Joshua Barrett

Barrett 1
Mrs. Knudson
UWRT 1102
2/22/15

Literacy Autobiography
Ive had a lot of different experiences when it comes to both
reading and writing. Ive read a lot of different books and wrote a lot of
different stories and papers throughout my life so far. Ive also learned many
new lessons on how to improve on my reading skills and my writing skills.
There are a variety of literacy events in my life that have helped me become
a better reader and writer. One event was that my parents always read
stories to me when I was a little kid; it was really fun because that was my
first experience with reading. Some of the books that they read to me were
Dr. Sues Green Eggs and Ham and SpongeBob. I also read a lot of dinosaur
books and shark books when I was in elementary school. I read those books
on my own because I really liked to read about what kind of dinosaurs were
on the earth and what kind of sharks lived in the ocean. I was very
interested in seeing what dinosaurs and sharks were like and how they lived
on earth. My first writing event happened when I was in the fourth grade. I
wrote a story about why I liked playing soccer so much; I talked about how
Ive been playing the sport for a while and made lots of new friends. I also
explained how I always have a lot of fun playing soccer and that its my
favorite sport in the whole world. There were parts in the story where I wrote

about how I struggled in practice sometimes, but I kept going and learned
from my mistakes.
My parents gave me a very important book that I still read today,
and its called the Bible. I started reading the Bible when I was a little kid; my
parents always told me stories that happened throughout the Bible and how
its the key to helping me live a good life. Im a Christian and the Bible has
taught me a lot about how I can have eternal life in heaven by accepting
Jesus as my savior and living my life according to God. I still read the Bible
today because there are still many lessons that I havent learned yet.
Another reason is that Im able to learn more about God and how He can help
me grow as a Christian. Reading the Bible has helped me improve a lot on
my reading skills because Im able to read through the text quickly and get
important information and the main ideas. I started reading longer novels
when I was in middle school and I also started writing research papers. My
reading and writing skills werent very good in elementary school. I would
always have to get help from my teachers and parents whenever I had to do
a reading or writing assignment. I also had to go to a lot of extra speech and
writing classes during school so that I could get extra help from some other
teachers. My biggest reading struggles came on the EOGs and the SAT and
the reason is because of all of the reading that was involved in those exams.
I had a tough time trying to figure out the main ideas and get important
information because of the limited amount of time that I had for the tests.

My writing skills started to improve a lot when I got to middle

school; my parents signed me up with an English tutor that I saw after school
on weekdays. My tutor taught me many new lessons on how I could write
better paragraphs and sentences. She showed me how to stay on topic
whenever Im writing a research paper or an essay. I always brought my
writing and reading assignments to her so that we could go over them and
fix any mistakes or errors. She always gave me advice on how I could make
my paragraphs more interesting for people to read and that I shouldnt
repeat any of my information in more than one paragraph. I learned how to
write better introduction paragraphs and conclusion paragraphs for essays
and other papers. My tutor also helped me write a speech that I had to say in
front of athletes at my old middle school. I was really nervous at first
because I didnt know what to say, but she told me a bunch of questions that
I could ask them and how I could keep their attention.
We talked a lot about digital literacy in some of our classes this
semester, and Ive had a lot of experience with that kind of literacy so far.
Ive used digital literacy for most of my life; I would go on the internet
sometimes to look up information for a paper or project. I would also use the
internet to look up sports games and other major events. The main website
that I use for this kind of literacy is google. Texting is one of the activities
that I do on a regular basis every day. I started texting in middle school when
my parents gave me my first phone. I always text my friends and family to
see how they are doing and what they are up to. I usually text my friends a

lot to see if anyone wants to hang out and play videogames or play a sport
outside. Whenever I need to communicate with my teachers or coaches
outside of class, I just send them an email with all of the details. Another
form of digital media that I do on a regular basis is social media and some
examples are twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. I started using social media
when I was in high school; the first form of social media that I used was
twitter. I go on twitter to send out tweets and update my status; I also check
to see what my friends are tweeting about. Twitter is a great way for me to
get caught up any major games or competitions that I wasnt able to see. It
keeps me updated with daily news and major events that are happening
around the world.
I usually use Facebook to keep my friends and family updated
on how Im doing and to post pictures of what Ive been doing throughout the
day. In Chapter two of Everythings A Text, I learned about how I need to
have a purpose in every kind of writing that I do whether it be an essay or a
research paper. Its pointless to do reading or writing if you dont have a
specific goal that you are trying to achieve. I also learned that I read and
write for a variety of different purposes because of all the creating that I do
both in and out of school. Chapter 2 of Everythings A Text showed me that
its also important to think about the audience whenever you are writing or
reading. There are many different kinds of audiences in the world including
teachers, friends, family, and yourself. I learned that the two main types of
audiences are primary and secondary. Primary audiences are the ones that

receive the information directly and secondary audiences are people that will
receive the information indirectly. Throughout my years of doing different
types of literacy, Ive mainly had to deal with many primary audiences. Ive
had to write stories and research papers for my teachers and Ive given
speeches in front of people.
Another important literacy event that happened in my life was
when I had to give a speech in front of athletes at my old middle school. The
teachers and coaches at the middle school wanted me to talk about how I
went from a really good soccer player to a college cross country and track
athlete. I was really nervous at first because I didnt know how to start off my
speech and I didnt know what to include in it. I ended up going to see my
tutor after school for a few days to get help on writing the speech. She
helped me out a lot because she told me a bunch of different questions that I
could ask the audience because they were all athletes just like me and I
should be able to connect with them. We worked on writing a good
introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion. I wrote about how soccer
was my all-time favorite sport and Ive played it ever since I was a kid. I also
explained how I did both soccer and cross country at the same time in high
school and how it was tough to go from cross country practice directly to a
soccer game. The part of my speech that I felt was most important was when
I explained how I had to make a choice between soccer or cross country and
track. It was a really tough decision for me because soccer was my favorite
sport, but I would get a scholarship if I continued to run. I ended up choosing

running and I wrote about how I got faster and stronger with all of the
training that I was doing and how it got me a scholarship to run at UNC
Charlotte. This was a great literacy event for me because I explained to a
bunch of middle school athletes about how they should never give up even
when it gets hard. I told them about how hard work really does pay off and
that they should always pay attention to the opportunities that are in front of
them. It was also a big improvement on my speech writing because I stayed
on topic throughout the whole paper and I made sure to include the
information and facts that were most important. The audience gave me their
full attention while I was giving my speech which was very helpful; they were
all very interested in what I had to say.
We talked a lot about personal literacies during one of our
classes and how it can help us understand the literature that we read. Ive
learned that whenever Im writing about my life and language, Im able to
see and understand myself and my place in the culture that surrounds me on
a daily basis. Wendy Bishop explained in the book how personal literacy is
the story of coming into language, of learning how to read and write, and of
learning what reading and writing mean in ones life. Ive gotten a good
understanding about what reading and writing mean in my life based on all
of the literacy events that have happened so far. Ive realized that reading
and writing are very important when it comes to getting a great education. I
also have to expand my vocabulary and gain more knowledge about words
that Ive never heard before. There are many lessons on both reading and

writing that I havent learned yet, and thats why I have to take a bunch of
writing classes in college. My first experience of coming into language was
when I was reading books as a kid in pre-school. I learned how to write by
going to school and writing a whole lot of papers, essays, and journal entries.
My teachers also taught me different rules that have to be followed
whenever Im doing a writing assignment. They showed me how to find the
main ideas of stories and how to find clues of important information in a
novel.
There was a section in Everythings A Text that talked about
how to tame a wild tongue and I learned a lot about how what affect
speaking different languages can have on other people. The only language
that Ive been able to speak very well is English; English was the only
language that was ever spoken in my house. My brothers and I took Spanish
courses in high school, but I barely remember anything from those classes.
The reason was because Spanish was a very difficult language for me to
understand and I would have a hard time pronouncing some of the words.
Ive learned a lot from reading Becoming a Reflective Reader in
Everythings a Text. The reading mainly talked about how in order to be
successful at reading, you have to become an active reader. Ive grown a lot
as an active reader throughout my years of literacy and Im still learning new
lessons. I highlight important words or phrases whenever Im reading a novel
or an article online. Ive learned that I might have to read a text more than
once in order to get all of the important information. Ive had to read a lot of

difficult novels and articles throughout my life and my teachers have always
told me that I will need to reread the text a few times. The reason was so
that I could get a better understanding of what the reading was about. This
passage in Everythings a Text has taught me that there are many different
strategies when it comes to annotating a reading and one of the main ones
was note taking. I wasnt very good at note taking when I was in elementary
school; I would just do the reading assignments and not write a single
sentence on what I learned from the novel. That changed when I got to
middle school because I started writing down notes and quotes from my
readings so that I could have an easier time studying and preparing for tests
and quizzes that were on the book. Becoming a Reflective Reader has also
taught me about how annotated reading keeps my mind active, helps me
retain information, and gives me ideas for responding.
There were many times in school where I was really confused with
what I was reading, so I just asked my teachers for help; they would always
give me good explanations on what I couldnt understand and they would
give me advice on how I can have an easier time figuring out the main ideas
and finding important clues. I would also go ask my friends about the reading
assignment; they always have good ideas and opinions about the books that
we read and they help me come up with my own opinions about the reading.
Its always good to talk to other people about a certain book because Im
able to talk about what I learned and hear what other people thought about

the book; Im able to get a better understanding and it helps me whenever I

have to an assignment, quiz, or test on the reading assignment.
My partner did a great job reviewing my paper during the
workshop in class. My partners name was Meghan Riddle and she told me
that I had a great start to my paper; I just have to keep elaborating. She also
explained how my tutor paragraph was the best one because people can
relate and my tutor had a big impact on me. She mentioned that I need to
explain more on digital literacy and that I need to make an easier transition
from soccer to the Bible paragraph. The three areas that she was very
curious to know more about was soccer, the tutor, and digital literacy.
Literacy has had a big impact on my life and all of the literacy events
that have happened have helped me be very successful in all of my reading
and writing classes. I know that there are still many more literacy events that
are going to occur in my life, but that means that still have a lot more new
lessons to learn. Ive made a lot of improvement on both my reading and
writing skills throughout my life and I know that I still have a lot of work to
do. The writing classes that Im going to take throughout my college career
will show me a lot of new information about reading and writing that Ive
never heard before. Im looking forward to learning more about literacy in
general.