Mortell 1 Sean Mortell English 1101-069 Mrs.

Hinnant September 9, 2013 Life Changing News Can you think of what your life would be like without literacy? Not just being able to read but being able to understand pictures or understand what people are saying, life would become impossible because you would have no way to communicate. This is because literacy is not only just being able to read and write but also the way you perceive things and ideas about things that you experience. There are events in your life that cause all of these ideas and perceptions to develop usually can trace these ideas back to one central event, place, or person. For me this central event was when I was younger my parents would discuss politics or news event and I would hear these discussions going on but would have no idea what these discussions were about. So though my life experiences I will look at how I developed my reading writing and verbal communication skills. At my young age as every young kid I would see events on the news and pay no attention to them. Even if I had there was probably no way for me to understand the news stories. One such instance of this was while I was living in Long Island, New York, when the September 11 terrorist attacks occurred. During the time of the attacks I was in the first grade, since the attacks occurred at around 9 oclock I was still home with my mom getting ready for school when the first plane struck the North tower. All I can really remember from that morning was my mom watching the news and then while at school was my teacher constantly being distracted by calls on her phone and we were not allowed outside for recess after lunch. All of these events

Mortell 2 from school were echoed when I returned home from my day at school. My mom was on the phone with different people and continued to watch the news and she seemed upset about something. Another I can remember about that day was the constant sight and sound of fighter jets flying overhead. As usual I was allowed to go out to play with my next door neighbor but we had to stay inside. My mom tells me that when I returned from playing with my friend I asked Why did the men who hate American attack us? I asked this because my friend who I was playing with was two years old and had a better grasp of what was going on and told me evil men who hate America attacked us. Of course that night my parents tried to explain to me what had happened in terms that I could understand, after explaining what had happened that day the best they could they asked me if I had any questions. I can remember asking if one of our family friend who is a New York City fire fighter was ok, they told me that he was perfectly fine. Being only a first grader I truly had no understanding or grasp of what had happened. As I became older I became more curious of the events that occurred on that day, and due to being as young as I was when the attacks happened I had no true idea of what had happened. Want to understand the events that occurred made me want to look up and research at the events that occurred. In my research I looked at everything from Wikipedia pages to government reports and even look at some of the conspiracy theories surrounding the attack. As I read the information from all of these different sources I could slowly see how the conspiracy theories were very unreliable since they seemed to be grasping at straws. I saw the how some the sites seem very reliable for they quoted their sources and used a variety of sources. This affected the way I write because it showed me how to write an essay for the more sources you use and the reliability of your sources dramatically increase the credibility of your essay.

Mortell 3 As I did more and more research on the attacks I began to understand what had happened on that day and why people acted the way they did that day when I was in the first grade. Also as I became older I began to understand some of the events on the news and was able to see that my parents were discussing the same events that were on the news, but I had no idea why any of these events were important or why they mattered. As I became more mature was able to see way these news events mattered. One event that really defined this was when in the fourth grade my school held a mock election between George W. Bush and John Kerry. Knowing my mom liked Bush I voted for him. Later that night when got home my parents knew this mock election occurred and asked who I voted for and I told them Bush. They then asked why I voted for him and I said because mom liked him, they then went on to tell me that I should for someone just because you or someone you know likes that candidate, but to develop your own thoughts and ideas about the candidates and vote the way you want. This really affected me because it showed me that I really need to fully develop my own ideas. I took this to heart because I now take my time thinking about what Im going say and think about it before I say even if it is just for a split second. Using this same idea of developing my own opinion I began to read and watch the news to see what was happening and try to understand these events. Thought the news I began to become educated on current events and why its important to be current on news topics. As I did with researching the September 11th terrorist attacks I would research topics in the news look at event from all sides and though this research I develop a great understanding of what was happening. So when middle school came around and we had to do current event I found them to be very easy to do, as I entered high school I began to develop my own opinions about politics and other events. With my parents usually being of opposing political views I began to take an

Mortell 4 objective look at each one of their sides of the argument and listen to both, while understanding each side. With this understanding of each side of the discussion I began to understand why people thought that way they did and how these politic decisions affect everyone. With this understanding I read news articles and the news with an objective mind set then I develop my opinion of the event after I completely read the article or watch the entire news story. With this outlook on news events I feel I better understand the stories in the news, also I feel this makes me more open to different opinions then my own. This being more open to different opinions allows me to discuss these topic more easily because do not become frustrated or angry about debating my opinion. With this outlook I have developed though reading the news and watching the news I feel this has most directly affected my literacy. As I had discussed earlier literacy is more than just being able to read and write but how you develop opinions and why you developed them. With my open look on opposing opinions then my own, I feel I can better communicate with people and be more understand of others, while developing a better understanding of topics.