Thomas Stephenson

UWRT 1104
Mrs. Thomas

Literacy Narrative

Reflection 1: Looking back at this, I am thankful that my mother encouraged me to write letters

and i am thankful that Santa and my grandma were so willing to write me back. I think that my

mother having me write letters is huge in how it affected my reading and writing as it made

writing seem like less of a chore and more like a fun way of communication. Writing letters to

Santa and my grandma made reading and writing far less exhausting than the reading and writing

I was doing at school and even though I no longer write my grandma letters, I still send her the

occasional e-mail.

Reflection 2: I find it to be very helpful to have other peoples feedback on my writings, as it

gives me a clearer understanding of what is good within my writing and what is not so good. I

also received advice on how to improve my writing and I recieved an idea of where to take my

writings from here. Based on the comments i received, i decided to accept most if not all of them

and i edited my writing and answered questions that my peers had about my writing.

When I was a young kid, my brother and I would often play outside. However, when we

were inside watching TV, my mother would attempt to get us to stop watching TV and to read or

write. She was particularly interested in getting us to read and write more because she is a

kindergarten teacher and she felt that it was very important to get extra practice outside of

school. Neither me nor my brother enjoyed reading or writing as it just seemed to be less

interesting than watching TV or playing with toys. One day in late fall, on a weekend, my mom

convinced me to stop watching Spongebob and various other cartoons and to write a letter to
Thomas Stephenson
UWRT 1104
Mrs. Thomas

Santa telling him what I wanted for Christmas. So, I sat down at the dining room table and

started writing with the supplies my mom had given me. I remember the feeling of the freshly

sharpened, yellow, number 2 pencil sliding across the bright white piece of copy paper. I

remember the chill I got from the sound of the pale pink eraser squeaking whenever I took

something off my list. I told Santa that I wanted a new hot wheels track, new nerf guns, Legos,

and Pokmon cards among other things. I didnt just tell Santa what I wanted for Christmas

though, I also inquired about the north pole, the elves, and the reindeer. After I was done writing

I saw how horribly crooked my lines were because I just could not write straight without the

lines on my paper. I didnt really care how it looked though, if Santa could read it. I really

enjoyed writing to Santa and I wrote to him often, adding or subtracting things to my Christmas

list and asking about the elves or the reindeer. I also enjoyed reading the letters I received back

from Santa through the mail telling me about how the elves were very busy and hard at work

getting ready for Christmas, and how the reindeer were anxious for Christmas eve, and of course

Santa always reminded me not to find myself on the naughty list.

Since I enjoyed writing to Santa so much, my mom told me that I should write letters to

my grandma because Christmas had passed and she knew that my grandma would be interested

in my letters, as she is a retired middle school English teacher and she also just liked to hear from

her grand kids. At first I was reluctant because I could just give her a call or visit her because she

lived relatively close by, but I guess one weekend I was bored enough to write my grandma a

letter. I wrote about what was happening at home and I would often complain to my grandma

about chores and how my mom was mean to me whenever I didnt do my chores. I also wrote

about what I had learned recently in school, and what games my friends and I played during

recess. Although I often just wrote about myself, I wouldnt always write about myself.
Thomas Stephenson
UWRT 1104
Mrs. Thomas

Sometimes I would just send a letter asking about Tate. My grandparents soft, short haired,

golden brown, floppy-eared boxer who was always so happy to see my brother and I whenever

we visited. When we played with Tate, she would wag her tail back and forth so fast it would

hurt if it hit you. She would also always try to lick us with her slobbery pink tongue and she

often succeeded, making us sticky wherever she licked us. I loved to read the stories my grandma

wrote about my grandpa taking Tate to the dog park and teaching Tate new tricks like playing

dead or jumping over the park benches on command. Other than Tate, my grandma would write

about her gardening, her 2 siamese cats, Trisha and Shan, or just things that would happen in her

day. One of my favourite stories I remember her telling me was when my grandpa had finally

had enough of the squirrels getting in the bird feeder and chewing on the light blue siding of the

house. So, he went into town and bought a BB gun to ward off the squirrels and I think he may

have killed a few of them.

In middle and high school, writing became much more of a chore than it was in

elementary school as we were supposed to write about things that were boring and plain. It also

felt like more of a chore because I would stress about using the right font, making sure my

writing was in the correct format, meeting page length requirements, and focusing on the

generic, repetitive essay where you write a thesis then back it up with supporting paragraphs and

a conclusion. Also I seemed to be punished for trying to inject my own creativity into my writing

and I would often get comments from my teachers saying not to compare the topic of the essay to

my own experiences. I specifically remember when my 8th grade English teacher told me that he

did not care all that much about the content and that he cared most about the essay meeting the

page length requirement. This was the definitive point in time in which reading and writing in
Thomas Stephenson
UWRT 1104
Mrs. Thomas

school took a turn for the worse. I no longer cared about my reading and writing assignments,

and I only wrote to check off boxes on a rubric, or to just get a grade I was happy with. I was

never really inspired by to put a lot of creative energy into my writing because I knew that it

would be graded on some rubric that only dedicated points based on the basics such as grammar,

page length, organization, and clarity. A reason for my lack of inspiration in my writing could be

blamed on me not reading much of anything other than sports articles. Even when we had

readings for English class, I often did not read it. I usually just looked up a summary on the

internet, watched the movie, or skimmed through a few chapters of the book to get my

understanding of the reading.

After my first semester at college, I found out the hard way that I could not rely on

summaries, or a movie to get me up to speed on a book. In my LBST course, I started to actually

read the required readings and I actually didnt dread doing it. That isn't to say i enjoyed it, but

this is definitely an improvement from how i felt about reading in high school. Writing-wise, I

would say that I still don't like to write, and the best way to describing my writing experience is

dull and boring. However, I blame this on ENGR 1201 for being so strict in grading the font and

format of my writing, and I am sure my future classes that aren't engineering will be much more

tolerant to different font and layouts for essays. Also, the writing I did in engineering was cold,

with no emotion, which made feel a lot more exhausting to write. Even though I would say that I

still do not enjoy writing, I can say that the free writing and creative writing of UWRT 1104

makes writing much more tolerable to me as it feels more personal and encourages me to be

creative in my writing.