Literate Beings

Over the course of my schooling, I have come to learn that to be literate it more than having the ability to read and write. While those two components are important parts of literacy, that is not all. The way one speaks, the way one interacts with others, the way one uses what he or she reads and writes to make a change is literacy. I have also learned that you never are complete in your literacy—it is always changing. The literacy I have today is not the literacy I will have tomorrow (although it will be similar) and it is not the literacy I had yesterday. Literacy is evolving to include all sorts of texts be it a book, a textbook, academic literature, a blog, a text, a phone call, a video, a podcast, a computer game, so on and so on!

To read or not to read: there was never any question. Ever since I can remember, I was a reader. Dr. Seuss, Roald Dahl, Tomie dePaola, E.B. White, C.S. Lewis and many others were my childhood friends. My grandmother was an elementary school librarian and as her first grandchild, I was read to—a lot. And I loved it. As soon as I got to Grandma’s house, I would go to the corner, pick out a book, and have her read to me. I could not get enough. Soon, I had her sounding out words for me and I began to read along. I could not wait to get to kindergarten and start reading. However, I had to make a pit stop into Preschool first. Here, while other kids played house and make pictures with shaving cream, I would sit and “read” books to the stuffed animals around me. FINALLY! I made it to Kindergarten. I started with “Pat Sat” and “Dan Ran” and quickly got the hang of reading. “What a brilliant little reader we have!” my grandmother would often say as I read to her. The same was said by my Kindergarten teacher who moved me rapidly up the reading chart until I was done and had reached Level Z. Soon, monosyllabic word books were not enough for me. I began to read The Boxcar Children, Encyclopedia Brown, and The Chronicles of Narnia. When the words became too difficult, and sounding out just did not work, I relied on my mom to help me get through it.

I was so intrigued by these stories that I wanted to write my own. I began to write of world travels, of princess and dragons, of brave animals that could speak and move as humans do. “What a great writer you are!” my teachers would often say. I would be asked to read my stories aloud to the class because I could make any boring assignment sound good. I was attracted to reading and writing because they were entertaining; I could leave behind whatever it was I was doing in my boring, everyday life and go somewhere new. But then fourth grade hit and there was very little time for silent reading and free writing. I was forced by my teachers to do math and science. Blck! However, I continued to read on my own.

In seventh grade, we had to take Accelerated Reading quizzes (AR) to determine that we were still reading in our grade level. As a seventh grader, I wanted to do better and read more than any of my peers. I was soon reading at a tenth grade reading level and getting more AR points all the time. The more AR points you had, the better your reading grade. English and Language Arts became my favorite subjects; I was good at reading and writing and it showed in my grades.

However, being pegged as a “good student” is not always a good thing. My teachers expected me to excel in everything, and while I did, it was difficult especially in classes that I did not “speak the language”. I rarely got the help I needed when I struggled in Math and Science (and sometimes English and History) because I was a smart kid and I would figure it. Well I did, but that does not mean I learned anything worthwhile except how to jump through hoops to get the grade.

I remember always being asked to peer-edit students papers in class. The students I helped would get lots of feedback, beyond “I liked this,” and would benefit from my feedback. But when I got my papers back it was full of “Really good” and “No suggestions” even from teachers. I got so sick of not getting feedback that I would purposely put mistakes in my papers so they would be forced to say something, but that did not really help either because they would just fix my grammar and leave the content alone. This “problem” in my literacy lead to more problems—if they did not care how my paper looked, then I would just put down some “word vomit” and get away with it. This contributed to my not being able truly analyze a text; I did not fully grasp the importance of it until I was in Ms. Hunter’s eleventh grade English class. It finally made sense to me that I would write something and then answer “So what? . . .” (This by the way has become my favorite way of analyzing things.)

I had to push myself to understand hard subjects and become literate in them. My biggest contributing factors here are good grades and my family pressure to get good grades. I was pegged in Kindergarten as a good student and this label continued with me throughout my education. Being the oldest of five children, it was up to me to set the standard and set it I did. I got my first “poor grade” in junior high and it just about broke my heart! But it just made me work harder to keep those grades fabulous.

One of my most favorite memories about the influence my parents had on my reading is the year that I challenged my dad to a reading contest when I was ten years old. He had been listening to books on tape on his way to work. He had already finished The Red Badge of Courage, The Old Man and the Sea, and One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest and I wanted to read a book with him (that was on my level of course.) We picked Lewis Sacher’s Holes to read and we both got a copy. I was bound and determined to read and finish the book before my dad did. And finish it first I did! We finished it in one week (we could only read it at the same time when he got home from work.) “What page are you on Dad?” I would ask. “Ninety-five. And you?” “One hundred and seven!” It was great that I could read a book with my dad and I loved the time that I got to spend with him. I also remember reading The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe with my mom when I was seven years old. Every child should be given the experience to read with someone, whether it is their parents or a family member or a friend.

It wasn’t until my AP Political Science class my Senior year in High school that I learned that I was becoming literate in reading, writing, and speaking for more than just my own entertainment. I was a white, middle-class, suburban female going to school in a well-funded public high school. I was already ahead of the curve and on my way to college. However, we had to read and write and debate about the Constitution in this class. I had to look beyond my sheltered world and realize that others weren’t as advantaged as I was. People experienced social injustices all over the world, in my own state, and what was being done? Well, I was not sure. I was given the opportunity to read and think and write about social problems and come up with solutions. I was able to talk to people and try to convince them of things that needed to be done. I was becoming literate so I could do something. I think this is part of the reason I wanted to become a history teacher. To be literate is to be empowered. How can I expect to make a change if I cannot read about it, write about it, talk about it? I realize that it is my job as an educator, regardless of what subject I am teaching, to assist students in becoming literate beings, to empower them, and to teach them that they can make a change through their reading and writing and communicating with others.

I feel that the praise I received in school helped me continue to become a literate person. I am not the best writer and sometimes when I speak, my words get all jumbled and my thoughts come out sounding weird. But the praise and motivation I received was enough for me to want to do better. Granted, this was because I wanted the good grade and for some students this extrinsic motivator will be enough. But it is usually the students like me that are motivated by this. What about the students who do not have the drive for “school” and grades? What will be their motivation? I have never loved textbook reading and tests that come after textbook reading and I think that is because it was the way I was taught in school. I would much rather read a historical fiction novel on the holocaust and then talk about how it related to what we would read in a textbook. I would much rather learn about Civil Rights Movement through personal accounts and novels like Mississippi Trial, 1955 than read a textbook and take a facts test. This will influence the way I teach my students. My “good” students may not be good students in my class because it is different learning than they are used to. However, I feel that all students will benefit when they apply their literacy to making a change, feeling historical empathy, critically thinking, and applying history to them. I want my students’ opinions and views to count in my class and not to become small narratives to my larger narrative. There are so many different ways lives are lived and through reading and writing and communicating and having a choice in what they learn, I feel students become empowered through their literacy and will want to read and write and become productive members of society which, as a history teacher or any teacher for that matter, is the ultimate goal we have for our students. I hope to be an example to my students who do not necessarily have the example that I did at home. I hope to create a better future for them by making their learning theirs, not just something they do to get through the public education system.