Liyah Lopez

CTW 1

Medina

1 December 2017

Literacy Narrative

When I was 11 years-old, I lost my great grandmother, Helen, to her battle with

Leukemia. I was nervous, scared, and clueless as to how I was supposed to handle these sudden

emotions of devastation. Although I didnt know it at the time, I had an anxiety disorder that

made matters much more difficult to comprehend, and it resulted in not knowing how to address

my adversities. Instead, I picked up the first book I could grasp and got lost in the world it took

me to. This time, the book I grabbed took me to Forks, Washington where I met a mysterious

boy in my biology class who turned out to be a vampire. Yes, the books that got me through my

real life struggles was the beloved Twilight series by Stephanie Myers. As I read the book, I was

not little 11 year old Liyah who was scared and defenseless. Rather, I was Bella Swan, the

daughter of a police chief and lover of Edward Cullen, the hottest and most-wanted student at

Forks High School. I was able to run away from my troubles as long as my head was in the book

and I loved every second of it. Eventually, I read through all 2,492 pages of the Twilight series

within the span of a month and could recite any line or scene. Reading helped me get through

that hard time and was my escape from reality.

In middle school, I set the class record every year for most books read in a semester and

had tested to be reading at a college level. As a result of this, I awarded with the Most Effort in

Language Arts from my teachers and was presented with it at graduation. Coming into high

school, I genuinely enjoyed reading and writing and made an effort to make it part of my daily
routine. However, as I was introduced to assigned readings and prompted writing topics, I began

to view literature and writing as more of a chore rather than a pleasure and developed into a

disliking of English and language arts as a whole. My once excitement to pick up a new book

and enter a different world diminished and I found it difficult to actually pick up my book,

resorting to sparknotes and other summary resources. I missed out on a lot of great reads because

I began to read text in search of the answers to worksheets or solutions to prompts instead of

reading them for my own enjoyment. I was too stubborn to understand that although my reading

was required, that did not subject it to being resented. In contrast, during breaks I found myself

reaching for novels and once again being excited to read. I was confused as to why I found it so

difficult to read during the semester but I went out of my way to read when it was convenient. It

was not until I graduated that I realized as rebellious teenagers, I tended to resent anything I was

required to do. Yes, as immature as it sounds, in search of my individuality, I liked to make

decisions for myself. However, my ego allowed my pride to get in the way of my education and

lead to myself resenting tasks I used to love such as reading and writing. Similarly, I enjoyed

expressing my ideas but hated being restricted in the ways I could do so. I think it is very

important for educators to understand that as students, we are searching for ways to utilize our

creativity in order to reflect what we are thinking.

In high school, I was taught to express any academic ideas through a Five Paragraph

Essay which restricted creativity and individuality. The widely promoted Five Paragraph

Essay consisted of a hook, topic sentence introducing three ideas, paragraphs elaborating those

three ideas, and a conclusion to restate your thesis. I utilized this format throughout my first three

years of high school and held the idea that the only way to structure a strong essay was through

five paragraphs. Although the 5-paragraph format made writing much easier and allowed essays
to flow better, it placed my ideas in a small box and restrained me from elaborating and giving

more in depth analysis. As I furthered in my educational career, it became a lot more prominent

of an issue as I was asked to expand my claims and create more elaborate arguments. It wasn't

until my senior year when I decided to challenge myself and take a class at my local community

college rather than taking the standard senior year English class provided at my high school that I

realized how restrictive the 5-paragraph format was. During that class, we were asked to look at

novels, movies, articles, and current events to analyze the treatment of Native Americans by

societies in the Americas. With that course, I learned to not focus on the structure of my essay

but rather the content I was putting on paper. I genuinely enjoyed writing every paper in that

class because I was not being confined and resisted to a specific process, I was able to show my

true ideas about topics I was passionate about. During that time, the Dakota Access Pipeline

protests were occuring and being part Yaqui Indian, I was inspired by my people who were

standing up for what they believed in. Being able to fully express my sentiment towards the

cause without direct 5-paragraph structure allowed me to develop and express honest opinions

and relate them to the treatment of Native Americans by our government system through

multiple centuries. I carried this idea of not following specific structure into my Critical

Thinking and Writing course at Santa Clara University. It was also helpful that my professor, Dr.

Cruz Medina, stood by the same mentality and encouraged our class to step away from the 5-

paragraph structure we had been taught. Both of these factors allowed an easier transition into

college writing for me and encouraged me to continue my love for writing and sharing my ideas.

As a result of a search for creativity, I leaned towards social media to express myself and

found that many of my peers did so as well. Scrolling through social media platforms such as

Twitter and Instagram, I witnessed classmates who I typically viewed as unengaged and
uninterested fighting for things they believed in. They utilized social media as a safe space to say

what was on their minds and display their individuality. Although it does not seem so, tweets,

captions, and snapchats are formulated with the concepts of ethos, logos, and pathos in order to

generate quality material. Without noticing it, my friends, peers, and myself are participating in a

form of writing and engaging their followers with their ideas. In my high school, educators

commonly perceived our student body as unmotivated to complete their assignments. Yet, what

they failed to understand is that we love to express our ideas but we like to do so in our own way.