In contrast with Arabic, we usually had two straight English classes reaching by that 11 hours/week. So we really had time more than enough to learn English. Teachers were mostly Americans and

Canadians. They taught us different ways to understand a text, new vocabulary, and how to write in more than different format. In my school, we had a reading book with short stories, poems, and stories from the medieval times. We had to read the writings and answer their comprehension questions and we will be tested on our understanding of the text. As well as for the vocabulary, we were always assigned to memorize between 40-80 new words with their definitions and be tested on them after every course. However, we had fun reading some interesting stories or watching videos, which explain the stories we couldnt understand clearly. What I liked the most while learning English is the writing assignments. Although we had to write a two pages essay every week, I found it challenging to use different formats in my writings. Every time we had a writing to do, the teacher would request a format, he thinks would best get along with the title. All in all, I had to be literate in English to succeed academically, because Universities and schools adopted English as a first language. However, after all the time I spent learning English in my school with a bunch of good teachers, I found out that I hated reading. I do not think that it could be changed easily, because of my personality. Im a kind of person who prefers watching and listening over reading. I am not able to just sit there all day long and enjoy reading a book. The reason behind that hate, were the stories we used to have in my High School. We had stories, which no one understood or cared about, because the stories were from the medieval times. Believe me, in my class it was no bodys interest to read 30 pages about Macbeth in the Three Witches!

Eventually, I managed to read stories assigned by teachers and be able to understand and answer their comprehension questions; even though, I had a bad experience with reading. My academic life now, in the present, is perfect because of literacy. Without literacy I wouldnt be able to enroll in any university. However, Im currently a UNCC student majoring in engineering. Graduating as a Mechanical Engineer from a good university is my dream. Starting as a freshman at UNCC is a step towards that dream. Being literate gave me the opportunity to be a university student. So clearly I was on the right path Way to Success. This was the point where I remembered all of my fathers sayings, because they all became true. In short, as influenced by my parent and taught in my private school I learned how to read and write in both English and Arabic. Academically literacy is an important factor toward success, because learning other subjects needs a literate person. Although I had some discouraging experiences, I became literate in English. I then found out that every age had a different most important type of literacy. However, when I was admitted at UNCC I found out that being literate and well educated person, were the fastest and most important steps towards success as my father always used to tell me.