|
| |
My Experience With Literature
When someone flips a light switch to turn on a light, electric currents
are rapidly sent to the bulbs. The bulbs immediately light up the room and
engulf it with light. In the same way that bulbs are filled with electrical
currents, my mind is now filled with literature. This past quarter I took an
English 131 class about literature, which was taught by Jan Strever. The
class seemed to fly by fast as I became acquainted with literature, which is
a piece of pros or verse writing where the author expresses their
imagination, their thoughts, or their ideas. The exercises and daily tasks in
English 131 helped me become more confident in writing, reading, and talking
about literature.
First of all, reading is very important in everything we do from driving,
to shopping, to watching TV. Since reading is so relevant most people know
how to read. However, reading literature can be a little different because of
its language use, sound, form, meaning, theme, point of view, and dialogue.
In English 131 we read a wide range of literature from pieces out of the
book, Bridges, to pieces of literature from the Internet, and we even read a
novel, In the Time of the Butterflies. Not only did we read and see
different kinds of literature but we also had mini lectures on some different
styles of literature like poetry, fiction, non-fiction, and drama. In the
lectures we learned what some of the significant elements are to the
different types of writing. Learning the different elements helped me better
understand the literature we read in class. All together the readings we did
in class gave me more experience with literature and made me a more advanced
reader.
Besides learning how to read and understand literature, I was also given
a lot of chances to try my hand at writing literature in my English 131
class. Throughout the whole quarter we were to keep a journal that consisted
of entries about pieces of literature we had read that week. At the beginning
of every week we were to have a new entry for our journals. Writing these
journal entries not only enabled me to practice writing, but it also gave me
a way to gather my thoughts about the literature I was reading and be able to
keep some sort of record on what I read. Along with the journals we also had
seminar papers due every week. The seminar papers were also over the
literature we read throughout the week but they were more in-depth than the
journals. The seminar papers usually dealt with comparing and contrasting
different aspects and characteristics related to prompts. Writing about the
different pieces of literature and relating them to prompts strengthened my
ability to stay focused on one topic in my writings. Overall, the journals
and the seminar papers strengthened me as a writer.
Along with learning how to read and write literature, I also learned how
to talk about it in front of a group of people. In English 131 we had several
opportunities to get up and talk in front of a group of people about
literature. After we finished our seminar papers we would have group meetings
and discuss the literature we wrote about for our paper. The seminars helped
me gain confidence in talking about literature in front of people. By doing
the seminars every week, I got used to talking in front of people and
expressing my thoughts about certain pieces of literature. By the end of the
quarter, I was feeling confident enough to speak up when I though differently
than other members of the group about a piece of literature. Another thing
that aided in the growth of my ability to speak in front of people was the
presentation that we did at the end of class. My part in the group
presentation consisted of teaching the class about the piece of literature we
read called "In the Time of the Butterflies." With the practice of
speaking
in front of people in the seminars, I was able to make it through the
presentation and do a really good job. The seminars and the presentation were
great practice for talking in front of the class about literature.
In conclusion, English 131 has been a great experience and I have learned
a lot from it. My abilities to read, write, and talk about literature have
greatly improved throughout the quarter. With the hard work that went into
the journals, seminars and the presentation, I have learned and comprehended
a lot about literature. The quarter seemed to have flown by because I was
learning and understanding so much. Just like with the light bulbs, I have
been lit up by literature and I now want to tell every one about what I have
learned and fill them up with everything about literature. My ability to
read, write and talk about literature has greatly improved and I now feel
more comfortable when I'm assigned a task that deals with literature. I'm
thankful to have taken this class because I now have a better understanding
of literature.
Postscript
This paper was hard to write because I hate writing about myself. Whenever I
write about myself I always feel like I'm going on and on and bragging about
myself. The topic was quite easy because there was a lot of different ways to
approach talking about how we have all improved over the quarter.
|