Dao1 Giang Dao Professor Jan Rieman ENGL 1101-010 February 11, 2013 Literacy memoir Nowadays, the

ability to read and write (literacy) becomes more and more important for everyones life. People who can read and write obviously make more money than people who cannot read and write. Therefore, now almost all people in the world have the ability to read and write. Relating to that, they might have literacy memoir. I also have literacy memoirs. My family, my teachers, and my friends affect me a lot in literacy. One year before I got first grade, my mother taught me how to speak each letter in Vietnamese, and she also taught me how to write them. Moreover, my parents bought me many books which use for painting and it has name of things and animals on the papers. I was so excited with them. When I daubed on the pictures, my mother taught me what things and animals I was daubing on. I did think that was the first time I had literacy, and I was wrong. Went to the first grade, teachers taught me almost same with what my mother taught me. However, they taught me how to speak some easy words but important like mom, dad, etc. It is some differences way to speak a word between Vietnamese and English. In English, when I see a word which is hard, and I have not heard before, I may speak them wrong, or even English native speakers could be wrong when they speak a hard word and they do not know or heard that
Comment [i2]: This could be a really good point in your paper as it proposes the idea of how you viewed your literacy to be at this point in your life. The thing that I would certainly suggest that you do is elaborate further on this idea that you had first thought it was your initial introduction to literacy, yet you found yourself to be wrong. Think about what exactly was wrong about that idea and why it wasnt actually the first time you had literacy. Comment [i1]: This is not necessarily entirely true in all cases. Although it serves the general purpose, you may want to consider rewording the sentence just a little bit in order to make it correct all the time. I might suggest you say something like Individuals who are able to read and write are generally more accepted and successful in the professional world than those who are not able to do so.

Dao2 before. However, in Vietnamese, when I see a word, I can read it correctly even I have not heard or know that before because we study how to spell each part of a word, and Vietnamese only has one vowel in each word. Moreover, they taught me how to hold a pen and how to write each letter. Second grade marked an important point in my life. I started studying Math. Even it was about numbers with plus and subtract calculations, but it is the basic people need to know to develop their Math skill. I usually used those signals to take notes in secondary school and high school. For example, = usually means equal, or + means and, etc. At the same time, I moved to live with my grandmother who born my mother. She told me many stories with her books. The story I most remember is which is Little Red Riding Hood in English
Comment [MB4]: I feel that if you are going to include math as a form of literacy, you should elaborate further on it and explain how it can be considered to be a form of literacy and why it was important in your life that you learned these skills. Comment [MB5]: I understand what you are trying to say from this for the most part. Though I dont fully see how the two ideas are connecting. I would suggest that if you decide to keep this portion of your paper, you should clearly explain that the symbols that you have learned in math have helped you to take notes in whatever subjects (specify). I would also include exactly how they have benefitted you and what advantage having this tool available to you has given you. Comment [MB6]: I am having a bit of trouble understanding exactly how this part of the paragraph connects to the first half of it. I would suggest that you break this part off and make it a separate paragraph. Also, I would elaborate more on what exactly you mean about looking at the words and the connection they have to your grandma because I found it a bit difficult to really get a good understanding of what you meant in that last sentence. Comment [MB7]: As I stated a few comments above, I would suggest that you put math in its own category or paragraph as another form of literacy that you have developed throughout your life. The main reason that I would suggest doing so is that the two ideas, learning to multiply and divide in math and beginning to study English, dont really have anything to do with one another. At least not that I am able to identify. Although, if you have some way that you can form a connection between the two ideas, then it is fine to leave this paragraph as it is, but make sure that you clearly explain in depth what connection exists between the two in your learning and literacy development. Comment [MB8]: I like how you connected the idea of getting a new video game that happened to be in English, to the fact that you not only had fun playing the game but actually learned from it as well. This is a really good example and I find it very admirable of you to have the ambition to learn new words and their meanings on your own after hearing them in the game. Comment [MB3]: I thought that this was a really good example of how the structure of the two languages are different from one another. You did a good job explaining a key difference between the two and made it clear to understand.

because it is famous and interesting at that age. Therefore, when I look at some words, she taught me how to pronounce and read them. At third grade, I studied multiply and divide calculations. At fifth grade, I started studying English. It was not grammar or structure. It was some formal words that people usually say in English like: Hello, Goodbye, etc. At that time, I started playing game. The first game that I played was Mario with English version. I studied some words after I played it many times. For example, I learned the words: Start, Options, and Quit.

Dao3 When I turned to sixth grade, I started studying Principle of Math. It was like some basic rules in Algebra. I also learned how to calculate Perimeter, Area, and Volume. Therefore, I studied some English words because P, A, V are used to stand for Perimeter, Area, and Volume. At that grade to twelfth grade, I also had to read a lot of pieces of many stories in Literature. Up to seventh grade, I had to study materialism and idealism in Citizen Education. It made me two new ideas about life. After that, I studied Marxism. It was really crazy for me when I studied those stuffs. I also had to study Biology and Physics. They affected me about some English words like: velocity, time, etc. I started studying Pascal, a programing language, at eighth grade. At that time, I do not know why I started good at Math. Therefore, I have ideas to solve problem when I wrote a program using Pascal. At that time, Literature was harder than it used to be in lower level. I had to analyze each piece of story. It meant to take good ideas of those stories. It really helped my writing skill. I also had to study Vietnamese grammar. Went to high school, because I passed the second best class in my high school, so my parents let me play MMORPG, Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game. I knew many new people and made many friends by game. In Vietnam, each part usually has its own kind of way to speak words, and they have many different words. I am from the North, and when I went to the mid-part and south-part of Vietnam, people talked, I could not understand even it was Vietnamese. Fortunately, I know many friends, and they helped me a lot about it. They taught me many slang words and how to pronounce them. Moreover, my friends in real life usually use words with other meanings.
Comment [MB9]: This is a really good example of what I had mentioned in one of the comments on the last page, about how you should make some connection between the two subjects if you were going to include them both in the same paragraph. You did a good job transitioning between the two subjects/ideas and how learning these parts of math led to you looking further into and learning the words and their meanings. Comment [MB10]: I dont really see any sort of connection between the ideas in the rest of the paragraph and this sentence. I feel that the two things dont really have anything to do with another. I would suggest that you not include this last sentence in your paper, at least not here in this paragraph, possibly somewhere else though if it fits. Comment [MB11]: I found this to be an interesting statement, and I would like to learn more about it. I feel that you should elaborate more on what exactly was so crazy about it, and why it was really crazy for you. Comment [MB12]: I like how you mentioned that the new subjects that you were learning helped you with English. I feel that you need to go further in depth with this statement and explain specifically how they affected your English. I would also suggest that you make this set of ideas its own separate paragraph and then do the elaboration I suggested above. Comment [MB13]: You seem to have at least three different ideas going on at once within this paragraph. Being this way, I have a hard time figuring out exactly what it is that you are trying to get at as a whole. I think you should break up the various ideas into separate paragraphs. I also think that you need to elaborate a lot more on each of the ideas and explain how they helped your literacy development, or how they were significant to your literacy growth. For example, you mentioned that it really helped your writing skills, but what exactly helped your writing skills and how exactly did that help them. Comment [MB14]: I dont really understand how this has anything to do with your literacy and its development. I would suggest that you completely omit this part from your paper because it doesnt contribute to the purpose of the paper and has no connection to the rest of the ideas included in this paragraph. Comment [MB15]: I like how you explained that as every language does, Vietnamese has several different dialects depending on what part of the country you are in. I found it rather interesting though that they were so different that it was difficult to understand at all if you werent from that specific part of the country. Comment [MB16]: I would suggest that you reread what you have said above this point and then think about the real underlying and significantly important factor you have included in the paragraph. I say this because I feel that this sentence, which is attempting to make a general statement of what you had said before this point, does not do so at all.

Dao4 When I was in high school, I studied Chemistry. Chemistry has many words I can use for abbreviation. Chemistry also has many English names of many substances, international name. Literature gave me very long novel which I had to spend the whole week to read, respond, and prepare for the class. Math was really useful for me today. I did study Limit, Derivative, Anti-derivative, Linear, and Geometry of space. Before twelfth grade I had choices to study in Vietnam or study abroad, I chose study in Vietnam. However, something came up at twelfth grade, so I decided to study abroad. At that time, I studied listening, reading, and speaking by my-self before I came to the U.S. My parents let me spend more time with the computer to watch movie and read comic. After I arrived the U.S., I joined ELTI, an English institution. I really studied a lot in reading and writing in there. I started studying what an essay is, and how to write an essay. I studied grammar there, but I studied most of them when I was in Vietnam. It was really helpful for writing skill. Not only grammar is important, but also punctuation is important, too. They taught me how to use words and punctuations. Moreover, my reading skill in English was developed when they gave me many readings, and I had to prepare for it. As I said that I was wrong about the first time I had literacy. Two days ago, I and my friends had a party for Lunar New Year. Couple of my friends have son. He is almost two years old, but he could not speak any things. However, I noticed that they talked a lot with their son. After that I think my parents also did it with me when I was very young. Therefore, in my opinion the first time I had awareness about literacy when I was a baby.
Comment [MB19]: This is a good example of connecting all of your ideas together as one and showing how they benefitted the development of your literacy. Though I would say that you should further explain exactly how your English skill was developed by them giving you readings, like how did them doing so help you to develop your skills. Comment [MB20]: I now understand what you meant in the beginning of the paper about how you were wrong when you thought that the books with the pictures was the first time you had literacy. I feel that this is a really good explanation of how you found yourself to be wrong about this matter, yet I would suggest that you insert this at the beginning of your paper after your statement that you were wrong. This will cause less confusion in the beginning and clear things up from the get-go. Comment [MB17]: All three of these ideas are potentially good points to make and include as key aspects of your life that have helped you develop your literacy. The reason I would consider them to be potentially good points is because you could easily do more with them. I would suggest that you break the three ideas up into three separate paragraphs because they dont really have anything to do with one another. After breaking them up, I would suggest that you elaborate further on each idea. Instead of just stating what you did and barely touching what you learned, dive in deeper on each of the ideas and provide a specific explanation as to how they relate to the development of your literacy and how exactly they helped you to further develop your literacy. Comment [MB18]: This sentence as it reads doesnt have any real connection to what you had stated in the rest of the paragraph. In order to connect this sentence with the rest of the paragraph I would suggest that you explain why your parents let you spend more time with the computer and how exactly you benefitted from them doing so as far as the development of your literacy goes. Otherwise it sounds like a pointless sentence as if you were just telling a story.