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Writing a Literacy Narrative

Writing a Literacy Narrative  Narratives are stories, and we read and tell them for many different purposes. Parents read their children bedtime stories as an evening ritual. Preachers base their Sunday sermons on Bible stories to teach the importance of religious faith. Grandparents tell how things used to be (sometimes the same stories year after year). Schoolchildren tell teachers that their dog ate their homework. College applicants write about significant moments in their lives. Writing students are often called upon to compose literacy narratives to explore how they learned to read or write. This chapter provides detailed guidelines for writing a literacy narrative. Here is an example. 

SHANNON NICHOLS “Proficiency”

In the following literacy narrative, Shannon Nichols, a student at Wright State University, describes her experience taking the standardized writing proficiency test that high school students in Ohio must pass to graduate. She wrote this essay for a college writing course, where her audience included her classmates and instructor.

The first time I took the ninth-grade proficiency test was in March of eighth grade. The test ultimately determines whether students may receive a high school diploma. After months of preparation and anxiety, the pressure was on. Throughout my elementary and middle school years, I was a strong student, always on the honor roll. I never had a GPA below 3.0. I was smart, and I knew it. That is, until I got the results of the proficiency test.  Although the test was challenging, covering reading, writing, math, and citizenship, I was sure I had passed every part. To my surprise, I did pass every part—except writing. “Writing! Yeah right! How did I manage to fail writing, and by half a point, no less?” I thought to myself in disbelief. Seeing my test results brought tears to my eyes. I honestly could not believe it. To make matters worse, most of my classmates, including some who were barely passing eighth-grade English, passed that part.  Until that time, I loved writing just as much as I loved math. It was one of my strengths. I was good at it, and I enjoyed it. If anything, I thought I might fail citizenship. How could I have screwed up writing? I surely spelled every word correctly, used good grammar, and even used big words in the proper context. How could I have failed?  Finally I got over it and decided it was no big deal. Surely I would pass the next time. In my honors English class I worked diligently, passing with an A. By October I’d be ready to conquer that writing test. Well, guess what? I failed the test again, again with only 4.5 of the 5 points needed to pass. That time I did cry, and even went to my English teacher, Mrs. Brown, and asked, “How can I get A’s in all my English classes but fail the writing part of the proficiency test twice?” She couldn’t answer my question. Even my friends and classmates were confused. I felt like a failure. I had disappointed my family and seriously let myself down. Worst of all, I still couldn’t figure out what I was doing wrong.  I decided to quit trying so hard. Apparently—I told myself—the people grading the tests didn’t have the slightest clue about what constituted good writing. I continued to excel in class and passed the test on the third try. But I never again felt the same love of reading and writing.  This experience showed me just how differently my writing could be judged by various readers. Obviously all my English teachers and many others enjoyed or at least appreciated my writing. A poem I wrote was put on television once. I must have been a pretty good writer. Unfortunately the graders of the ninth-grade proficiency test didn’t feel the same, and when students fail the test, the state of Ohio doesn’t offer any explanation.  After I failed the test the first time, I began to hate writing, and I started to doubt myself. I doubted my ability and the ideas I wrote about. Failing the second time made things worse, so perhaps to protect myself from my doubts, I stopped taking English seriously. Perhaps because of that lack of seriousness, I earned a 2 on the Advanced Placement English Exam, barely passed the twelfth-grade proficiency test, and was placed in developmental writing in college. I wish I knew why I failed that test, because then I might have written what was expected on the second try, maintained my enthusiasm for writing, and continued to do well.

Nichols ‘ s narrative focuses on her emotional reaction to failing a test that she should have passed easily. The contrast between her demonstrated writing ability and her repeated failures creates a tension that captures readers ‘  attention. We want to know what will happen to her.   Key Features / Literacy Narratives  A well-told story.  As with most narratives, those about literacy often set up some sort of situation that needs to be resolved. That need for resolution makes readers want to keep reading. We want to know whether Nichols ultimately will pass the proficiency test. Some literacy narratives simply explore the role that reading or writing played at some time in someone’s life—assuming, perhaps, that learning to read or write is a challenge to be met.  Vivid detail.  Details can bring a narrative to life for readers by giving them vivid mental images of the sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and textures of the world in which your story takes place. The details you use when describing something can help readers picture places, people, and events; dialogue can help them hear what is being said. We get a picture of the only treasure Bragg has ever known through the details he provides: “a water-damaged Faulkner,” “a paperback with two naked women on the cover,” books “wrapped in fake leather.” Similarly, we hear a three-yearold’s exasperation through his own words: “I’d like to see a menu.” Dialogue can help bring a narrative to life.  Some indication of the narrative’s significance.  By definition, a literacy narrative tells something the writer remembers about learning to read or write. In addition, the writer needs to make clear why the incident matters to him or her. You may reveal its significance in various ways. Nichols does it when she says she no longer loves to read or write. Bragg is more direct when he tells us he would not trade the books for a gold monkey. The trick is to avoid tacking onto the end a statement about your narrative’s significance as if it were a kind of moral of the story. Bragg’s narrative would have far less power if he’d said, “Thus did my father teach me to value books of all kinds.” 

A GUIDE TO WRITING A LITERACY NARRATIVE Choosing a Topic  In general, it’s a good idea to focus on a single event that took place during a relatively brief period of time. For example: 

  • any early memory about writing or reading that you recall vividly
  • someone who taught you to read or write
  • a book or other text that has been significant for you in some way
  • an event at school that was interesting, humorous, or embarrassing
  • a writing or reading task that you found (or still find) difficult or challenging
  • a memento that represents an important moment in your literacy development (perhaps the start of a  LITERACY PORTFOLIO )
  • the origins of your current attitudes about writing or reading
  • perhaps more recent challenges: learning to write instant messages, learning to write email appropriately, learning to construct a Web page

Make a list of possible topics, and then choose one that you think will be interesting to you and to others—and that you’re willing to share with others. If several seem promising, try them out on a friend or classmate. Or just choose one and see where it leads; you can switch to another if need be. If you have trouble coming up with a topic, try  FREEWRITING,   LISTING,   CLUSTERING,  or  LOOPING.   Considering the Rhetorical Situation

Generating Ideas and Text  Good literacy narratives share certain elements that make them interesting and compelling for readers. Remember that your goals are to tell the story as clearly and vividly as you can and to convey the meaning the incident has for you today. Start by writing out what you remember about the setting and those involved, perhaps trying out some of the methods in the chapter on  GENERATING IDEAS AND TEXT.  You may also want to  INTERVIEW  a teacher or parent who figures in your narrative.  Describe the setting. Where does your narrative take place? List the places where your story unfolds. For each place, write informally for a few minutes,  DESCRIBING  what you remember: 

  • What do you see?  If you’re inside, what color are the walls? What’s hanging on them? What can you see out any windows? What else do you see? Books? Lined paper? Red ink? Are there people? Places to sit?
  • What do you hear?  A radiator hissing? Air conditioners? Leaves rustling? The wind howling? Rain? Someone reading aloud? Shouts? Cheers? Children playing? Music? The zing of an instant message arriving?
  • What do you smell?  Sweat? White paste? Perfume? Incense? Food cooking?
  • How and what do you feel?  Nervous? Happy? Cold? Hot? A scratchy wool sweater? Tight shoes? Rough wood on a bench?
  • What do you taste?  Gum? Mints? Graham crackers? Juice? Coffee?

Think about the key people. Narratives include people whose actions play an important role in the story. In your literacy narrative, you are probably one of those people. A good way to develop your understanding of the people in your narrative is to write about them: 

  • Describe each person in a paragraph or so. What do the people look like? How do they dress? How do they speak? Quickly? Slowly? With an accent? Do they speak clearly, or do they mumble? Do they use any distinctive words or phrases? You might begin by  DESCRIBING  their movements, their posture, their bearing, their facial expressions. Do they have a distinctive scent?
  • Recall (or imagine) some characteristic dialogue. A good way to bring people to life and move a story along is with  DIALOGUE,  to let readers hear them rather than just hearing about them. Try writing six to ten lines of dialogue between two people in your narrative. If you can’t remember an actual conversation, make up one that could have happened. (After all, you are telling the story, and you get to decide how it is to be told.) If you don’t recall a conversation, try to remember (and write down) some of the characteristic words or phrases that the people in your narrative used.

Write about “what happened.” At the heart of every good narrative is the answer to the question “What happened?” The action in a literacy  NARRATIVE  may be as dramatic as winning a spelling bee or as subtle as a conversation between two friends; both contain action, movement, or change that the narrative tries to capture for readers. A good story dramatizes the action. Try  SUMMARIZING  the action in your narrative in a paragraph—try to capture what happened. Use active and specific verbs (pondered, shouted, laughed) to describe the action as vividly as possible.  Consider the significance of the narrative.  You need to make clear the ways in which any event you are writing about is significant for you now. Write a page or so about the meaning it has for you. How did it change or otherwise affect you? What aspects of your life now can you trace to that event? How might your life have been different if this event had not happened or had turned out differently? Why does this story matter to you?  Ways of Organizing a Literacy Narrative  Start by  OUTLINING  the main events in your narrative. Then think about how you want to tell the story. Don’t assume that the only way to tell your story is just as it happened. That’s one way—starting at the beginning of the action and continuing to the end. But you could also start in the middle—or even at the end. Shannon Nichols, for example, could have begun her narrative by telling how she finally passed the proficiency test and then gone back to tell about the times she tried to pass it, even as she was an A student in an honors English class. Several ways of organizing a narrative follow. 

Ways of organizing a narrative

Writing Out a Draft  Once you have generated ideas and thought about how you want to organize your narrative, it’s time to begin  DRAFTING.  Do this quickly—try to write a complete draft in one sitting, concentrating on getting the story on paper or screen and on putting in as much detail as you can. Some writers find it helpful to work on the beginning or ending first.  Draft a beginning. A good narrative grabs readers’ attention right from the start. Here are some ways of beginning; you can find more advice in the chapter on beginning and ending. 

  • Jump right in. Sometimes you may want to get to the main action as quickly as possible. Nichols, for example, begins as she takes the ninth-grade proficiency test for the first time.
  • Describe the context. You may want to provide any background information at the start of your narrative, as I decided to do, beginning by explaining how my grandmother taught me to read.
  • Describe the setting, especially if it’s important to the narrative. Bragg begins by describing the small Alabama town where his father lived.

Draft an ending. Think about what you want your readers to read last. An effective ending helps them understand the meaning of your narrative. Here are some possibilities; look also at the chapter on beginning and ending. 

  • End where your story ends.  It’s up to you to decide where a narrative ends. Bragg’s story ends with him standing in front of a pile of books; mine ends several years after it begins, with my graduation from college.
  • Say something about the significance of your narrative.  Nichols observes that she no longer loves to read or write, for example. The trick is to touch upon the narrative’s significance without stating it too directly, like the moral of a fable.
  • Refer back to the beginning.  My narrative ends with my grandmother watching me graduate from college; Nichols ends by contemplating the negative effects of failing the proficiency test.
  • End on a surprising note.  Bragg catches our attention when his father gives him the boxes of books—and leaves us with a complicated image to ponder.

Come up with a title. A good title indicates something about the subject of your narrative—and makes readers want to take a look. Nichols’s title states her subject, “Proficiency,” but she also puts the word in quotes, calling it into question in a way that might make readers wonder—and read on. I focus on the significance of my narrative: “How I Learned about the Power of Writing.” Bragg takes his title from something memorable his father said: “It’s all over but the shoutin.’ ” See the section on guiding your reader for more advice on titles.  Considering Matters of Design  You’ll probably write your narrative in paragraph form, but think about the information you’re presenting and how you can design it to enhance your story and appeal to your audience. 

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  • Would it help your readers if you added headings in order to divide your narrative into shorter sections?
  • Would photographs or other visuals show details better than you can describe them with words alone? If you’re writing about learning to read, for example, you might scan in an image of one of the first books you read in order to help readers picture it. Or if your topic is learning to write, you could include something you wrote.

Getting Response and Revising  The following questions can help you study your draft with a critical eye.  GETTING RESPONSE  from others is always good, and these questions can guide their reading, too. Make sure they know your purpose and audience. 

  • Do the title and first few sentences make readers want to read on? If not, how else might you begin?
  • Does the narrative move from beginning to end clearly? Does it flow, and are there effective transitions? Does the narrative get sidetracked at any point?
  • Is anything confusing?
  • Is there enough detail, and is it interesting? Is there enough information about the setting and the people? Can readers picture the characters and sense what they’re like as people? Would it help to add some dialogue, so that readers can “hear” them? Will they be able to imagine the setting?
  • Have you made the situation meaningful enough to make readers wonder and care about what will happen?
  • Do you narrate any actions clearly? vividly? Does the action keep readers engaged?
  • Is the significance of the narrative clear?
  • Does the narrative end in a satisfying way? What are readers left thinking?

The preceding questions should identify aspects of your narrative you need to work on. When it’s time to  REVISE, make sure your text appeals to your audience and achieves your purpose as successfully as possible.  Editing and Proofreading  Readers equate correctness with competence. Once you’ve revised your draft, follow these guidelines for  EDITING  a narrative: 

  • Make sure events are  NARRATED  in a clear order and include appropriate time markers,  TRANSITIONS,  and summary phrases to link the parts and show the passing of time.
  • Be careful that verb tenses are consistent throughout. If you write your narrative in the past tense (“he taught me how to use a computer”), be careful not to switch to the present (“So I look at him and say . . . “) along the way.
  • Check to see that verb tenses correctly indicate when an action took place. If one action took place before another action in the past, you should use the past perfect tense: “I forgot to dot my i’s, a mistake I had made many times.”
  • Punctuate  DIALOGUE  correctly. Whenever someone speaks, surround the speech with quotation marks (“No way,” I said.). Periods and commas go inside quotation marks; exclamation points and question marks go inside if they’re part of the quotation, outside if they’re part of the whole sentence:

Inside: Opening the door, Ms. Cordell announced, “Pop quiz!”  Outside: It wasn’t my intention to announce, “I hate to read”!

  • PROOFREAD  your finished narrative carefully before turning it in.

Taking Stock of Your Work 

  • How well do you think you told the story?
  • What did you do especially well?
  • What could still be improved?
  • How did you go about coming up with ideas and generating text?
  • How did you go about drafting your narrative?
  • Did you use photographs or any other graphics? What did they add? Can you think of graphics you might have used?
  • How did others’ responses influence your writing?
  • What would you do differently next time?

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How to Write a Literacy Narrative Essay | Guide & Examples

22 December 2023

last updated

Mastering an art of writing requires students to have a guideline of how to write a good literacy narrative essay, emphasizing the details they should consider. This article begins by defining this type of academic document, its distinctive features, and its unique structure. Moreover, the guideline teaches students how to choose some topics and provides a sample outline and an example of a literacy narrative essay. Other crucial information is the technical details writers should focus on when writing a document, 10 things to do and not to do, and essential tips for producing a high-standard text. Therefore, reading this guideline benefits students and others because one gains critical insights that help to start writing a literacy narrative essay and want to meet a scholarly standard.

General Aspects of How to Write an Outstanding Literacy Narrative Essay

Learning how to write many types of essays should be a priority for any student hoping to be intellectually sharp. Besides being an exercise for academic assessment, writing is a platform for developing mental faculties, including intellect, memory, imagination, reason, and intuition. This guideline of how to write a literacy narrative, and this type of essay requires students to tell their story through the text. It defines a literacy narrative, distinctive text features, unique structure, possible topics students can choose from, and the technicality of writing this kind of text. There is also a sample outline and an example of a good literacy narrative essay. Hence, this guideline gives students critical insights for writing a high-standard literacy narrative essay.

How to Write a Literacy Narrative Essay | Guide & Examples

Definition of What Is a Literacy Narrative Essay and Its Meaning

A literacy narrative is an essay that tells the writer’s personal story. It differs from other types of papers , including an argumentative essay , an analytical essay , a cause and effect essay , a report , or a research paper . While these other texts require students to borrow information from different sources to strengthen a thesis statement and back up claims, a literacy narrative means that students narrate an experience or event that has impacted them significantly. In other words, writers focus on one or several aspects of their lives and construct a story through the text. Therefore, when writing a literacy narrative essay, students should examine and reexamine their life course to identify experiences, events, or issues that stand out because they were pleasant or unpleasant. After identifying a memorable aspect of their life, students should use their accumulated knowledge to construct a narrative through speaking, reading, or writing.

Distinctive Features of a Literacy Narrative Essay

Every type of scholarly text has distinctive features that differentiate it from others. While some features may be standard among academic papers, most are not. Therefore, when writing a literacy narrative essay, students must first familiarize themselves with the features that make this kind of document distinct from others, like reports and research papers. With such knowledge, writers can know when to use an element when telling their personal stories through writing. Some distinctive features of a literacy narrative essay include a personal tone, a private tale, descriptive language, show-not-tell, active voice, similes and metaphors, and dialogue .

💠 Personal Tone

A personal tone is a quality that makes a narrative personal, meaning it is the writer telling the story. In this respect, students should use the first-person language, such as ‘I’ and ‘we,’ throughout the story. Using these terms makes the audience realize that the story is about the writer and those close to them, such as family, peers, and colleagues. The value of using a personal tone in writing a literacy narrative essay is that it reinforces the story’s theme, such as celebration or tragedy. In essence, people hearing, listening, or reading the story can appreciate its direct effect on the reader, speaker, or writer.

💠 Private Story

The essence of a literacy narrative essay is to tell a personal story. In this respect, telling people about a private experience, event, or issue gives this kind of text a narrative identity. Although the story people tell need not be about them, they must have been witnesses. For example, one can write a literacy narrative essay about their worst experience after joining college. Such a narrative should tell a private story involving the writer directly. Alternatively, people can write a literacy narrative essay about the day they witnessed corruption in public office. Such a narrative should not necessarily focus on the writer but on corrupt individuals in public office. Therefore, a private story should have the writer as the central character or a witness to an event.

💠 Descriptive Language

Since a literacy narrative essay is about a personal, private story that tells the writer’s experience, it is critical to provide details that help the audience to identify with the experience. Individuals can only do this activity by using descriptive language in their stories because the audience uses the information to imagine what they hear or read. An example of descriptive language is where, instead of writing, “I passed my aunt by the roadside as I headed home to inform others about the event,” one should write, “As I headed home to inform others about the happening, I came across my aunt standing on the roadside with a village elder in what seemed like a deep conversation about the event that had just transpired.” This latter statement is rich with information the audience can use to imagine the situation.

💠 Show-Not-Tell

A literacy narrative essay aims to help the audience to recreate the writer’s experience in their minds. As such, they focus less on telling the audience what happened and more on ‘showing’ them how events unfolded. A practical method for doing this activity is comprehensively narrating experiences and events. For example, authors should not just write about how an experience made them feel, but they should be thorough in their narration by telling how the feeling affected them, such as influencing them to do something. As a result, a literacy narrative essay allows writers to show the audience how past experiences, events, or situations affected them or influenced their worldviews.

💠 Active Voice

Academic writing conventions demand that students write non-scientific scholarly documents, including literacy narrative essays, in the active voice, meaning writing in a form where the subject of a sentence performs the action. Practically, it should follow the following format: subject + verb + object. For example, this arrangement makes the sentence easy to read but, most importantly, keeps meanings in sentences clear and avoids complicating sentences or making them too wordy. The opposite of the active voice is the passive voice, which is common in scientific papers. The following sentence exemplifies the active voice: “The young men helped the old lady climb the stairs.” A passive voice would read: “The old woman was helped by the young men to climb up the stairs.” As is evidence, the active voice is simple, straightforward, and short as opposed to the passive voice.

💠 Similes and Metaphors

Similes and metaphors are literary devices or figures of speech writers use to compare two things that are not alike in literacy narrative essays. The point of difference between these aspects is that similes compare two things by emphasizing one thing is like something else, while metaphors emphasize one thing is something else. Simply put, similes use the terms ‘is like’ or ‘is as…as’ to emphasize comparison between two things. A metaphor uses the word ‘is’ to highlight the comparison. Therefore, when writing a literary narrative essay, students should incorporate similes by saying, “Friendship is like a flowery garden,” meaning friendship is pleasant. An example of a metaphor one can use is the statement: “My uncle’s watch is a dinosaur,” meaning it is ancient, a relic.

Dialogue is communication between two or more people familiar with plays, films, or novels. The purpose of this kind of communication is to show the importance of an issue to different people. Generally, discussions are the most common platforms for dialogue because individuals can speak their minds and hear what others say about the same problem. Dialogue is a distinctive feature of a literacy narrative essay because it allows writers to show-not-tell. Authors can show readers how their interaction with someone moved from pleasant to unpleasant through dialogue. Consequently, dialogue can help readers to understand the writer’s attitudes, mindset, or state of mind during an event described in the text. As such, incorporating a dialogue in a literacy narrative essay makes the text personal to the writer and descriptive to the reader.

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Unique Structure of a Literacy Narrative Essay

Besides the distinctive features above, a literacy narrative is distinct from other types of scholarly documents because it has a unique essay structure . In academic writing, a text’s structure denotes essay outline that writers adopt to produce the work. For example, it is common knowledge that essays should have three sections: introduction, body, and conclusion . In the same way, literacy narratives, which also follow this outline, have a structure, which students should demonstrate in the body. The structure addresses a literacy issue, solution, lesson, and summary . This structure allows writers to produce a coherent paper that readers find to have a logical flow of ideas.

1️⃣ Literacy Issue

A literacy issue signifies a problem or struggles for the writer and is the personal or private issue that the narrative focuses on. Ideally, students use this issue to give the audience a sneak peek into their personalities and private life. Most literacy issues are personal experiences involving a problem or struggle and their effect on the writer and those close to them, like family members or friends. Therefore, when writing a literacy narrative essay, students should identify personal problems or struggles in their past and make them the paper’s focal subject.

2️⃣ Solution

The solution element in a literacy narrative essay describes how writers overcame their problems or managed personal struggles. Simply put, it is where authors tell and show readers how they solved the personal, private issue that is the paper’s subject. Such information is crucial to readers because they need to know what happened to the writer, who they see as the hero or protagonist of the story. For example, literacy narratives are informative because they show the audience how writers dealt with a problem or struggle and how they can use the same strategy to overcome their examples. From this perspective, students should write a literacy narrative essay to inform and empower readers through insights that are relevant and applicable to one’s life.

The lesson element is the message readers get from the writer’s narrative about a literacy issue and its solution. For example, students can talk about how lacking confidence affects their social life by undermining their ability to create and nurture friendships. This problem is personal and becomes a literacy issue. Then, they show readers how they dealt with the situation, such as reading books and articles on building personal confidence. Writers should use practical examples of how they solved their problems or struggles. Overall, including all the information about the unique situation or struggle and the solution helps readers to learn a lesson, what they take away after reading the text. As such, students should know that their literacy narrative essays must have a lesson for their readers.

4️⃣ Summary

The summary element briefly describes a personal experience and its effects. Every literacy narrative essay must summarize the writer’s experience to allow readers to judge, such as learning the value of something. When summarizing their personal story, such as an experience, students should understand that the summary must be brief but detailed enough to allow readers to put themselves in their place. In other words, the summary must be relevant to the reader and the broader society. The most crucial element in the summary is emphasizing the lesson from the personal issue by telling how the writer addressed the personal issue.

Examples of Famous Literacy Narrative Essays

Research is an essential activity that helps writers to find credible sources to support their work. When writing literacy narrative essays, students should adopt this approach to find famous literacy narratives and discover what makes them popular in the literary world. Students should focus on how writers adopt the unique structure described above. The list below highlights five popular literacy narratives because they are high-standard texts.

Learning to Read by Malcolm X

Malcolm X’s Learning to Read is a literacy narrative that describes his journey to enlightenment. The text reflects the unique structure of a literacy narrative because it communicates a personal issue, the solution to the problem, a lesson to the reader, and a summary of the writer’s experience. For example, the literacy issue is the writer’s hardships that inspired his journey to becoming a literate activist. After dropping from school at a young age, Malcolm X committed a crime that led to his imprisonment. The solution to his hardships was knowledge, and he immersed himself in education by reading in the prison library, gaining essential knowledge that helped him to confront his reality. The lesson is that education is transformative, and people can educate themselves from ignorance to enlightenment. The summary is that personal struggles are a ladder to more extraordinary life achievements.

Scars: A Life in Injuries by David Owen

David Owen’s Scars: A Life in Injuries is a literacy narrative that adopts the unique structure above. The literacy issue in the story is Owen’s scars, including over ten injuries and witnessing Duncan’s traumas. For example, the solution that the article proposes for dealing with personal scars is finding a purpose in each. The text describes how Owen saw each scar not as bad but as something that gave him a reason to live. The lesson is that scars are not just injuries but stories people can tell others to give hope and a reason for living. The summary is that life’s misfortunes should not be a reason to give up but a motivation to press on. It clarifies that, while misfortunes can lead to despair, one must be bold enough to see them as scars, not disabilities.

Notes of a Native Son by James Baldwin

James Baldwin’s Notes of a Native Son reflects the writer’s tense relationship with his father in the context of racial tension that gripped New York City in the mid-20th century. The story fits the unique structure of a literacy narrative. The personal issue in the text is the writer’s tense relationship with his father. The solution to this struggle is accepting life as it is and humans as they are, not struggling to change anyone or anything. For example, the lesson in the text is that the family can cause pain and anguish, and the best people can do is not to let others influence their feelings, attitude, behaviors, or motivations in life. The summary is that people’s struggles are a fire that sparks a revolution of ideas that uplift them and others in the broader society.

Dreams From My Father by Barack Obama

Barack Obama’s Dreams From My Father is the story of the writer’s search for his biracial identity that satisfies the unique structure of a literacy narrative. For example, the personal issue in the text is Obama’s desire to understand the forces that shaped him and his father’s legacy, which propelled him to travel to Kenya. The journey exposed him to brutal poverty and tribal conflict and a community with an enduring spirit. The solution to this personal struggle is becoming a community organizer in the tumultuous political and racial strife that birthed despair in the inner cities. The reader learns that community is valuable in healing wounds that can lead to distress. The summary is that family is crucial to one’s identity, and spending time to know one’s background is helpful for a purposeful and meaningful life.

A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway

Ernest Hemingway’s A Moveable Feast recalls the writer’s time in Paris during the 1920s. The personal issue in the text is dealing with a changing Paris. The solution to the writer’s struggle was to build a network of friends and use them as a study. For example, the text summarizes the writer’s story by discussing his relationships, including befriending Paul Cézanne, Ezra Pound, and F. Scott  Fitzgerald. He found some unpleasant and others very hedonistic. The reader learns from the text that friendships are vital in one’s professional journey because they provide insights into the attitudes that make up the human community. The summary is that one’s friendships are crucial in social and intellectual development, despite the weaknesses of some friends.

Topic Examples for Writing a Good Literacy Narrative Essay

Since students may get a chance to write a literacy narrative essay, they should learn how to choose good essay topics . Typically, students receive instructions specifying the topic, but, sometimes, such specifications may be lacking. In such an instance, one must know how to choose a good theme from lists of popular narrative essay topics or personal essay topics . For example, the best approach in selecting a subject is to read widely while noting valuable ideas. These aspects are a good starting point when deciding the subject of a literacy narrative essay. The following list provides easy topics for this kind of scholarly paper because they require students to tell a personal story, addressing the elements of the unique structure.

  • Overcoming a Fear That Changed My Life
  • A Memorable Day in Winter
  • My Experience in an Adventure in Africa
  • The Greatest Lessons in Friendship
  • My Family Is My Anchor
  • The Day I Will Never Forget
  • My Life as a Community Advocate
  • Delving Into the Enigma of Alternate Universes: A Hypothetical Journey

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Sample Outline Template for Writing a Literacy Narrative Essay

I. College Essay Introduction

  • A hook : An exciting statement to grab the reader’s attention.
  • Background of the topic.
  • A thesis that states the topic’s significance to the writer and reader.

A. Literacy Issue:

  • State the literacy issue that signifies a personal problem, struggle, or issue.

B. Solution

  • Give some background information about the literacy issue.
  • Describe the setting of the literacy issue.
  • Mention some characters involved in solving the literacy issue.
  • Give a short story about the literacy issue and its significance.

D. Summary:

  • State the outcomes of the literacy issue through detailed language.

III. Conclusion Examples

  • Restate the thesis.
  • State the outcome and the lesson.

Example of a Literacy Narrative Essay

Topic: My Life as a Community Advocate

I. Example of an Introduction of a Literacy Narrative Essay

Community service is a noble idea that should form part of every person’s life mantra. The context of community is the myriad social issues that may undermine people’s quality of life without adequate interventions. My life as a community advocate is about how I have helped to address social issues without holding any public office, evidence that all one needs is love, concern, focus, and commitment.

II. Examples of Body Paragraphs of a Literacy Narrative Essay

A. literacy issue sample paragraph.

Community service is a noble duty every person should view as an intervention against social problems that potentially undermine the quality of life of vulnerable groups in society, such as children, persons living with disabilities, and senior citizens. Community advocacy is standing up for the community in critical forums where decision-makers gather. As such, my life as a community advocate involves attending community meetings, political gatherings, seminars, and any association that consists of an interaction between ordinary people and those in leadership. My goal in such meetings is to raise issues affecting vulnerable groups in my community, which need more attention from local, state, or national leadership.

B. Solution Sample Paragraph

My life as a community advocate happens in the community where I live and any place where leaders with the power to change the community’s political, economic, and social architecture gather. In this respect, people involved in my role as a community advocate include elected leaders at the local, state, and national levels and leaders of various groups, including senior citizens and persons with disabilities. I also interact with school administrators, social workers, and health professionals like psychologists. These people are valuable in providing insights into different groups’ challenges and what is missing to make their lives satisfactory, if not better. It is common knowledge that vulnerable groups are significantly disadvantaged across dimensions of life, including employment, healthcare, and leadership. Therefore, my life as a community advocate focuses on being a voice for these groups in forums where those with the potential to improve their experiences and outcomes are present.

C. Lesson Sample Paragraph

An event that makes me proud of being a community advocate is when I helped to create a school-based program for children from low-income households below the age of five in my county. The program’s objective was to feed children and provide essential amenities they lacked due to their parent’s or guardians’ economic circumstances. Over time, I have learned that several counties across the state have adopted the program and made the lives of vulnerable children promising.

D. Summary Sample Paragraph

I took part in activities and improved the quality of health support for children. I have learned from several clinicians and social workers that children in the program have shown improved scores in body immunity because of good nutrition. Such news makes me proud to be a community advocate and continue being a voice for the voiceless in a society where politicians have prioritized self-interests in local, state, and national leadership.

III. Example of a Conclusion of a Literacy Narrative Essay

My life as a community advocate has shown me that people can solve social problems without minding their position in the community. The only tools I have used are love, concern, focus, and commitment to make the lives of vulnerable groups satisfactory, if not better. Looking back, I feel proud knowing I have helped vulnerable children to experience a life they may have missed if no one showed love and care. My community advocacy is evidence that people can solve social problems by caring.

4 Easy Steps for Writing a Great Literacy Narrative Essay

Writing a literacy narrative essay is a technical exercise that involves several steps. Each step requires writers to demonstrate sufficient knowledge of how to write this type of scholarly document. In essence, the technical details of writing a good literacy narrative essay are the issues one must address in each step of writing: preparation, stage setup, writing a first draft, and wrap-up. Although not every detail applies in a literacy narrative, most do, and students must grasp all for an improved understanding of what writing a high-standard academic document means.

Step 1: Preparation

Preparation is the first step in starting a literacy narrative essay. One technical detail students should address is defining a specific topic. Typically, instructors choose the topic, but students can select one if such a specification is lacking. For example, the best way to choose a topic is research, where one searches for documents, including famous narratives, on the Internet, using online databases. The second technical detail is to generate ideas, which means reading reliable sources while making notes. In this task, one should consider the audience to determine whether to use simple or technical language.

Step 2: Stage Set Up

Setting the stage is the second step in writing a literacy narrative essay. The first technical detail one needs to address is to create a well-organized outline according to the one above. For example, this task helps writers to assess their ideas to see whether they are sufficient for each paper section. The second technical detail is gathering stories by recalling experiences and events significantly affecting one’s life. The last technical point is constructing a hook, a statement that will help the text to grab readers’ attention from the start.

Step 3: Writing a First Draft

Writing a first draft of a literacy narrative essay is the third step in this activity. The first technical detail students should address is creating a draft. This text is the first product of the writing process and helps writers to judge their work. For example, the main issue is whether they have used all the ideas to construct a compelling narrative. The answer will determine if they will add new ideas or delete some, meaning adding or deleting academic sources. Whatever the outcome, writers may have to alter clear outlines to fit all the ideas necessary to make papers compelling and high-standard.

Writing an Introduction for a Literacy Analysis Essay

Students should focus on three outcomes when writing a good introduction: a hook, context, and thesis. The hook is a statement that captures the reader’s attention. As such, one must use a quote, fact, or question that triggers the reader’s interest to want to read more. Context is telling readers why the topic is vital to write about. A thesis is a statement that summarizes the writer’s purpose for writing a literacy narrative essay.

Writing a Body for a Literacy Analysis Essay

Writing the body part of a literacy narrative essay requires addressing the essential elements of a unique structure. The first element is to state a personal issue and make it the center of the narrative. The best approach is to look into the past and identify an experience or event with a lasting impact. The second element is a solution to the problem or struggle resulting from the personal issue. Therefore, writers should identify personal problems that expose them to conflict with others or social structures and systems. The third element is a lesson, how the personal issue and the solution affect the writer and potentially the reader. The last element is a summary, where authors conclude by giving readers a life perspective relating to the personal story.

Writing a Conclusion for a Literacy Analysis Essay

When writing a conclusion part for a literacy narrative essay, students should summarize the story by reemphasizing the thesis, the personal issue, and the lesson learned. Ideally, the goal of this section is not to introduce new ideas but reinforce what the paper has said and use the main points to conclude the story. As such, writers should not leave readers with questions but give information that allows them to draw a good lesson from the text.

Step 4: Wrap Up

The last step in writing a literacy narrative essay is wrapping up a final draft. The first technical detail students should address is revising the sections without a logical order of ideas. Ideally, one should read and reread their work to ensure the sentences and paragraphs make logical sense. For example, this task should ensure all body paragraphs have a topic sentence , a concluding sentence, and a transition. The next technical detail is editing a final draft by adding or deleting words and fixing grammar and format errors. Lastly, writers should confirm that a literary narrative essay adopts a single formatting style from beginning to end. Content in literacy narratives includes block quotes and dialogue. Students should format them appropriately as follows:

  • Block quotes: Select the text to quote, click “Layout” on the ribbon, set the left indent to 0.5cm, click the “Enter” key, then use the arrows in the indent size box to increase or decrease the indentation.
  • Dialogue: Use quotation marks to start and end spoken dialogue and create a new paragraph for each speaker.

20 Tips for Writing a Literacy Narrative Essay

Writing a literacy narrative essay requires students to learn several tips. These elements include choosing topics that are meaningful to the writer, generating ideas from the selected themes and putting them in sentence form, creating a clear outline and populating it with the ideas, writing the first draft that reflects the unique structure (literacy issue, solution, lesson, and summary), reading and rereading the draft, revising and editing the draft to produce a high-quality literacy narrative essay, proofreading the document.

10 things to do when writing a literacy narrative essay include:

  • developing a hook to grab the readers’ attention,
  • writing in paragraphs ,
  • using the correct grammar,
  • incorporating verbs that trigger the reader’s interest,
  • showing rather than telling by using descriptive language,
  • incorporating a dialogue,
  • varying sentence beginnings,
  • following figurative speech,
  • formatting correctly,
  • rereading the text.

10 things not to do include:

  • choosing an irrelevant topic that does not stir interest in the reader,
  • presenting a long introduction,
  • providing a thesis that does not emphasize a personal issue,
  • writing paragraphs without topic sentences and transitions,
  • ignoring the unique structure of a literacy narrative essay (literacy issue, solution, lesson, and summary),
  • focusing on too many personal experiences or events,
  • using several formatting styles,
  • writing sentences without logical sense,
  • finalizing a document with multiple grammatical and formatting mistakes,
  • not concluding the narrative by reemphasizing the thesis and lesson learned.

Summing Up on How to Write a Perfect Literacy Narrative Essay

  • For writing a good literacy narrative essay, think of a personal experience or an event with a lasting impact.
  • Use descriptive language to narrate the experience or event.
  • Identify a conflict in the experience or event.
  • State how the conflict shaped your perspective.
  • Provide a solution to the conflict.
  • Mention the setting of the personal experience or event, including people or groups involved.
  • State the significance of the experience or event to people and groups involved and the broader society.

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literacy narrative essay

How to Write a Literacy Narrative Essay Examples, Topics

If you need topics, examples, and an extensive step-by-step on writing a stellar literary narrative essay, then don’t waste your time and effort trying to look for a better guide because we’ve taken it upon ourselves to gather all the information you’ll need to know to achieve that.

In this article we will go through the basics, guide you through every step of the process, and provide you with topics and literacy narrative essay 2022 examples. We recommend not skipping anything. Read through the whole thing, and you’ll be sure to know the ins and outs at the end.

Finally, it’s time to finish the brain fog and confusion that surrounds this topic. But, writing can be tough for some. Well, did you know that you can hire essay writers from our persuasive essay writing service to handle some writing tasks for you? Now, you do. Get in touch with them ASAP by clicking that link.

In the quest to express personal journeys with literacy through a narrative essay, high school seniors are also stepping closer to a significant milestone - transitioning to higher education. This transition, however exciting, brings along a financial consideration that cannot be overlooked. Scholarships emerge as a beacon of hope in such scenarios, providing the much-needed financial relief. As you delve into your literacy narrative, exploring your relationship with reading and writing, it's also an opportune time to explore scholarships that can support your academic endeavors ahead. Discover a curated list of the best scholarships for high school seniors that can provide a financial cushion as you embark on your college journey. Balancing your passion for literacy with the practicality of securing scholarship aid will not only enrich your narrative but also set a strong foundation for your academic future.

A Few Things To Consider

We will teach you how to write a literacy narrative essay. We will be going in-depth and learning all the relevant details there are to know. Moreover, we’ll explore narrative essay topics. Even as a beginner, with just the right amount of practice and research, you can write up an excellent paper. 

This type of essay has a lot of elements that need to be included and to be taken into consideration, so to craft a well-rounded work that includes all these elements, we first need to know what we’re going to have to include in our writing.

Overview: What Is a Literacy Narrative Essay? 

So, what is a literacy narrative essay? This type of essay is an essay where the writer tells about their experiences in writing and reading. It’s meta. You can typically read about the writer’s sources of inspiration for their literacy, such as books, amongst other things. 

The content and experiences one can read from this type of essay are pretty broad since everyone experiences something different from the other. The goal of this essay is to examine the importance of literacy in one’s own experience, how it’s shaped them, and sometimes it serves as a lesson to those who read it. 

Keep reading for the chance to peek at some good narrative essay topics, and don’t miss out on the chance to hire a professional writer to do the work for you from narrative essay writing service made for troubled or burnt-out students.

literacy narrative college essay

What to Include in a Literacy Narrative Essay

literacy narrative college essay

Firstly, let’s establish some basics, just like any other essay, this one will need to include: 

  • An introductory paragraph with a hook and a thesis. 
  • Body paragraphs to extrapolate on the points made in the introduction.
  • A concluding paragraph to sum it all up.

And since this type of essay is about sharing an anecdote and trying to convey a lesson/message through one’s own experiences and realizations, it’s important not to write in a rigid and overly formal manner. 

A personal literacy narrative essay example would typically feature:

  • A personal tone of voice since the main goal is to write about an anecdote related to literacy.
  • A literacy narrative example essay will, of course, include personal stories.
  • Dialogue and monologue if context-appropriate.
  • Visual and colorful language.
  • Literary tools such as metaphors and similes help the descriptive elements of this essay.
  • Use of active verbs.

Go through these bullet points and try to remember them. Obviously, by including all of them in your writing, you have more chances of getting a higher score on what you turn in. Stick around for college literacy narrative essay examples and narrative essay outline guides. 

Outline Example 

literacy narrative college essay

Writing an outline is crucial. It helps reduce mistakes, gives structure to your ideas, and streamlines the writing process. Speaking of writing, EssayService has a plethora of writing services, including report writing services , essay writing, and even proofreading.

If you want to know how to write a literacy narrative essay, here’s an outline example of what you can write in your introduction to your concluding paragraph. 

  • Introduce the main issue/problem: in the introduction, highlight the issue you want to provide an answer to. This will typically revolve around being illiterate or the importance of literacy. 
  • Give a solution: through sharing your own experiences, you can give a solution by sharing the realizations and lessons you’ve learned through these said experiences.
  • Give further advice: write how your readers can explicitly apply the advice you gave for their problems. Help them understand how to use this knowledge. 
  • Sum up: conclude the most relevant points you made to persuade your readers to care about the problem and consider your advice.

Literacy Narrative Essay Sample

Key differences between literacy narrative & narrative essay.

Don’t confuse a literacy narrative prompt with a narrative prompt. These two essays are very similar, but they’re not the same. Key differences are:

  • A literacy narrative essay is strictly an essay that showcases a story/anecdote of how this person became literate. No matter how different the story may be from one person to another, it always revolves around this. 
  • A narrative essay can be any story. It can be anecdotal, personal, etc. A narrative essay’s purpose is to show the readers that the writer knows how to use storytelling techniques.

Stick around to look at literacy narrative essay examples from our political science essay writing service .

Tips On Writing 

literacy narrative college essay

Now that you’ve looked at one of our college literacy narrative essay examples, it’s time to finish it off by reading our tips on writing. You’ve been taught the fundamentals and have seen a reference, and our tips will help your writing get better. 

Prepare and Find Sources

Be sure to do a proper amount of research. Try to find credible sources. Colleges usually don’t accept anything less. For example, scholarly articles and peer-reviewed works can be used. Gather these sources and filter through them. Now you can move on to your college literacy narrative essay outline and then write your college literacy narrative essay.

Also, note that literacy narratives discuss memories from time to time. So your personal experiences can be just as good of a source, provided the topic is fitting. Don’t be scared to add some flare to your literacy story. Take your audience on a rough and exciting journey. Your personal literacy story has the advantage of being written not just in your own unique style but also from your own unique perspective.

Shape your own story from a hilarious and witty ride you’ve had with your friends, talk about your bully, remember some of your own love stories, and let your vast imagination free. That’s what a literacy narrative takes. And don’t worry about carefully planned words. That’s not how reading or writing a personal essay works. Your entire journey is about personal exploration. With their creative juices flowing, college students can utilize only a few sentences of written words to hit the spot. Even the wrong way will get you somewhere on this literacy journey. So make it a personalized story.

One thing that can become a serious challenge is writer’s block. Simply sitting staring at a blank page can have disastrous consequences for your productivity. If you find yourself stumped for words - look for literacy narrative examples to get you inspired. Read about the writing life of your favorite author.

If you’re having trouble finding good sources, then don’t hesitate to get a writer’s help on EssayService, but you can also just extend your research by getting leads from your professor or your coursemates. They should know some useful links that can help you. 

Take Notes On Relevant Information 

Filter through your sources and note down relevant information in bite-sized chunks. The brain is better at remembering small blocks of information than it is at painstakingly long paragraphs. Do yourself a favor and segment your notes in this fashion - it will help you remember things much more easily. 

You can also use colored notes to streamline this process, and for some students, memorizing becomes even easier this way, but this is optional. Just remember to take down notes on what matters and use these in your college literacy narrative essay outline. 

Time To Write It 

After researching, figuring out your outline, etc. - it’s to write it all down. We hope you didn’t skip any of our prior tips since they truly do help the bigger picture. Use your notes and your research as a reference when writing. Don’t be scared to come back to them when writing, especially if you feel stuck. That’s what they are there for. 

Read the literacy narrative essay sample we’ve provided above if you need inspiration or fresh ideas, or if you just want to grasp the concept of this type of essay. But don’t forget to use your own experiences, and not just that of someone else’s; otherwise, the whole purpose of it is defeated. 

Write a rough draft if you need to, then polish it in the final version. Rough drafts are a great way to keep writing without overthinking since you know that you’ll easily erase the mistakes you’ll be making in the process. Don’t overthink. Just write. 

Proofread And Edit Your Essay

Lastly, it’s time to proofread it for any errors in your writing and edit if needed. A perfect paper can sometimes be unattainable, but perhaps you’ll get a perfect score by being meticulous. Don’t forget to reread our free literacy narrative essay sample above and some more free samples at EssayService to help you with learning. 

In case you want your writing to be perfect, ask your peer to proofread your paper for you instead of doing it yourself. Or you can proofread it and then let another person do the same a second time. Two are better than one sometimes, and one more person can detect errors you might have overlooked. 

You can address to our nursing essay writer if you need to edit your task or to buy case study .

Literacy Narrative Essay Topics 

The good thing about this type of essay is that there should be no shortage of ideas or topics to write about since the majority of us in school have had experiences of coming into literacy one way or another. 

People might have become literate much faster than some, but unless you’re completely illiterate, you should remember one thing or two from the past that can be used for your essay. 

Here are some prompts for your memory and general narrative essay topics/ideas for topics:

  • The First Thing I Read
  • The First Thing I Wrote
  • Languages I Learnt
  • How to Encourage Early Reading Skills
  • Computer Literacy Among Teachers
  • The Role of Public Libraries in Modern Education
  • What Do Low Literacy Rates Imply?
  • How Important Is Computer Literacy?
  • The Impact of Instant Messengers on Literacy
  • Cultural Impact of Online Communication
  • Factors Affecting Literacy Rates
  • Balanced Literacy Teaching Methods
  • Literacy and Cultural Awareness
  • Phonemic Awareness and Child Literacy
  • The Role of Literacy in Research
  • The Cornerstone of Early Literacy
  • Literacy History Throughout Ages
  • Defining Literacy Concept
  • An Early Literacy Intervention
  • Today’s Problems of Literacy

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literacy narrative college essay

English Writing Guide

  • Literacy Narrative
  • Visual Analysis
  • Rhetorical Analysis
  • Argument Research Paper
  • The Writing Handbook
  • Using the Library

Attribution

This guide is adapted from the Writing Guide with Handbook by OpenStax .

CC BY License

What is a literacy narrative?

  • The Writing Guide: Literacy Narrative Link to the online, interactive chapter on Literacy Narrative.
  • Literacy Narrative Chapter 3 from The Writing Guide As a PDF for downloading or printing.

Topics Covered

  • Identity and Expression
  • Literacy Narrative Trailblazer: Tara Westover
  • Glance at Genre: The Literacy Narrative
  • Annotated Sample Reading: from Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass by Frederick Douglass
  • Writing Process: Tracing the Beginnings of Literacy
  • Editing Focus: Sentence Structure
  • Evaluation: Self-Evaluating
  • Spotlight on … The Digital Archive of Literacy Narratives (DALN)
  • Portfolio: A Literacy Artifact
  • Lecture Slides for Literacy Narrative As a PDF for downloading or printing.
  • How to Write a Literacy Narrative Guide with exercises to assist you in writing a literacy narrative.
  • Digital Archive of Literacy Narratives The DALN is an open public resource made up of stories from people just like you about their experiences learning to read, write, and generally communicate with the world around them.
  • Next: Visual Analysis >>
  • Last Updated: Jan 12, 2024 7:36 AM
  • URL: https://library.jeffersonstate.edu/Writing-Guide-OpenStax
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ENG 120 College Writing

Literacy narrative resources, example literacy narratives.

  • Rhetorical Analysis
  • How to Search the Library This link opens in a new window
  • Evaluating Sources This link opens in a new window
  • Annotated Bibliography Resources
  • APA This link opens in a new window
  • Writing Support & Tutoring
  • Turnitin This link opens in a new window
  • Literacy Narrative Explained From CUNY Academic Commons, learn more about literacy narratives with examples.
  • Literacy Narratives From the UNC Charlotte The Writing Resources Corner, this resource provides information on what literacy narratives are and how to write one.
  • Purdue OWL: Narrative Essays When writing a narrative essay, one might think of it as telling a story. These essays are often anecdotal, experiential, and personal—allowing students to express themselves in a creative and, quite often, moving ways.
  • Narrative Essay Narration is a rhetorical style that basically just tells a story. Being able to convey events in a clear, descriptive, chronological order is important in many fields. Many times, in college, your professors will ask you to write paragraphs or entire essays using a narrative style.
  • Digital Archive of Literacy Narratives An open public resource made up of stories from people just like you about their experiences learning to read, write, and generally communicate with the world around them.
  • HERS by Perri Klass
  • "Literacy Narrative" by Kiki Petrosino
  • Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris
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  • Next: Rhetorical Analysis >>
  • Last Updated: Mar 5, 2024 4:24 PM
  • URL: https://guides.franklin.edu/ENG120

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1 Literacy Narrative

The foundation of our course is built on the ability to read closely and critically. To engage with this skill, and the multiple literacies we navigate on a daily basis, this first major essay is a personal piece in which you will explore a significant moment regarding your own literacy; you may approach literacy either in the traditional sense or using our expanded, modern definition. 

Course objectives

  • Develop rhetorical knowledge
  • Develop critical and creative thinking
  • Develop experience in writing Recall previous experience with various types of reading

Module objectives

During the process of completing this assignment, writers will:

  • Recall previous experience with various types of reading
  • Identify personal goals for academic reading and writing
  • Distinguish the different purposes for academic reading and writing
  • Give examples of familiar genres

ASSIGNMENT SHEET

Assignment Sheet – Literacy Narrative

The foundation of this course is built on your ability to read closely and critically. To engage with this skill, and the multiple literacies we navigate on a daily basis, this first major essay is a personal piece in which you will explore a significant moment regarding your own literacy; you may approach literacy either in the traditional sense or using our expanded, modern definition.

Literacy is a key component of academic success, as well as professional success. In this class and others, you will be asked to read and engage with various types of texts, so the purpose of this assignment is twofold. First, this assignment will allow you to write about something important to you, using an open form and personal tone instead of an academic one, allowing you to examine some of your deepest convictions and experiences and convey these ideas in a compelling way through writing. Second, this essay provides us an opportunity to get to know each other as a class community.

For this assignment you should imagine your audience to be an academic audience. Your audience will want a good understanding of your literacy, past, present, or future, and how you seek to comprehend the texts around you.

Requirements:

Choose ONE prompt below to tell about an important time in your life when you engaged with or were confronted with literacy, using the traditional or broad definition. We’ll discuss various types of literacy, so you will identify and define the type of literacy you’re discussing.

  • Describe a situation when you were challenged in your reading by describing the source of that challenge (vocabulary, length, organization, something else). How did you overcome that challenge to understand what the text was saying? What strategies or steps do you plan to take in the future to make the process easier?
  • Describe the type of texts you read (watch, listen to, etc.) most often. What makes them easy or challenging to read and interpret? What strategies do you use to ensure that you fully understand them or can apply them?
  • Describe what kind of texts you think you will have to read or interpret in the future and where you will encounter these texts (i.e. future classes, your career, etc.). How do you think they might challenge you? What strategies will you use to overcome these difficulties?

Formatting:

  • Narratives should be between 500-600 words (around 2-3 pages). Be concise, and choose your details carefully.
  • Your work must be typed in size 12, Times New Roman font and double spaced, 1” margins, following MLA requirements.

Week 1: Introducing Rhetoric

The foundation of our course is built on your ability to read closely and critically. To engage with this skill, and the multiple literacies we navigate on a daily basis, this project is a personal piece in which you will explore a significant moment regarding your own literacy; you may approach literacy either in the traditional sense or using our expanded, modern definition.

Exploring Literacy

What comes to mind when you hear the term “ literacy “? Traditionally, we can define literacy as the ability to read and write. To be literate is to be a reader and writer. More broadly, this term has come to be used in other fields and specialties and refers generally to an ability or competency.

For example, you could refer to music literacy as the ability to read and write music; there are varying levels of literacy, so while you may recognize the image below as a music staff and the symbols for musical notes, it’s another thing to name the notes, to play any or multiple instruments, or to compose music.

Photo of sheet music

Or, you may be a casual football fan, but to be football literate , you would need to be able to understand and read the playbook, have an understanding of the positions, define terms like “offsides” or “holding” as they relate to the sport, and interpret the hand signals used by the referees.

Educator and writer Shaelynn Faarnsworth describes and defines literacy as “social” and “constantly changing.” In this unit, we’ll explore literacy as a changing, dynamic process. By expanding our definition of literacy, we’ll come to a better understanding of our skills as readers and writers. We’ll use this discussion so that you, as writers, can better understand and write about “…what skills [you] get and what [you] don’t, [and include your] interests, passions, and quite possibly YouTube.”

Checking In: Questions and Activities

  • Consider our expanded definition of literacy . In what ways are you literate?
  • When, where, and how do you read and write on a daily basis?
  • Thinking of traditional literacy (reading and writing), what successes or challenges have you faced in school, at home, in the workplace, etc.?

Close Reading Strategies: Introducing the Conversation Model

Reading is a necessary step in the writing process. One helpful metaphor for the writing process is the conversation model. Imagine approaching a group of friends who are in the middle o

Graphic illustrating the conversation model

f an intense discussion. Instead of interrupting and blurting out the first thing you think of, you would listen. Then as you listen, you may need to ask questions to catch up and gain a better understanding of what has already been said. Finally, once you have this thorough understanding, you can feel prepared to add your ideas, challenge, and further the conversation.

Similarly, when writing, the first step is to read. Like listening, this helps you understand the topic better and approach the issues you’re discussing with more knowledge. With that understanding, you can start to ask more specific questions, look up definitions, and start to do more driven research. With all that information, then you can offer a new perspective on what others have already written. As you write, you may go through this process — listening, researching, and writing — several times!

This unit focuses first on the importance of reading. There are two important ways we’ll think about reading in this course. Close reading and critical reading are both important processes with difference focuses. Close reading is a process to understand what is being said. It’s often used in summaries, where the goal is to comprehend and report on what a text is communicating. Compared to critical reading, an analytical process focused on how and why an idea is presented, close reading forces us to slow down and identify the meaning of the information. This skill is especially important in summaries and accurately quoting and paraphrasing.

Close reading, essentially, is like listening to the conversation. Both focus on comprehension and being able to understand and report back on what is written or said. In this project,

  • Within close reading, your processes could be further broken down into pre-reading, active reading, and post-reading strategies. What do you focus on before and after you read a text?
  • Have your instructors asked you to annotate a text?
  • Do you find yourself copying down important lines, highlighting, or making notes as you read?
  • What strategies do you rely on to actively and closely read?
  • What are your least favorite strategies?

The Rhetorical Situation

You may have heard of “rhetorical questions” or gotten frustrated watching the news when a commentator dismisses another by saying “that’s just empty rhetoric” — but what does rhetoric mean? With definitions dating back to Aristotle and Plato, this is a complex concept with many historical and contemporary definitions. We define rhetoric as the ways language and other communication strategies are used to achieve a purpose with an audience. Below, we’ll explore the rhetorical situation, examining how many different factors contribute to how a writer can achieve their goals, and what may influence them to make different decisions.

Graphic depiction of the rhetorical situation

The rhetorical situation is composed of many interactive pieces that each depend on the other. Let’s start by defining each component:

  • Ask yourself: Who created this?
  • Ask yourself: Who is likely to, or supposed to, see this?
  • Ask yourself: What am I looking at?
  • Ask yourself: Why was the text created?
  • Ask yourself: When was this created? How did it get developed? Where was the text published? What shaped the creative process?

Each of these categories intersects and influences the other. When we think about a complete rhetorical situation, you’ll need to define all these different pieces to best understand the text. As we begin practicing close reading, drawing the rhetorical situation will be a helpful tool.

Let’s examine this project, the literacy narrative.

  • Author : You! While you have a unique background, you’re a student in this course, and your individual writing experience will influence what you write about.
  • Audience : Your classmates and instructor. This is a collaborative course, and your instructor will read what you produce.
  • Text : Literacy Narrative. This type of text has different goals and requirements. We’ve examined literacy already, and we’ll review narratives soon. Together, these guidelines will help us construct this specific type of text (rather than a poem about reading or your personal memoir about how you became a writer!).
  • Purpose : To reflect. To introduce yourself. To define your literacy. These are all goals of this assignment. Throughout your assignment, you’ll want to check in with yourself and ensure that you’re accomplishing these goals. If not, you won’t meet the demands of the assignment.
  • Context : This assignment — the assignment sheet above has specific requirements that will influence what you create. Your writing background — no one else has the same life experience with reading and writing as you. The goals of the course — there are specific tasks to accomplish with this project that are specific to CO1 objectives. Each of these aspects will influence how you put the project together. Since you didn’t just wake up and decide to write about literacy, the context of this assignment will determine what you create.
  • Which of the elements of the rhetorical triangle influence your writing decisions most? Why?
  • Are there any elements you don’t consider? Why don’t they seem as important?

Week 2: Defining Narrative and Organization

This week, you’ll review the assignment more fully, begin drafting, and work more closely with feedback from others. A literacy narrative is a specific type of genre, so there are certain requirements for this text. Using examples from other students, we’ll begin to develop your first draft.

Introducing the Literacy Narrative

narrative : a method of story-telling  

A literacy narrative is a common genre for writers who want to explore their own experiences with writing. Just Google “literacy narrative” and find endless examples! While this assignment will respond to specific prompts and follow a more specific structure than some of the examples you’ll find on Google, there is a common theme in each essay that revolves around your relationship with literacy. Week one defined literacy ,  but what about narrative? Narrative can be defined as a method of story-telling. In the simplest terms, your goal in this literacy narrative, in this assignment, is to tell the story of your personal experience with literacy, either from a past event, something you’re working with now, or looking to the future. Let’s review the three sets of prompts from the assignment sheet:

Each of these prompts gives you the chance to tell your story and examine your experience with a specific type of literacy. As you consider the prompts, think about how you could tell a story to answer these questions. With this frame of mind, review the questions and activities below.

  • Which prompt from the assignment sheet will you address? Why does this prompt appeal to you?
  • Consider the brainstorming you did about the ways that you are literate. Which prompt matches those skills best? Are these skills you struggled with at first, skills you currently practice, or a skill that you’re learning and will use in the future? Use these notes to decide which set of questions you’ll focus on in this project.

Organization: PIE Method

Each prompt includes three questions, which we’ll use as the starting point for three paragraphs. In each set of prompts, your first paragraph will describe the text; remember, when thinking about reading a text, we can interpret this broadly, like with music and sports. The second paragraph will explore the challenges or successes you’ve experienced. Then, the third paragraph will focus on strategies and techniques for improvement. This way, you can tell a more complete story of your experience, sharing the details and emotions along the way and making readers feel like they’re right there with you. But how do you capture all this detail in a way that helps you organize your thoughts and keep your reader interested in the story?

We’ll use a formula for the paragraph structure called PIE, which stands for Point, Information, and Explanation. This method will help you plan what you want to say, and then give examples so you can show why each step was so important to you. Let’s review each part of the paragraph, and then we’ll look at how this applies to your literacy narrative with a student sample.

  • In the literacy narrative: Since each paragraph responds to a question from the prompt, the Point of each paragraph should tell readers which question you’re answering. By rephrasing the question in your Point, you can signal to your classmates and instructor so that they know which question you’re answering.
  • In the literacy narrative: Most of your evidence, in a narrative, will be from your experience. Report what happened, what you read, or what you learned. Naming these details can help your readers see through your eyes when you give specific examples.
  • In the literacy narrative: Help your readers get inside your head and feel like they’re with you. Keeping the Point in mind and showing how all these ideas relate will bring the paragraph together by developing each example clearly and offering a thoughtful response to each prompt. How did you feel about the examples from the Information? Why was it was so significant? Why should your readers care about this experience? Answering these questions will help show your readers what you experienced so they can understand the significance and connect with you.

Together, these pieces all come together to create a strong, developed paragraph that responds to the question from the prompt more fully.

  • Below is a sample paragraph that follows the PIE structure. It is coded for the different parts of the paragraph above, with the Point in bold , the  Information in italics , and the  Explanation underlined . The second paragraph has been shortened and has not been coded. First, review the parts of the coded example. Then, review and identify PIE in the paragraph.

Planning a Draft

Now that we’ve reviewed all the components and the foundation for this assignment, you’re ready to begin your draft! We’ll focus just on the first paragraph here, but you can use these steps for each paragraph to construct your draft.

Consider the first question from each prompt, copied below, to decide if you’ll focus on a past experience, the present, or the future:

  • Describe a situation when you were challenged in your reading by describing the source of that challenge (vocabulary, length, organization, something else).  
  • Describe the type of texts you read (watch, listen to, etc.) most often.  
  • Describe what kind of texts you think you will have to read or interpret in the future and where you will encounter these texts (i.e. future classes, your career, etc.).  

Literacy Narrative Rough Draft

Using your brainstorming from previous weeks, and using the student sample as a reference, begin drafting using the PIE structure, following these steps below to build the first paragraph of your draft. This is just a first draft, so let yourself write freely! This doesn’t need to be perfect or even good — instead, the goal is to put ideas on paper.

  • In your Point, rephrase one of the questions above. You can borrow some of this same language to signal to your readers and show which question you’re answering. Remember, this only introduces the main idea — no details yet!
  • Review your brainstorming. Did you name specific examples? Add these to your paragraph to develop the Information. Name at least two examples. Each example you give should connect to the Point, providing evidence from your experience.
  • Review the examples and start to Explain. How did you feel about the examples from the Information? Why was it was so significant? Why should your readers care about this experience? Ask yourself these questions for each example you include.
  • Depending on your drafting process, it might be easy to tackle all three paragraphs at once and get everything down, or you might prefer to write one paragraph at a time.
  • Throughout the course, practice with drafting one paragraph per day, or setting a timer to see what you can write in a specific amount of time.
  • Review what you’ve written, and see if there are more details to add. Remember, the goal is to get as much as you can out of your head. Revisions will take place next.

Week 3: Peer Review and Revision

Peer review.

Peer review is an important part of the drafting process. It helps us learn from our classmates and see our own work in a different way. Writing can be a lonely and isolating experience that makes the process frustrating and unsatisfying. Getting to share your work with others can break that uncomfortable pattern!

That said, you may be new to sharing your work or have different experiences with peer review. Good peer reviews can spark creativity, help build on good ideas, and revise the rougher ideas. But, sometimes peer review can be challenging if your peer is too critical or too complementary, or maybe you can’t read and understand what they wrote! The tips below will help reinforce best practices, as well as avoid some common mistakes with peer review.

When completing peer review, one important rule is to focus on the big picture and NOT to edit. Think about it like this: If you add a comma, then you’ve helped make one sentence of the paper better. In a paper that’s 1,000 words long, that’s not so helpful! Instead, consider the rhetorical triangle. If you can make observations and ask questions to help your classmate understand the audience or the genre better, then the entire paper is going to improve, because you focused on a higher order concept that affects not just one sentence, but the paragraph and the whole paper. Throughout these projects, we’ll practice several strategies for peer review so you can see several example methods and find what works best for you.

Peer workshop

When you sit down with your peer’s paper, we’ll practice a three-step process. This gives you a chance to explain exactly what you mean while offering specific advice for your peer. Review the steps below:

  • Observe : Make a statement or summarize what you see. Identifying a pattern in your peer’s work or repeating what you think your peer is saying can help your peer know if they’re communicating clearly. Using the rhetorical triangle to support these observations could be a helpful strategy!
  • Explain : Critique what you see, explaining if the writer has a strong idea or if it might need work. U sing adjectives to describe what’s going well or what’s not working is important so that you peer can learn more about your observation. Was this “clear” or “confusing”? Is the writer “engaging and interesting” or is the writing “plain and repetitive”?
  • EXAMPLE: 1) You give a few examples for information, then a sentence of explanation. 2) It doesn’t look like this meets the word limits from the assignment sheet, and I’m not sure which part you’ll focus on as the main form of literacy. 3) Could you clarify this? More explanation about why these are important could help you meet the word limit, too!

All together, these comments will need to be a few sentences long. Since we’re NOT focused on grammar or editing, the changes that your peer can make will have a big effect on the final product. With these more developed comments, your goal is to make 1-2 comments per paragraph. Give your classmate something to consider, using our course vocabulary, to really help them improve. As you read and practice this method, it’s likely that you’ll get ideas for your own paper, which makes this process doubly helpful!

Assignment Rubric

  • Will clearly and accurately define a specific type of literacy, explaining the connection and development of literacy. Will clearly establish the identity of the writer and the influence and importance of literacy.
  • Will communicate significant experiences to an academic audience. Will give the reader something new to consider. Will interest the reader through storytelling.
  • Will remain focused on literacy and the individual prompts. Will include specific details from a variety of experiences. Will engage readers with details and examples. Will explain the connections and development of growth through chosen examples.
  • Will follow PIE structure closely.
  • Will be clear and readable without distracting grammar, punctuation or spelling errors.

A “B” (good) summary (80% +):

  • The concept of literacy may not be as clearly connected or central  to the writer’s development.
  • More attention could be paid to engage or interest the readers. May lack context to help the reader understand the writer’s experience.
  • Focus may lack through discussing events outside of the prompts. May include few specific examples. May lack explanation to show connection between examples.
  • PIE may not be followed in one paragraph. Either the point, information, or explanation could be further developed or clarified within a paragraph.
  • The writer may need to work on communicating information more effectively. The narrative will be generally clear and readable but may need further editing for grammatical errors.

A “C” (satisfactory) summary (70% +):

  • Literacy is not defined or explained clearly in connection to skill.
  • Awareness of audience is lacking, making sections confusing for an unfamiliar reader.
  • Prompts may not be clearly connected to the paragraphs. Examples are not included or are not clearly explained.
  • PIE may be missing or underdeveloped in multiple paragraphs.
  • “C” narratives may also need more editing for readability.

A “D” (poor) summary (60% +):

  • Will show an attempt toward the assignment goals that has fallen short. May have several of the above problems.

An “F” (failing) summary:

  • ignores the assignment.
  • has been plagiarized.
  • Review the same sample paragraph below from a previous student. Identify one strength and one area for improvement in the draft, following the 3-step method above. As you review, consider how to balance praise and criticism. Something is going well in your peer’s draft, and something can be improved!

Most of this week revolves around drafting activities. This week brings our first revisions and peer reviews, an important part of the writing process. With your peers, you’ll get to review what they’ve been working on while receiving feedback on your own work. Similar to the sample, it will be your responsibility to identify strengths and praise your peers’ writing, as well as identify areas for improvement and explain why this is an important revision they must make.

Applying Peer Review: Taking Suggestions and Revising

Once you’ve completed peer review, you’ll likely have lots of ideas — reviewing others’ work often ignites a creative spark for your own work! You should feel free to apply strategies from your peers and reexamine your work, but you want to focus on your peers’ suggestions for you. This way, you can see how your ideas and their commentary lines up. In our 3-step feedback process, the last step is to make a suggestion. While the notes from your peers should be valuable, it’s ultimately your draft and your decision about what feedback to include. As you read through the commentary, review the assignment sheet, and begin making changes to the draft. This is one of the most important steps in the writing process and what makes the difference between a rough first draft and a polished, complete draft.

Suggested schedule and pacing

This module is intended to take 3 weeks and would work well as a first, introductory assignment or as a final, reflective assignment. Each unit is designed to help instructors offer feedback at critical stages of the drafting process, assisting writers strategically before they offer their drafts for peer review. This does require a quick turnaround from instructors; for planning this three-week unit, drafts would be due to you after the two-week mark, and peer review is recommended to take place a few days after, once your feedback can be reviewed and used for revisions. This necessarily leads to less intensive feedback on the final drafts, helping to disperse workload and making for faster turnaround of final submissions.

Writers may experience typical growing pains throughout these assignments, especially when used as a first assessment and adjust to your style and teaching practice. Overall, writers seem motivated and engaged in the narrative aspect and less intimidated when starting the course with a less formal, less academic assignment. This is intentional so that everyone begins from a familiar place. As a last, reflective project, this can be used to help writers process and digest rhetorical concepts and their growth throughout the semester.

This unit focuses on close reading skills and introspection to allow students to orient themselves to writing in a constructive and open-minded way. By focusing on literacy and setting the tone for the semester, students tend to be more receptive to rhetorical concepts and understand the time investment required for this course.

Assessment notes

Through this three-week unit, students will explore their past  literacies and expand the definition of literacy  beyond  the traditional sense  to grow comfortable and familiar with the idea of reading and writing in academic English.   

the ability to read and write; more broadly, a specific ability to navigate a specialized discipline

Close reading is a process to understand what is being said.

the ways language and other communication strategies are used to achieve a purpose with an audience

a method of story-telling

First-Year Composition Copyright © by Leslie Davis and Kiley Miller is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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  • How to write a narrative essay | Example & tips

How to Write a Narrative Essay | Example & Tips

Published on July 24, 2020 by Jack Caulfield . Revised on July 23, 2023.

A narrative essay tells a story. In most cases, this is a story about a personal experience you had. This type of essay , along with the descriptive essay , allows you to get personal and creative, unlike most academic writing .

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Table of contents

What is a narrative essay for, choosing a topic, interactive example of a narrative essay, other interesting articles, frequently asked questions about narrative essays.

When assigned a narrative essay, you might find yourself wondering: Why does my teacher want to hear this story? Topics for narrative essays can range from the important to the trivial. Usually the point is not so much the story itself, but the way you tell it.

A narrative essay is a way of testing your ability to tell a story in a clear and interesting way. You’re expected to think about where your story begins and ends, and how to convey it with eye-catching language and a satisfying pace.

These skills are quite different from those needed for formal academic writing. For instance, in a narrative essay the use of the first person (“I”) is encouraged, as is the use of figurative language, dialogue, and suspense.

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Narrative essay assignments vary widely in the amount of direction you’re given about your topic. You may be assigned quite a specific topic or choice of topics to work with.

  • Write a story about your first day of school.
  • Write a story about your favorite holiday destination.

You may also be given prompts that leave you a much wider choice of topic.

  • Write about an experience where you learned something about yourself.
  • Write about an achievement you are proud of. What did you accomplish, and how?

In these cases, you might have to think harder to decide what story you want to tell. The best kind of story for a narrative essay is one you can use to talk about a particular theme or lesson, or that takes a surprising turn somewhere along the way.

For example, a trip where everything went according to plan makes for a less interesting story than one where something unexpected happened that you then had to respond to. Choose an experience that might surprise the reader or teach them something.

Narrative essays in college applications

When applying for college , you might be asked to write a narrative essay that expresses something about your personal qualities.

For example, this application prompt from Common App requires you to respond with a narrative essay.

In this context, choose a story that is not only interesting but also expresses the qualities the prompt is looking for—here, resilience and the ability to learn from failure—and frame the story in a way that emphasizes these qualities.

An example of a short narrative essay, responding to the prompt “Write about an experience where you learned something about yourself,” is shown below.

Hover over different parts of the text to see how the structure works.

Since elementary school, I have always favored subjects like science and math over the humanities. My instinct was always to think of these subjects as more solid and serious than classes like English. If there was no right answer, I thought, why bother? But recently I had an experience that taught me my academic interests are more flexible than I had thought: I took my first philosophy class.

Before I entered the classroom, I was skeptical. I waited outside with the other students and wondered what exactly philosophy would involve—I really had no idea. I imagined something pretty abstract: long, stilted conversations pondering the meaning of life. But what I got was something quite different.

A young man in jeans, Mr. Jones—“but you can call me Rob”—was far from the white-haired, buttoned-up old man I had half-expected. And rather than pulling us into pedantic arguments about obscure philosophical points, Rob engaged us on our level. To talk free will, we looked at our own choices. To talk ethics, we looked at dilemmas we had faced ourselves. By the end of class, I’d discovered that questions with no right answer can turn out to be the most interesting ones.

The experience has taught me to look at things a little more “philosophically”—and not just because it was a philosophy class! I learned that if I let go of my preconceptions, I can actually get a lot out of subjects I was previously dismissive of. The class taught me—in more ways than one—to look at things with an open mind.

If you want to know more about AI tools , college essays , or fallacies make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples or go directly to our tools!

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If you’re not given much guidance on what your narrative essay should be about, consider the context and scope of the assignment. What kind of story is relevant, interesting, and possible to tell within the word count?

The best kind of story for a narrative essay is one you can use to reflect on a particular theme or lesson, or that takes a surprising turn somewhere along the way.

Don’t worry too much if your topic seems unoriginal. The point of a narrative essay is how you tell the story and the point you make with it, not the subject of the story itself.

Narrative essays are usually assigned as writing exercises at high school or in university composition classes. They may also form part of a university application.

When you are prompted to tell a story about your own life or experiences, a narrative essay is usually the right response.

The key difference is that a narrative essay is designed to tell a complete story, while a descriptive essay is meant to convey an intense description of a particular place, object, or concept.

Narrative and descriptive essays both allow you to write more personally and creatively than other kinds of essays , and similar writing skills can apply to both.

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The Power of Literacy Narratives

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I first learned to read at the age of three while sitting on my grandmother’s lap in her high-rise apartment on Lake Shore Drive in Chicago, IL. While flipping casually through Time magazine, she noticed how I took a keen interest in the blur of black and white shapes on the page. Soon, I was following her wrinkled finger from one word to the next, sounding them out, until those words came into focus, and I could read. It felt as though I had unlocked time itself.

What Is a “Literacy Narrative?”

What are your strongest memories of reading and writing? These stories, otherwise known as “literacy narratives,” allow writers to talk through and discover their relationships with reading, writing, and speaking in all its forms. Narrowing in on specific moments reveals the significance of literacy’s impact on our lives, conjuring up buried emotions tied to the power of language, communication, and expression.

To be “ literate ” implies the ability to decode language on its most basic terms, but literacy also expands to one’s ability to "read and write" the world — to find and make meaning out of our relationships with texts, ourselves, and the world around us. At any given moment, we orbit language worlds. Soccer players, for example, learn the language of the game. Doctors talk in technical medical terms. Fishermen speak the sounds of the sea. And in each of these worlds, our literacy in these specific languages allows us to navigate, participate and contribute to the depth of knowledge generated within them.

Famous writers like Annie Dillard, author of "The Writing Life," and Anne Lammot, "Bird by Bird," have penned literacy narratives to reveal the highs and lows of language learning, literacies, and the written word. But you don’t have to be famous to tell your own literacy narrative — everyone has their own story to tell about their relationships with reading and writing. In fact, the Digital Archive of Literacy Narratives at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign offers a publicly accessible archive of personal literacy narratives in multiple formats featuring over 6,000 entries. Each shows the range of subjects, themes, and ways into the literacy narrative process as well as variations in terms of voice, tone, and style.

How to Write Your Own Literacy Narrative

Ready to write your own literacy narrative but don’t know where to begin?

  • Think of a story linked to your personal history of reading and writing. Perhaps you want to write about your favorite author or book and its impact on your life. Maybe you remember your first brush with the sublime power of poetry. Do you remember the time you first learned to read, write or speak in another language? Or maybe the story of your first big writing project comes to mind. Make sure to consider why this particular story is the most important one to tell. Usually, there are powerful lessons and revelations uncovered in the telling of a literacy narrative.
  • Wherever you begin, picture the first scene that comes to mind in relation to this story, using descriptive details. Tell us where you were, who you were with, and what you were doing in this specific moment when your literacy narrative begins. For example, a story about your favorite book may begin with a description of where you were when the book first landed in your hands. If you’re writing about your discovery of poetry, tell us exactly where you were when you first felt that spark. Do you remember where you were when you first learned a new word in a second language?
  • Continue from there to explore the ways in which this experience had meaning for you. What other memories are triggered in the telling of this first scene? Where did this experience lead you in your writing and reading journey? To what extent did it transform you or your ideas about the world? What challenges did you face in the process? How did this particular literacy narrative shape your life story? How do questions of power or knowledge come into play in your literacy narrative?

Writing Toward a Shared Humanity

Writing literacy narratives can be a joyful process, but it can also trigger untapped feelings about the complexities of literacy. Many of us carry scars and wounds from early literacy experiences. Writing it down can help us explore and reconcile these feelings in order to strengthen our relationship with reading and writing. Writing literacy narratives can also help us learn about ourselves as consumers and producers of words, revealing the intricacies of knowledge, culture, and power bound up in language and literacies. Ultimately, telling our literacy stories brings us closer to ourselves and each other in our collective desire to express and communicate a shared humanity.​

Amanda Leigh Lichtenstein is a poet, writer, and educator from Chicago, IL (USA) who currently splits her time in East Africa. Her essays on arts, culture, and education appear in Teaching Artist Journal, Art in the Public Interest, Teachers & Writers Magazine, Teaching Tolerance, The Equity Collective, AramcoWorld, Selamta, The Forward, among others.

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3.8 Spotlight on … The Digital Archive of Literacy Narratives (DALN)

Learning outcomes.

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

  • Use a variety of technologies to address a range of audiences.
  • Match the capacities of different environments to varying rhetorical situations.

An archive is a collection of artifacts, often historical, that serve to document a time period, location, or group of people. Archives may be located far from cities, accessible only in person, and they typically house rare documents that visitors view or handle with particular care. When an archive is digitized, however, visitors are allowed to view the document in virtual spaces, thus creating an open and accessible environment. The Digital Archive of Literacy Narratives (DALN) “is an open public resource made up of stories from people just like you about their experiences learning to read, write, and generally communicate with the world around them.” People who have diverse identities, lived experiences, and engagement with literacies have uploaded their literacy narratives and given permission for their stories to be read and shared with public audiences.

Using the Digital Archive of Literacy Narratives (DALN)

The DALN is completely keyword searchable, so if you are looking to read literacy narratives on particular subjects—such as music or dance as literacy, or any other concentrated subject about which one can demonstrate knowledge—you can search for shared narratives with these literacies. As the website states, “The DALN invites people of all ages, races, communities, backgrounds, and interests to contribute stories about how—and in what circumstances—they read, write, and compose meaning, and how they learned to do so (or helped others learn).” Sharing your literacy narrative in the DALN can be a rewarding way to celebrate the completion of this writing milestone. The DALN welcomes literacy narratives of all kinds and in all formats, including diaries, blogs, poetry, music, videos, letters, stories, chat rooms, and so on.

Publish Your Literacy Narrative

After you have completed and revised your literacy narrative, consider sharing it with the DALN You may also want to consider reimagining your literacy narrative in the form of a podcast or a TED Talk–type video. The TED Talks in TED Talk is an acronym that stands for the phrase “Technology, Entertainment, and Design.” TED is a nonprofit organization devoted to the distribution of ideas; the website is keyword searchable and provides an archive where you can find short talks about just about any topic. The criteria for a TED Talk can be found on the organization’s website. To prepare for this publication alternative, take an opportunity to watch the following sample TED Talks that fit the genre of literacy narrative:

  • Luvvie Ajayi discusses how blogging and creating a post that went viral led to her identifying as a writer.
  • John Trischitti talks about how reading literally saves lives and advocates for providing young people with books to secure their futures.

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Writing Program at New College

Assignments - literacy narrative (1000 - 1500 words).

A Literacy Narrative is a type of autobiographical essay –“The Art of Eating Spaghetti,” for example – that focuses on personal experiences with literacy (speaking, writing, reading, and the like) in order to confirm the importance of these rhetorical experiences in a person’s life.

Begin by recalling a rhetorical moment from your life. Think back and reflect on significant situations that helped develop you as a reader and/or writer. Think about who helped you learn about and/or appreciate reading and writing. Think about particular experiences that effected how you thought about reading and writing.

Finding your Focus

Above all, try to recall a moment in your life when speaking, reading, writing, and the like had a big impact on your life. Answer the following questions to get you thinking:

  • What is your earliest memory of reading and writing?
  • How did you learn to read and write? Did you ever teach anyone else to read or write?
  • Who encouraged you to read and write?
  • What events interrupted and/or slowed down your ability and/or desire to read and write?
  • Did you apply literacy skills to other content areas: sports, music, video games, etc.?
  • What kinds of reading have you done in your past and what kinds of reading to you do now?
  • What teachers had a particular impact on your reading and writing?
  • What assignments had a particular impact on your reading and writing?
  • Have different schools or other institutions had an impact on your reading and writing?
  • How do you currently feel about reading and writing?
  • What rewards have come from reading and writing?
  • Did a special or important event from your past make you the reader and/or writer you are today?
  • Was there a moment or moments that were especially empowering?
  • Did you ever read a book or poem or song that made sense to you beyond the words on the page?

Organizing your Ideas

Discuss these questions with members of the class, and then post responses to at least seven (7) of the questions to Blackboard. The completion of this WTL assignment will provide you with more information about what to pursue for the writing assignment. As you look over this profile of your writing history, consider what “argument” or “so what” point will guide your literacy narrative. For example, you may learn that while you failed or did poorly on a certain assignment, this grade motivated you to work more diligently on your writing skills.

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Literacy is experience, competency, and skill in communication. Literacy begins with language acquisition; learning words and speaking is the earliest form of productive communication. Developing listening and reading comprehension is classified as receptive communication. The acquisition of writing skills is a form of productive communication. Both types of communication are tools for learning. The definition of literacy has evolved through cultural change from oral, reading, and writing to include visual, musical, technical, numeracy, and information literacies.

To describe literacy, what other literacies would you include that facilitate learning?

A literacy narrative is a type of autobiographical essay that often tells the story of learning to read or write. It is reflective writing that describes the process and growth of learning. Narratives are a way of telling a personal story through remembrance and introspection.

A literacy narrative is based on life events. This means it is your experience of literacy, you may or may not love to read and write. Tell your story. To describe what you experienced, consider how to include specific details, who, what, when, where, why, and how.

  • Who taught you?
  • What changed or made an impact on learning?
  • Recount a memory of the time when developing literacy made a difference.
  • To describe where may include a place and/or an emotional state.
  • Explain why it matters.
  • Describe how literacy met a want or need and/or how it worked out.

Telling the Story

  • Describe the setting of a main event.
  • Blend in sensory images of sights, sounds, textures, smells, and tastes that manifest a personal experience.
  • Incorporate dialogue, including what was said can add an emotional connection to a narrative.
  • Include situations that build the plot: introduction, challenge, complication, inspiration, revelation, resolution to organize and add interest.

Stories are most often told in chronological order. Consider if that is the best way to tell the story.

  • Chronologically, from beginning to end.
  • Start in the middle.
  • Start at the end.

Read your assignment and rubric to note the criteria, markers of quality, and rating scale and scoring before brainstorming your approach to the literacy narrative.

  • If the assignment and rubric do not make clear what the professor expects, take the opportunity to ask questions.
  • Typical criteria include writing style, focus, length, and due date(s).
  • Typical quality markers include  clear  language and error-free, consistent organization, context, audience, purpose, evaluation, critical thinking.
  • Typical rating scale may include how criteria determines elements of the narrative from mastery to inadequate.
  • Last Updated: Mar 3, 2022 1:29 PM
  • URL: https://jefferson.kctcs.libguides.com/literacy-narratives

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Humanities LibreTexts

3: Module 1: Introduction to Literacy Narratives

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  • Page ID 85927
  • 3.1: Self as Writer
  • 3.2: Discussion: What is a Literacy Narrative?
  • 3.3: Discussion: Strategies Writers Use in a Literacy Narrative
  • 3.4: Discussion: How to Summarize (Basic Rules)
  • 3.5: Discussion: Synthesizing Literacy Narratives
  • 3.6: Assignment: Summarize a Sophisticated Essay about Literacy Narratives

English 110 | Fall 2020

Tues. & Thurs. 11am-12:15pm Instructor: Brenna Crowe

Norton Field Guide’s Writing a Literacy Narrative

Key features / literacy narratives.

A well-told story. As with most narratives, those about literacy often set up some sort of situation that needs to be resolved. That need for res- olution makes readers want to keep reading. We want to know whether Nichols ultimately will pass the proficiency test. Some literacy narratives simply explore the role that reading or writing played at some time in someone’s life—assuming, perhaps, that learning to read or write is a challenge to be met.

Vivid detail. Details can bring a narrative to life for readers by giving them vivid mental images of the sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and textures of the world in which your story takes place. The details you use when describing something can help readers picture places, people, and events; dialogue can help them hear what is being said. We get a picture of Agosín’s Chilean childhood when she writes of the “blue electric sky” and her “little blue notebook” in which she described her “house surrounded by cherry trees and gardenias.” Similarly, we can picture a little boy standing on a stool planting African violets — and hear a three-year- old’s exasperation through his own words: “I’d like to see a menu.” Dialogue can help bring a narrative to life.

Some indication of the narrative’s significance. By definition, a literacy narrative tells something the writer remembers about learning to read or write. In addition, the writer needs to make clear why the incident matters to him or her. You may reveal its significance in various ways. Nichols does it when she says she no longer loves to read or write. Agosín points out that she writes in Spanish because “nothing else from my childhood world remains . . . To write in Spanish is for me a gesture of survival.” The trick is to avoid tacking onto the end a brief statement about your narrative’s significance as if it were a kind of moral of the story. My narrative would be less effective if, instead of discussing my grandmother’s back- ground and my graduation, I had simply said, “She taught me to be a life- long reader.”

A GUIDE TO WRITING LITERACY NARRATIVES

Choosing a Topic In general, it’s a good idea to focus on a single event that took place during a relatively brief period of time. For example:

  • any early memory about writing or reading that you recall vividly
  • someone who taught you to read or write
  • a book or other text that has been significant for you in some way
  • an event at school that was interesting, humorous, or embarrassing
  • a writing or reading task that you found (or still find) especially difficult or challenging
  • a memento that represents an important moment in your literacy development (perhaps the start of a LITERACY PORTFOLIO)
  • the origins of your current attitudes about writing or reading
  • learning to write instant messages, learning to write email appropriately, learning to construct a website, creating and maintaining a Facebook page

Make a list of possible topics, and then choose one that you think will be interesting to you and to others — and that you’re willing to share with others. If several seem promising, try them out on a friend or classmate. Or just choose one and see where it leads; you can switch to another if need be. If you have trouble coming up with a topic, try FREE-WRITING, LISTING, CLUSTERING, or LOOPING.

Considering the Rhetorical Situation

PURPOSE:   Why do you want to tell this story? To share a memory with others? To fulfill an assignment? To teach a lesson? To explore your past learning? Think about the reasons for your choice and how they will shape what you write.

AUDIENCE: Are your readers likely to have had similar experiences? Would they tell similar stories? How much explaining will you have to do to help them understand your narrative? Can you assume that they will share your attitudes toward your story, or will you have to work at making them see your perspective? How much about your life are you willing to share with this audience?

STANCE: What attitude do you want to project? Affectionate? Neutral? Critical? Do you wish to be sincere? serious? humorously detached? self-critical? self-effacing? something else? How do you want your readers to see you?

MEDIA / DESIGN: Will your narrative be in print? presented orally? on a web- site? Would photos, charts, or other illustrations help you present your subject? Is there a typeface that conveys the right tone? Do you need headings?

Generating Ideas and Text

Good literacy narratives share certain elements that make them interesting and compelling for readers. Remember that your goals are to tell the story as clearly and vividly as you can and to convey the meaning the incident has for you today. Start by writing out what you remember about the setting and those involved, perhaps trying out some of the methods in the chapter on GENERATING IDEAS AND TEXT. You may also want to INTERVIEW a teacher or parent who figures in your narrative.

Describe the setting . Where does your narrative take place? List the places where your story unfolds. For each place, write informally for a few minutes, DESCRIBING what you remember:

  • What do you see? If you’re inside, what color are the walls? What’s hanging on them? What can you see out any windows? What else do you see? Books? Lined paper? Red ink? Are there people? Places to sit? A desk or a table?
  • What do you hear? A radiator hissing? Leaves rustling? The wind howl- ing? Rain? Someone reading aloud? Shouts? Cheers? Children play- ing? Music? The zing of an instant message arriving?
  • What do you smell? Sweat? Perfume? Incense? Food cooking?
  • How and what do you feel? Nervous? Happy? Cold? Hot? A scratchy wool sweater? Tight shoes? Rough wood on a bench?
  • What do you taste? Gum? Mints? Graham crackers? Juice? Coffee?

Think about the key people. Narratives include people whose actions play an important role in the story. In your literacy narrative, you are prob- ably one of those people. A good way to develop your understanding of the people in your narrative is to write about them:

• Describe each person in a paragraph or so. What do the people look like? How do they dress? How do they speak? Quickly? Slowly? With an accent? Do they speak clearly, or do they mumble? Do they use any distinctive words or phrases? You might begin by DESCRIBING their movements, their posture, their bearing, their facial expressions. Do they have a distinctive scent?

• Recall (or imagine) some characteristic dialogue. A good way to bring people to life and move a story along is with DIALOGUE, to let readers hear them rather than just hearing about them. Try writing six to ten lines of dialogue between two people in your narrative. If you can’t remember an actual conversation, make up one that could have happened. (After all, you are telling the story, and you get to decide how it is to be told.) Try to remember (and write down) some of the characteristic words or phrases that the people in your narrative used.

Write about “what happened.” At the heart of every good NARRATIVE is the answer to the question “What happened?” The action in a literacy narrative may be as dramatic as winning a spelling bee or as subtle as a conversation between two friends; both contain action, movement, or change that the narrative tries to capture for readers. A good story dramatizes the action. Try SUMMARIZING the action in your narrative in a paragraph — try to capture what happened. Use active and specific verbs (pondered, shouted, laughed) to describe the action as vividly as possible.

Consider the significance of the narrative. You need to make clear the ways in which any event you are writing about is significant for you now. Write a page or so about the meaning it has for you. How did it change or otherwise affect you? What aspects of your life now can you trace to that event? How might your life have been different if this event had not hap- pened or had turned out differently? Why does this story matter to you?

Ways of Organizing a Literacy Narrative

Start by OUTLINING the main events in your narrative. Then think about how you want to tell the story. Don’t assume that the only way to tell your story is just as it happened. That’s one way—starting at the beginning of the action and continuing to the end. But you could also start in the middle—or even at the end. Shannon Nichols, for example, could have begun her narrative by telling how she finally passed the proficiency test and then gone back to tell about the times she tried to pass it, even as she was an A student in an honors English class. Several ways of organizing a narrative follow.

[Chronologically, from beginning to end]

  • Introduce the story.
  • Describe the setting and people.
  • Tell about what happened.
  • Say how the story was resolved.
  • Say something about the significance.

[Beginning in the middle]

  • Start in the middle of the action, giving enough information to let readers know what was happening.
  • Fill in details: setting, people, specific actions.
  • Make clear how the situation was resolved.

[Beginning at the end]

  • Start at the end of the story: tell how the story ends up, then introduce the subject.
  • Go back to the beginning of the story, telling what happens chronologically and describing the setting and people.
  • Conclude by saying something about the story’s significance.

Writing Out a Draft

Once you have generated ideas and thought about how you want to organ- ize your narrative, it’s time to begin DRAFTING. Do this quickly —try to write a complete draft in one sitting, concentrating on getting the story on paper or screen and on putting in as much detail as you can. Some writers find it helpful to work on the beginning or ending first. Others write out the main event first and then draft the beginning and ending.

Draft a beginning . A good narrative grabs readers’ attention right from the start. Here are some ways of beginning; you can find more advice in the chapter on BEGINNING AND ENDING.

  • Jump right in. Sometimes you may want to get to the main action as quickly as possible. Nichols, for example, begins as she takes the ninth-grade proficiency test for the first time.
  • Describe the context. You may want to provide any background information at the start of your narrative, as I decided to do, beginning by explaining how my grandmother taught me to read.
  • Describe the setting, especially if it’s important to the narrative. Agosín begins by describing the constellations in her native Chile.

Draft an ending. Think about what you want readers to read last. An effective ENDING helps them understand the meaning of your narrative. Here are some possibilities:

  • End where your story ends. It’s up to you to decide where a narrative ends. Mine ends several years after it begins, with my graduation from college.
  • Say something about the significance of your narrative. Nichols observes that she no longer loves to write, for example. The trick is to touch upon the narrative’s significance without stating it too directly, like the moral of a fable.
  • Refer back to the beginning. My narrative ends with my grandmother watching me graduate from college; Nichols ends by contemplating the negative effects of failing the proficiency test.
  • End on a surprising note. Agosín catches our attention when she tells us of the deaths and disappearances of her friends and relatives.

Come up with a title. A good TITLE indicates something about the subject of your narrative — and makes readers want to take a look. Nichols’s title states her subject, “Proficiency,” but she also puts the word in quotes, calling it into question in a way that might make readers wonder — and read on. I focus on the significance of my narrative: “How I Learned about the Power of Writing.” Agosín makes her title an expression of her sense of identity: “Always Living in Spanish.”

Source: Bullock, Richard. The Norton Field Guide to Writing . New York, W. W. Norton & Company, 2009.

literacy narrative college essay

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Module 2: Writing Your Own Literacy Narrative

Literacy narrative assignment.

Download the rubric for this assignment here .

Prompt: Write a 700-900 word, thesis-driven essay in which you discuss some moment of your literacy acquisition that you can relate to at least two of the essays we’ve read.

Essay Requirements:

  • Double-spaced
  • 12 pt font Courier New
  • Standard Essay format (title, introduction, thesis, at least three body paragraphs, conclusion)
  • Quotations in MLA format from at least two of the essays we’ve read

Introduction: Provide background information that you think will help your reader to understand the context for the story you’re going to tell. Close with a thesis that clarifies what your paper is going to be about; make sure it’s clear why what you’re going to write about is important. Make sure this thesis relies on one of the themes we’ve discussed (use your synthesis chart)

Section 1: THIS MAY BE MORE THAN ONE PARAGRAPH. Discuss a shared theme in two or more of the essays we’ve read (this includes those from the DALN, too. You can even quote from your classmates if you found what they posted about in discussion connects to what you’ve read); help your reader to understand how other writers have acquired literacy. When you provide examples, quote and/or paraphrase from the essay(s)  using MLA format.

Section 2: THIS MAY BE MORE THAN ONE PARAGRAPH. Discuss a key moment in your life related to that same literacy theme from section 1.

Conclusion: Make clear why what you’ve discussed is important for your reader.

  • Literacy Narrative Assignment. Authored by : Elizabeth Johnston. License : CC BY: Attribution

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literacy narrative college essay

English 110 Freshman Composition

“You don’t start out writing good stuff. You start out writing crap and thinking it’s good stuff, and then gradually you get better at it. That’s why I say one of the most valuable traits is persistence.” ― Octavia E. Butler

Student Samples- Literacy Narrative

Literacy narratives.

lit narrative engl 110 sample 1

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lit narrative engl 110 sample 3

lit narrative engl 110 sample 4

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lit narrative engl 110 sample 7

lit narrative engl 110 singh

literacy narrative  1 CN

Literary Narrative 2 CN

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Literary Narrative 5 CN

Literacy Narrative Ewelina Randall

Literacy Narrative Naoko Kasai

Literacy Narrative Gjurgjaj

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literacy narrative college essay

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The Loss of Things I Took for Granted

Ten years into my college teaching career, students stopped being able to read effectively..

Recent years have seen successive waves of book bans in Republican-controlled states, aimed at pulling any text with “woke” themes from classrooms and library shelves. Though the results sometimes seem farcical, as with the banning of Art Spiegelman’s Maus due to its inclusion of “cuss words” and explicit rodent nudity, the book-banning agenda is no laughing matter. Motivated by bigotry, it has already done demonstrable harm and promises to do more. But at the same time, the appropriate response is, in principle, simple. Named individuals have advanced explicit policies with clear goals and outcomes, and we can replace those individuals with people who want to reverse those policies. That is already beginning to happen in many places, and I hope those successes will continue until every banned book is restored.

If and when that happens, however, we will not be able to declare victory quite yet. Defeating the open conspiracy to deprive students of physical access to books will do little to counteract the more diffuse confluence of forces that are depriving students of the skills needed to meaningfully engage with those books in the first place. As a college educator, I am confronted daily with the results of that conspiracy-without-conspirators. I have been teaching in small liberal arts colleges for over 15 years now, and in the past five years, it’s as though someone flipped a switch. For most of my career, I assigned around 30 pages of reading per class meeting as a baseline expectation—sometimes scaling up for purely expository readings or pulling back for more difficult texts. (No human being can read 30 pages of Hegel in one sitting, for example.) Now students are intimidated by anything over 10 pages and seem to walk away from readings of as little as 20 pages with no real understanding. Even smart and motivated students struggle to do more with written texts than extract decontextualized take-aways. Considerable class time is taken up simply establishing what happened in a story or the basic steps of an argument—skills I used to be able to take for granted.

Since this development very directly affects my ability to do my job as I understand it, I talk about it a lot. And when I talk about it with nonacademics, certain predictable responses inevitably arise, all questioning the reality of the trend I describe. Hasn’t every generation felt that the younger cohort is going to hell in a handbasket? Haven’t professors always complained that educators at earlier levels are not adequately equipping their students? And haven’t students from time immemorial skipped the readings?

The response of my fellow academics, however, reassures me that I’m not simply indulging in intergenerational grousing. Anecdotally, I have literally never met a professor who did not share my experience. Professors are also discussing the issue in academic trade publications , from a variety of perspectives. What we almost all seem to agree on is that we are facing new obstacles in structuring and delivering our courses, requiring us to ratchet down expectations in the face of a ratcheting down of preparation. Yes, there were always students who skipped the readings, but we are in new territory when even highly motivated honors students struggle to grasp the basic argument of a 20-page article. Yes, professors never feel satisfied that high school teachers have done enough, but not every generation of professors has had to deal with the fallout of No Child Left Behind and Common Core. Finally, yes, every generation thinks the younger generation is failing to make the grade— except for the current cohort of professors, who are by and large more invested in their students’ success and mental health and more responsive to student needs than any group of educators in human history. We are not complaining about our students. We are complaining about what has been taken from them.

If we ask what has caused this change, there are some obvious culprits. The first is the same thing that has taken away almost everyone’s ability to focus—the ubiquitous smartphone. Even as a career academic who studies the Quran in Arabic for fun, I have noticed my reading endurance flagging. I once found myself boasting at a faculty meeting that I had read through my entire hourlong train ride without looking at my phone. My colleagues agreed this was a major feat, one they had not achieved recently. Even if I rarely attain that high level of focus, though, I am able to “turn it on” when demanded, for instance to plow through a big novel during a holiday break. That’s because I was able to develop and practice those skills of extended concentration and attentive reading before the intervention of the smartphone. For children who were raised with smartphones, by contrast, that foundation is missing. It is probably no coincidence that the iPhone itself, originally released in 2007, is approaching college age, meaning that professors are increasingly dealing with students who would have become addicted to the dopamine hit of the omnipresent screen long before they were introduced to the more subtle pleasures of the page.

The second go-to explanation is the massive disruption of school closures during COVID-19. There is still some debate about the necessity of those measures, but what is not up for debate any longer is the very real learning loss that students suffered at every level. The impact will inevitably continue to be felt for the next decade or more, until the last cohort affected by the mass “pivot to online” finally graduates. I doubt that the pandemic closures were the decisive factor in themselves, however. Not only did the marked decline in reading resilience start before the pandemic, but the students I am seeing would have already been in high school during the school closures. Hence they would be better equipped to get something out of the online format and, more importantly, their basic reading competence would have already been established.

Less discussed than these broader cultural trends over which educators have little control are the major changes in reading pedagogy that have occurred in recent decades—some motivated by the ever-increasing demand to “teach to the test” and some by fads coming out of schools of education. In the latter category is the widely discussed decline in phonics education in favor of the “balanced literacy” approach advocated by education expert Lucy Calkins (who has more recently come to accept the need for more phonics instruction). I started to see the results of this ill-advised change several years ago, when students abruptly stopped attempting to sound out unfamiliar words and instead paused until they recognized the whole word as a unit. (In a recent class session, a smart, capable student was caught short by the word circumstances when reading a text out loud.) The result of this vibes-based literacy is that students never attain genuine fluency in reading. Even aside from the impact of smartphones, their experience of reading is constantly interrupted by their intentionally cultivated inability to process unfamiliar words.

For all the flaws of the balanced literacy method, it was presumably implemented by people who thought it would help. It is hard to see a similar motivation in the growing trend toward assigning students only the kind of short passages that can be included in a standardized test. Due in part to changes driven by the infamous Common Core standards , teachers now have to fight to assign their students longer readings, much less entire books, because those activities won’t feed directly into students getting higher test scores, which leads to schools getting more funding. The emphasis on standardized tests was always a distraction at best, but we have reached the point where it is actively cannibalizing students’ educational experience—an outcome no one intended or planned, and for which there is no possible justification.

We can’t go back in time and do the pandemic differently at this point, nor is there any realistic path to putting the smartphone genie back in the bottle. (Though I will note that we as a society do at least attempt to keep other addictive products out of the hands of children.) But I have to think that we can, at the very least, stop actively preventing young people from developing the ability to follow extended narratives and arguments in the classroom. Regardless of their profession or ultimate educational level, they will need those skills. The world is a complicated place. People—their histories and identities, their institutions and work processes, their fears and desires—are simply too complex to be captured in a worksheet with a paragraph and some reading comprehension questions. Large-scale prose writing is the best medium we have for capturing that complexity, and the education system should not be in the business of keeping students from learning how to engage effectively with it.

This is a matter not of snobbery, but of basic justice. I recognize that not everyone centers their lives on books as much as a humanities professor does. I think they’re missing out, but they’re adults and they can choose how to spend their time. What’s happening with the current generation is not that they are simply choosing TikTok over Jane Austen. They are being deprived of the ability to choose—for no real reason or benefit. We can and must stop perpetrating this crime on our young people.

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  2. Literacy Narrative Video Essay-FIRST DRAFT

  3. My Literacy Narrative

  4. Project 1 Digital Literacy Narrative

  5. Literacy Narrative

  6. Literacy Narrative Digital Remix

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  1. Literacy Narrative Explained

    Literacy Narrative Examples for College Students. A literacy narrative is quite simply that: it is a story of how you became literate and how it has affected your life. ... Going beyond a short essay, a literacy narrative can even become an entire book that explores your literacy journey. To get your creative juices flowing, look at a few ...

  2. Writing a Literacy Narrative

    In the following literacy narrative, Shannon Nichols, a student at Wright State University, describes her experience taking the standardized writing proficiency test that high school students in Ohio must pass to graduate. She wrote this essay for a college writing course, where her audience included her classmates and instructor.

  3. College Writing Tips: How to Write a Good Literacy Narrative

    If you do not, that is okay. Skip this step. Write the first draft of your literacy narrative. Remember to stay focused on the theme. If you do not know yet what your theme is, work toward a theme during this stage of writing. Read over your draft. Evaluate your strengths and weaknesses.

  4. How to Write a Literacy Narrative Essay

    Definition of What Is a Literacy Narrative Essay and Its Meaning. A literacy narrative is an essay that tells the writer's personal story. It differs from other types of papers, including an argumentative essay, an analytical essay, a cause and effect essay, a report, or a research paper.While these other texts require students to borrow information from different sources to strengthen a ...

  5. How to Write a Literacy Narrative Essay Examples, Topics

    A personal literacy narrative essay example would typically feature: A personal tone of voice since the main goal is to write about an anecdote related to literacy. A literacy narrative example essay will, of course, include personal stories. Dialogue and monologue if context-appropriate. Visual and colorful language.

  6. Literacy Narrative

    The term "narrative" means story; thus, a literacy narrative essay is an essay that tells the story of your literacy. It highlights times in your life during which you have gained knowledge or developed skills. ... "Embracing My Culturally Diverse Literacy" by Sarah Royer; College Essay Example #5 for Cornell College of College of Arts ...

  7. Literacy Narrative

    Glance at Genre: The Literacy Narrative; Annotated Sample Reading: from Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass by Frederick Douglass; Writing Process: Tracing the Beginnings of Literacy; Editing Focus: Sentence Structure; Evaluation: Self-Evaluating; Spotlight on … The Digital Archive of Literacy Narratives (DALN) Portfolio: A Literacy ...

  8. Literacy Narrative

    The term "narrative" means story; thus, a literacy narrative essay is an essay that tells the story of your literacy. It highlights times in your life during which you have gained knowledge or developed skills. ... "Embracing My Culturally Diverse Literacy" by Sarah Royer; College Essay Example #5 for Cornell College of College of Arts ...

  9. Research Guides: ENG 120 College Writing: Literacy Narrative

    These essays are often anecdotal, experiential, and personal—allowing students to express themselves in a creative and, quite often, moving ways. Narrative Essay. Narration is a rhetorical style that basically just tells a story. Being able to convey events in a clear, descriptive, chronological order is important in many fields.

  10. Literacy Narrative Essay ⇒ Definition with Examples and Topics

    A literacy narrative essay is a first-person account of learning how to read or write. It often discusses the significance of books and other written materials in a person's life and the role of literacy in society. Most literacy narratives discuss memories, which means they are based on actual events from the writer's life.

  11. Literacy Narrative

    Assignment Sheet - Literacy Narrative. The foundation of this course is built on your ability to read closely and critically. To engage with this skill, and the multiple literacies we navigate on a daily basis, this first major essay is a personal piece in which you will explore a significant moment regarding your own literacy; you may ...

  12. PDF Literacy Narratives

    Literacy narratives are personal essays in which writers share their personal experiences with learning to read and write. Literacy narrative guidelines can vary widely by instructor, but writers may also discuss other types of literacy like music, technology, or math. Writers of literacy narratives have two goals: to convey their experiences

  13. How to Write a Narrative Essay

    Interactive example of a narrative essay. An example of a short narrative essay, responding to the prompt "Write about an experience where you learned something about yourself," is shown below. Hover over different parts of the text to see how the structure works.

  14. How to Write a Literacy Narrative

    Tell us where you were, who you were with, and what you were doing in this specific moment when your literacy narrative begins. For example, a story about your favorite book may begin with a description of where you were when the book first landed in your hands. If you're writing about your discovery of poetry, tell us exactly where you were ...

  15. The Digital Archive of Literacy Narratives (DALN)

    The DALN welcomes literacy narratives of all kinds and in all formats, including diaries, blogs, poetry, music, videos, letters, stories, chat rooms, and so on. Publish Your Literacy Narrative After you have completed and revised your literacy narrative, consider sharing it with the DALN You may also want to consider reimagining your literacy ...

  16. Assignments

    Assignments - Literacy Narrative (1000 - 1500 words) Overview. A Literacy Narrative is a type of autobiographical essay -"The Art of Eating Spaghetti," for example - that focuses on personal experiences with literacy (speaking, writing, reading, and the like) in order to confirm the importance of these rhetorical experiences in a person's life.

  17. Learning Guides: Literacy Narrative : Getting Started

    Literacy Narrative Definition. A literacy narrative is a type of autobiographical essay that often tells the story of learning to read or write. It is reflective writing that describes the process and growth of learning. Narratives are a way of telling a personal story through remembrance and introspection.

  18. 3: Module 1: Introduction to Literacy Narratives

    3.5: Discussion: Synthesizing Literacy Narratives 3.6: Assignment: Summarize a Sophisticated Essay about Literacy Narratives 3: Module 1: Introduction to Literacy Narratives is shared under a not declared license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by LibreTexts.

  19. Norton Field Guide's Writing a Literacy Narrative

    Dialogue can help bring a narrative to life. Some indication of the narrative's significance. By definition, a literacy narrative tells something the writer remembers about learning to read or write. In addition, the writer needs to make clear why the incident matters to him or her. You may reveal its significance in various ways.

  20. Literacy Narrative Assignment

    Literacy Narrative Assignment. Prompt: Write a 700-900 word, thesis-driven essay in which you discuss some moment of your literacy acquisition that you can relate to at least two of the essays we've read. Standard Essay format (title, introduction, thesis, at least three body paragraphs, conclusion) Quotations in MLA format from at least two ...

  21. Digital Archive of Literacy Narratives

    The DALN is an open public resource made up of stories from people just like you about their experiences learning to read, write, and generally communicate with the world around them. If you have a compelling story to share (it can be text, video, audio, or a combination of formats), we'd love to hear it. SUBMIT YOUR LITERACY NARRATIVE.

  22. Literacy Narrative Examples for College Students

    Find your story and bring your own literacy narrative to life by exploring original and famous examples of this type of writing.

  23. Student Samples- Literacy Narrative

    Literacy Narratives. lit narrative engl 110 sample 1. lit narrative engl 110 sample 2. lit narrative engl 110 sample 3. lit narrative engl 110 sample 4. lit narrative engl 110 sample 5. lit narrative engl 110 sample 6. lit narrative engl 110 sample 7. lit narrative engl 110 singh.

  24. Literacy crisis in college students: Essay from a professor on students

    Recent years have seen successive waves of book bans in Republican-controlled states, aimed at pulling any text with "woke" themes from classrooms and library shelves.