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First Words
My first breakthrough in literacy was speaking my first ever words or in this case word. My first word was "moon" as I was apparently fairly interested in the moon. According to my parents, this was very significant to them because of my siblings. Apparently, my siblings, first words were either mom or dad whereas mine was just "moon". This could be an indication that my literacy developed differently from my siblings. -
First time singing
According to my parents, the first time they remember me singing was in late 2004. I was riding in the car and my parents were listening to the radio. The song that I apparently began to sing along with was Since You Been Gone by Kelly Clarkson. This showed a large leap in my literacy skills to be able to mimic things that I heard on the radio.
Link to video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7UrFYvl5TE -
First time reading
This is the earliest memory I have of actually reading myself. The first thing that I read was a book about a garbage truck that my parents used to read me. -
Kindergarden
I remember a lot from kindergarten. I asked a few friends about this and they also agreed that they remember a lot more from kindergarden than other years. For me this is due to the amount of expansion that occured for me especially in the realms of literacy and social skills. I vividly remember a song we did on the third alphabet day when we learned about the letters of the alphabet. In this song we learned about the letter C by thinking about the sound castenets made. -
First time reading and advanced book
In 2nd grade I finally had the opportunity to read more advanced literature. There was an open library in my 2nd grade teachers classroom. She allowed us all to take a book at a time and read it during designated free times. This book was the first time I really struggled with reading a book. I feel as though this struggle was actually very beneficial for me. It pushed me to work harder to better understand what I was actually reading. -
Hot N Cold by Katy Perry
I can vividly remember the first time I was able to memorize all the lyrics to a song. This song was Hot N Cold by Katy Perry. At the time she was all over the radio and I was hering her songs all the time. For some reason this song just stuck out to me and I was able to memorize all the lyrics to it. I would probably be able to recite all the lyrics to this day. -
Mrs. Kelleher 3rd grade
I remember my 3rd grade year the most out of any of my elemntary school yeards apart from kindergarden. I feel like 3rd grade was the turning point in my education. I feel as though my 3rd grade teacher Mrs. Kelleher really helped to instill a great respect for literature in me. She focused much more on reading and being able to comprehend literature than my previous teachers. She also happened to be a much more avid reader than previous teachers. -
The Hunger Games
As odd as it may seem one of the biggest literacy events in my life was seeng the Hunger Games. This is because it was the first movie I had ever seen after reading the book first. It is a really strange experience to read something in a book and put it together in your head your own way, then seeing it on a screen and it looks compltetely different than you imagined it. -
Mrs. Metcalf
When I was in middle school I had some personal issues and had to transfer to online school. I chose to go to ARISE because it was the only online school in the Janesville Area plus my neighbor Beth Metcalf taught there. She really pushed me to learn new things that I would have usually avoided. She opened me up to non-fiction and historical literature which, even though is till do not enjoy, was a very good experience to have. -
National History Day
National History Day is a memory that will stick with me forever. It is the first time I had to give a speech in front of an audience that I did not already know. This was a big step as it had been years since I had given a real presentation. I feel as though this experience really set me up for future speeches that I ended up giving. -
CIF (Critical Issues Forum)
One of my biggest literary achievements happened quite recently. The critical issues forum was an amazing experience that I was very happy to partake in. Not only that but it was an amazing literacy sponsor for speech. I had to practice the hell out of my speech to memorize it to the point that I did. It was a great experience that really allowed me to grow in terms of my speaking skills.