Brandon Hunter                                                                                       9/21/10

English                                                                                               History Essay                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   

What exactly is literacy? It has many different meanings to many different types of people. To me, the definition of literacy is the ability to read and write. We read and write in our everyday lives all of the time. For instance, when we are driving to school or work, we read signs and that’s one form of literacy. Another form of literacy is when we are filling out a form for work. Those are some ways that we use literacy in our everyday lives. Literacy was originally oral and was written down long after it was composed.

There were many things that influenced me to start reading. One person that influenced me was my mom. She was always reading and I wanted to learn how. Another was when I was when I was little and I saw commercials. I wanted to know what the words meant. The first book that I read was a chapter book called The Adventures of Captain Underpants. I have read every single book in that series. I liked many fairy tales as a little boy. For instance, I liked “Major Payne’s” version of “The Little Engine That Could.” I also liked “The Three Little Pigs.” Those are a few of my favorite nursery rhymes.

I attended Winslow Township Upper Elementary #5 for grades 3-5. Well there were a few books that came to my attention during those years of my education. One book was written by Ronald Dahl called “The BFG”. Another was a series called “The series of Unfortunate Events” by Lemony Snicket. There were no teachers that helped me developed a knack for reading. I actually got that on my own. After reading books that I thought were extremely interesting I started to read a whole lot. All of that reading had expanded my vocabulary.

I attended Winslow Township Middle School during my middle school years. During those long three years, I liked many different authors. For instance, I liked Dav Pilkey, Lemony Snicket, and many more. When I left that school, I was into the series “The Chronicles of Vladimir Todd”. The final book just came out so I’m going to get that soon. The genres that I liked changed on a little bit. I read all types and was learning about more in my readings.

I hope to read many books in my high school years. I want to read genres that I would like. I think that will expand my vocabulary and help me in my writings. There is only one other kind of writings that I listen to and that is newsletters. I don’t consider myself as a literate person, but many other people do. They say that all of the reading that I do has made me smarter. I have noticed my vocabulary expanding though.

All of those years of reading have made me like reading. At this time I am reading a series called “The Chronicles of Vladimir Todd.” Literacy is very important because it helps teach the English language. Literacy has helped me in my life. For instance, it has taught me how to talk and read. Literacy is like a tree in many ways. For instance, the base of literacy is learning to talk. Then the branches are reading, writing and the different genres.