Reflective Essay: Improving My Writing

Growing up, reading was always my least favorite subject. I hated reading everything, from menus, to cereal boxes, to road signs. As a kid, I thought practicing reading would never actually benefit me because I did not want to become an author. Now that I am older I have realized that reading is a huge part of my everyday life. As a student, my day can consist of reading a countless number of things, from essays, to assignments, to directions. Without the support from my family and teachers and the hard work I put into improving my reading skills, I would never be at the level I am at today.

Let me start by saying, I was not always a fantastic reader, I was not even an on level reader at one point. My mom started teaching me to read during the summer of ‘05, so I …show more content…
Out of all of the methods, I found marching around and patting my leg the most effective. Hitting my leg at a consecutive and steady beat helped me pace my reading. Not only did marching help me pace, but it helped me concentrate. As a child, I was very antsy and restless, so while reading I could never sit still. Moving my body while reading, helped me actually understand and comprehend the words and not just disregard or overlook them. These methods helped and carried me all the way until about 3rd grade. But at this point, it was not just about reading and finishing sentences. The focus now, was actually understanding the excerpt and being able to answer questions about it. This was something I struggles with. I had mastered reading the words, but accurately understanding the written material was a bit harder. Third grade year was my hardest, I was failing all my reading test, and struggling to keep up with the other students. It had gotten to the point, where the teacher recommended I go to the support class for struggling readers. My mom was not too thrilled about this, so she made it her mission to better my