Erin
Molello
English101
Literacy
Narrative
I remember thinking that these days were
going to be the best days of my life, I was in elementary school and didn’t
have a worry in the world. Two recesses a day, a fun lunch with all your
friends, creative art activities, and best of all fun writing prompts. I use to
love to write in elementary school, it was an outlet for me, a time where I
could be creative and really have creative control over what I was writing. At
that time writing wasn’t about a grade or proving you could interpret the
correct theme of a story, it was about getting comfortable with putting your
thoughts, feelings, or imaginary ideas down on paper and finding a new way to
communicate those ideas with others.
My elementary school was filled with
laughter, fun, and creativity everywhere. Walking down the bright yellow
hallways you felt as if you could accomplish anything. Art projects were posted
around the school everywhere, ones that were done in class and even ones created
at home could be brought in a hung up for everyone to see. It gave you a sense
of accomplishment and pride to walk down the hallway and see your work of art
hanging on the wall. It is true that you feel small in elementary school, the
chairs are tiny, the desk and tables are as well, and even the structure of the
building is obviously built for smaller human beings. But despite the obvious
feeling of feeling small, I never felt insignificant walking through the
hallways of that school.
In 5th grade right around
Halloween time we had an assignment to write a scary story, no other criteria,
it could be however short, or in my case long as you wished it to be. When I
heard about this assignment I almost screamed out loud with excitement “I love
scary stories, I love Halloween, and I love writing! This is the perfect
assignment for me!” I thought to myself.
We
had two weeks to write and make a cover for our story in order to be ready to
share them with our classmates on Halloween. Mine was written about a group of
friends who went to a mansion for a Halloween party and found it to be haunted
when their mom went missing and later found to be taken by something in the
mansion. One week passed and 14 pages into my scary story 5th grade
me had decided it would be better as a chapter book.
Knowing I wouldn’t be able to finish my
chapter book in the timeframe given by my teacher I sat down with her to
explain how I believed I couldn’t tell my story correctly or as well as I could
if I had more time. She read what I already had and saw enough potential in me
to sign off on those first 14 pages as my assignment and then allowed me to
freely work on it. I could have stopped if I wanted to, but I was dedicated.
Writing a scary story during Halloween made sense but my decision carried out
my writing two months later; walking through the doors the first day back from
winter break I set my finished chapter book on my teacher’s desk. It was
written as you would expect a 5th grader to write, the grammar
wasn’t the best, my spelling was not up to par, and even some of my thoughts
were not portrayed and connected correctly. With saying that, to this day I
still believe that 5th grade assignment has been my best work due to
my dedication, inspiration, and my love for writing at the time.
Throughout elementary school I succeeded
because I had passion for the assignment I was given. I was always told I would
succeed, that I was a bright student and as long as I continued to put my heart
into my writing or whatever it was that I was doing I would never struggle to
accomplish my goals. What I wasn’t told is how hard it is to put your heart
into an assignment you have no interest in or passion for, which is what I came
to realize in middle school. The transition from elementary school to middle
school was easy for me at first. A bigger school with new people didn’t scare
me, nor did having 6 different classes all with a different teachers and
classmates. I enjoyed the thought of it, of being older, smarter, that I had
more to offer. I had a new place to prove that I had the skills to succeed. I
enjoyed walking down the halls starring at the empty walls that were no longer
showboating childish artwork, and most of all I enjoyed starring at the big
picture of the panther mascot.
I started middle school placed into a
year higher math class that I tested into but besides that I was in the
standard 6th grade classes; that lasted for about two months. It was
obvious I wasn’t being challenged in my English class being two months into the
school year and already having 115% in the class, I as well as my parents and
teacher new I needed a change. It was then I was transferred out of standard
English and social studies and was put into the agate program at Poulsbo Middle
School which is when everything changed.
I was taught to let your passion for
a topic drive you, to put your heart into everything you did including school
work, but how do you put your heart into a topic you have no interest in, no
passion for? This is what I struggled with in agate. My teacher no longer
wanted my own creative thoughts, she wanted answers based on my interpretations
of what the theme of the story was, or the different motifs. But even then my
own interpretations weren’t good enough, they had to be the correct ones. Analyzing
the correct theme and motifs of a story became my life. No passion for what I
was writing, just writing for a grade, so I struggled. Many times I found
myself wishing to be back in elementary school, the days where everything was
easier, but I wanted to live up to the expectations everyone, including myself
set for me. I had to learn how to rewire how I went about writing, I had to allow
my passion to come from wanting to get an A on a paper verses having a desire
to write about the topic I was given.
Yes, I no longer had a passion for
writing, but I did have a passion for getting good grades and accomplishing
what everyone told me I could. So I learned how to write differently, informatively.
I spent after school hours with my teacher, asked other students, and even
family members for extra help. I was determined to get a grasp on this
different type of writing I was not use to. And eventually, after getting many
graded papers back that I was not proud of, I got a book report back on
Frankenstein. A book that at first I could barely read due to the intense
vocabulary, a book that I’d spend hours re-reading parts in order to understand
what was being said, but most of all a book I wrote a report on that lead me to
the first grade on a written assignment that I was proud of. It wasn’t perfect
but it showed me that I was learning, growing, and was able to understand a
concept that at one point in time I could not begin to wrap my head around.
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