According to UNESCO, an organization that is part of the United Nations, over ninety-nine percent of all adults in developed countries are literate. Because of how common it is literacy is a skill that many of us often take for granted. The ability to read and write is so common that it is only natural to assume that the people around us are literate and that literacy is nothing special. However literacy is special, especially to children who just learned how to read or write for the first time. Learning how to read can be one of the most exciting events in a child’s life. The first time I ever read a book I felt empowered. I felt as though I had done something amazing. In the first grade I was assigned my very first book report. Up until
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Seuss due to it being one of my favorite bed time stories when I was around four or five. I can still imagine the sound of my mother’s voice reading to me and my younger brother as my heart beat began slowing down and I drifted off into sleep. Her voice was sweet and calm, never loud but never too quiet, just perfect. On the way home that bright sunny day my heart was racing, my toes were tapping, and I was speaking faster than normal to my grandmother who was asking about my day at school. As soon as the humming of the car’s engine stopped I was already in the house running up the stairs as fast as my little legs could take me. I was simply excited. I grabbed the blue book and sat down in the chair in my room. The windows were open to let in a cool breeze and the door shut and locked in order to make sure I would be left alone. Reading the story for myself was very challenging at the time. A story that took my mom around ten or at most fifteen minutes to read took me at the minimum thirty. I read every word slowly, pausing …show more content…
In this example Garcia López de Cárdenas discovered the Grand Canyon, but to him it was more special because it was a surprise, he had no assumption which would influence his perception of the Grand Canyon (Percy, 1954). A child learning to read is very similar because many children are a blank slate just as Garcia was. They both have no assumptions when it comes to reading or the Grand Canyon due to the minimal amount of exposure they have had. So when a child does read for the first time it paints a very vivid picture in their mind. That picture can’t be compared to a movie or TV show because they’re perceiving it in a way that may be completely different to another person’s perception. A movie on the other hand is harder to perceive differently because there is less to interpret. To a common sightseer seeing a child read is nothing special because we all have done it but to the child it is a completely different experience. The Grand Canyon is currently effected by a symbolic complex (Percy, 1954). A symbolic complex is basically an idea that changes our perception of something since it attaches a special meaning to it (Percy, 1954). Percy uses the example of the Grand Canyon as being effected by a symbolic complex because it has already been given meaning to it (1954). Due to this added meaning a person is unable to have the same experience as the
Seuss due to it being one of my favorite bed time stories when I was around four or five. I can still imagine the sound of my mother’s voice reading to me and my younger brother as my heart beat began slowing down and I drifted off into sleep. Her voice was sweet and calm, never loud but never too quiet, just perfect. On the way home that bright sunny day my heart was racing, my toes were tapping, and I was speaking faster than normal to my grandmother who was asking about my day at school. As soon as the humming of the car’s engine stopped I was already in the house running up the stairs as fast as my little legs could take me. I was simply excited. I grabbed the blue book and sat down in the chair in my room. The windows were open to let in a cool breeze and the door shut and locked in order to make sure I would be left alone. Reading the story for myself was very challenging at the time. A story that took my mom around ten or at most fifteen minutes to read took me at the minimum thirty. I read every word slowly, pausing …show more content…
In this example Garcia López de Cárdenas discovered the Grand Canyon, but to him it was more special because it was a surprise, he had no assumption which would influence his perception of the Grand Canyon (Percy, 1954). A child learning to read is very similar because many children are a blank slate just as Garcia was. They both have no assumptions when it comes to reading or the Grand Canyon due to the minimal amount of exposure they have had. So when a child does read for the first time it paints a very vivid picture in their mind. That picture can’t be compared to a movie or TV show because they’re perceiving it in a way that may be completely different to another person’s perception. A movie on the other hand is harder to perceive differently because there is less to interpret. To a common sightseer seeing a child read is nothing special because we all have done it but to the child it is a completely different experience. The Grand Canyon is currently effected by a symbolic complex (Percy, 1954). A symbolic complex is basically an idea that changes our perception of something since it attaches a special meaning to it (Percy, 1954). Percy uses the example of the Grand Canyon as being effected by a symbolic complex because it has already been given meaning to it (1954). Due to this added meaning a person is unable to have the same experience as the