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Michael Myers
Professor Arnold
English 1101-003
September 3, 2013
My Life and Literacy
I can really only recall a couple specific memories of my younger self becoming literate
in reading and writing. One of those flashbulb memories was when I was maybe about 5 or 6
years old. I remember sitting on my living room couch with my mother reading a children’s book
to her. I was slowly but surely reading the big, bold words on each page. Every now and then, I
needed help sounding out a larger word and she would assist me. I was more focused on learning
just the words at the time, and didn’t even know what sentences were, but that’s where the other
memory comes in. The other memory was close to the same situation. I was in the living room
again, and I was still around the same age. I spoke normal statements to my mother, asking her if
they were complete sentences, or not. I believe I needed help doing homework for my school,
and it was difficult for me, at the time, to form structurally sound sentences on paper, in
particular. My mother helped me become the literate person I am today in reading, writing, and
speaking.
Throughout my school years, I always tried doing really well with my grades and kept
them up. A’s and B’s took up most of the space on my report cards up until about 10th grade in
high school. The assignments obviously got more difficult, but I had more trouble specifically
with writing papers. I would say I am still in the process of learning to become literate in writing.
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Speaking English hasn’t been as much of a challenge for me as writing in it, however. I am able
to form sentences with proper grammar, even in writing. But being creative in writing is my
major problem. I have taken many years of Spanish classes in elementary, middle, and high
school, but I am still not fluent in this language. If I were to have a conversation in Spanish, I
could only hear words that stick out to me from the sentences of the one speaking Spanish to me
and try to piece them together to get a general sense of what he or she is saying. I would not be
able to produce grammatically correct, organized sentences back to him or her, unfortunately. I
tried my best to obtain a solid Hispanic accent when I spoke Spanish. Now, I can speak English
with a few different accents. I think my ability of this is pretty funny and interesting. I like doing
Hispanic, French, Irish, Scottish, Russian, British, German, and Australian. French, Irish, and
Australian are the hardest accents for me, so it is not consistent when I try speaking with them.
I feel it is easy to become literate in TV shows and movies because simply, I think it’s
fun to watch them. I have always been a big fan of the Lord of the Rings movies, Star Wars, and
Harry Potter, which all have their own books too. I have become literate in these series by
watching the movies and reading the books about them. I know the characters, plot lines,
locations, and mostly any other thing that deals with them. I have even played video games
involving them, which is something else I am literate in. I love to and have played many video
games. My favorite genre of video game is stealth because I think it’s a complicated aspect to put
into a game. I think I became literate in video games because I like the idea of doing things in
them that you can’t do in real life.
Sports have been a giant part of my literacy career. I have played or participated in some
way in soccer, baseball, basketball, football, golf, swimming, and so many more. I know most of
the rules to these sports by playing them in my childhood. I was never good at basketball or golf
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or football, so I dropped those from my list of hobbies. One of my favorite things to do is to flip
and trick of diving boards at pools. I have been doing this since I was a young child and still love
doing it today. I know the names of the flips and spins, and have memorized the motions my
body must take to complete the tricks. Some examples of the tricks I can do are a one-and-a-half
(a front flip into a dive, all one motion), a double front flip, a gainer (a black flip moving
forward), a 360 front flip, a 360 backflip, and others. I tried doing flips off the diving boards
because I had seen other people doing them in person, on TV, and on the computer. I learned by
watching and mimicking. This lead to my obsession with acrobatics, so I bought a 15-foot
trampoline to practice on. Now, I can even back flip on flat ground. Doing this sort of physical
activity has kept me in shape and even motivated to me to start lifting weights. I became literate
at weightlifting when I was in high school. I took a class on it in my junior and senior years,
which helped me to learn good lifting techniques in order to avoid injury.
For a pretty long time period in my life, I had a passion for riding all kinds of boards. I
rode skateboards for a while and learned to do multiple tricks, but gave it up because of the
inevitability of injury whenever I rode. From skating though, I picked up longboarding which is
very similar to skateboarding. My most recent boarding hobbies are skim boarding and surfing.
Skim boarding is riding very thin waves into other, larger waves. When I became literate in these
board sports, all I did was watch videos about them. I learned by watching and attempting and
practicing. For surfing however, I got lessons from a surfing instructor that told me the basics of
surfing, and the minor details that need major attention.
My favorite sport of all is lacrosse. I started my freshman year of high school and have
played every year since then. I got interested in it with one of my old friends who got a lacrosse
stick and let me try it out. I got my mom to sign me up for a lacrosse clinic so I could learn the
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rules and ways to play lacrosse. Eventually, I got some gear and was able to play at a basic level.
I played every year of high school and always participated in camps every summer. In this way, I
met and was taught by many lacrosse coaches from all over my North Carolina area. This helped
me to get a variety of styles, plays, techniques, and other instructions. I was so into this
traditional Native American game that I got a lacrosse goal at both my mom’s house and my
dad’s house so I could practice wherever I went. To better my lacrosse technique with anything
varying from passing, to shooting, to catching, I would look up lacrosse tutorial videos on
YouTube. This constant participation and determination increased my lacrosse abilities
exponentially. There is even lacrosse terminology that I picked up along the way. ”Lettuce” or
“flow” is the grown-out hair that protrudes from underneath the back of the lacrosse helmet.
“Tilt” is how far down your helmet is tilted, easy enough. Hitting “cheese” on a lacrosse goal is
hitting the top or outsides of the goal.
Literacy, for me, has mainly taken the form of hobbies that I like to participate in. I have
been learning to do all these things and not even realizing the depth of the information I was
receiving. I didn’t realize I was becoming literate. I am literate in school, language, media,
sports, and more that have all had their sponsors, whether they are my parents, coaches, or,
strangely, YouTube. I have been learning to learn this whole time, and I am still continuing to do
so.