Fadaee 2

Fadaee 1

Kamand FadaeeProfessor Lynn C. RaymondUWRT 1103February 4, 2015Forever a Bookworm

I have been a bookworm for as long as I can remember. In preschool, the teachers used to call me the Bookworm of Good Shepherd. I cant remember the exact moment when I picked up a book and started to realize my deep love for them. There wasnt a defining moment for my literacy narrative. It was more like a series of moments and steps that encouraged me to get into reading and writing. I dont think my parents purposefully raised me to love books, I think they just raised me in a similar way they were raised and it just so happened that I blossomed into a lover of words.When I first moved to America when I was three, I had already started learning to read in Farsi (main language in Iran) and I had also memorized a few nursery rhymes and I would sing them to myself as I flipped through my mothers various fashion and cooking magazines. My dad loved history and art and non-fiction so we always had at least two large shelves packed with books like sardines packed in a can. As a child, I would always look upon the rows of books and think to myself that they were one of the most comforting things I had ever seen. My mother was an avid-reader as well so there was always some book on her nightstand. According to the article Facts About Childrens Literacy, the more types of reading materials there are in the home, the higher students are in reading proficiency. This was in fact proven true because as I progressed through elementary, middle and high school, Reading/Language Arts/English classes proved to be strongest subjects. When I started preschool, I already knew how to speak Farsi fluently and I had basically memorized a few of my favorite books in Farsi as well. According to my mother, she started reading to me when I was seven months (old enough to sit up without assistance.) When we moved to Charlotte, I had some trouble sleeping at night so my dad started telling me bedtime stories that he grew up hearing and he did this almost every night up until I was 9. According to an article by Christine Cohen on Scholastic.com, as kids reach the upper-elementary grades, reading demands increase, yet one-on-one reading instructionfor competent readers doesnt. Listening to parents read more advanced books shows children strategies that will help them at school.Growing up as a child who loved to read was challenging. To love books was frowned upon by your peers. One would often hear the phrases Ew, another required reading?? or Ugh, I have to read so many pages tonight! in my eighth grade classroom. If you compare what kids in 2007 did for fun versus kids in 2015, you would find one big difference; lack of technology; more specifically lack of smartphones and tablets in 2007. Sure, we had cellphones, laptops and desktop computers, but kids still went outside to ride their bikes, go over to each others houses to actually play instead of sitting on their beds on their phones. Similarly; I had other activities I did for fun like playing outside and leisure reading. Children nowadays are constantly obsessing over their smartphones to the point where they are not even interested in reading for fun because its considered boring. According to the article Bilingual Childrens Language Abilities and Early Reading Outcomes in Head Start and Kindergarten, generally, the more students read for fun on their own time, the higher their reading scores. Between 1984 and 1996 however, the percentage of twelfth grade students reporting that they "never" or "hardly ever" read for fun increased from nine percent to sixteen percent. My little sister is a prime example of this because as a ten year old, she owns an ipad, a smartphone and her own laptop. And she absolutely despises reading. As a child who grew up loving books, its hard to see my sister hate it so much. She is a bright kid with a wild imagination capable of loving stories but because of the growing popularity of electronics, she isnt able to fully sit down and enjoy books the same way I did. In summary, my literacy narrative is very much a result of my family. My upbringing, my schooling, and lack of technology all had substantial influence on the development of my love for books today. Without my background, I probably wouldnt be the avid reader I am today and for that I am thankful.