Personal Narrative Draft Two

When reading this it would be helpful if you could look at my transition sentences and look to see where I can add more detail. Thank you.
Personal Narrative

            Ever since the day I was born I always wanted to be a firefighter. Growing up in the Bay Area schools were always over crowded. I was never the best student, never the best writer. I struggled with writing mostly because class sizes were too large and the teacher never could focus on one student individually. The fact that I didn’t read much and didn’t have a large vocabulary for a third grader didn’t help either. I hated reading, it was boring and the pages seemed to never end. Every time I flipped that page I only had more to read. I loved watching movies as a kid. My favorite movie growing up was “The Sandlot”. It described my childhood perfectly. Summer days were always spent riding my bike around my town with my friends. I was always outside whenever I had the chance. Unlike most kids, I was never a tech savvy person. Computers were too complicated; I enjoyed the simple things in life. It wasn’t until high school that I started to strengthen my writing skills and fully understand what it took to become an effective writer.

            From fifth to eighth grade I struggled with writing. I wrote very simple papers. I tried to get write as much as I could, not paying attention to structure or the effectiveness of my writing. Somehow I still managed to get good grades and was told by many teachers that I was a good writer. I never thought that I was a good writer because I never put any time into it. At the end of my eighth grade year I had to write sixteen poems for an assignment. I thought for sure I was going to fail because I wasn’t the most creative writer. I worked hard at it and at the end when I turned the poems in my English teacher asked if he could keep them as examples. I was shocked when I heard him ask this. After that I had gained confidence in myself and started to believe that I was a good writer. Teachers were telling me this for years and I started to believe it just as I started high school, which would come in handy for the next four years.

            At the start of my senior year in high school I was placed in an expository writing class. I thought it would be an easy A and a waste of my time. I found out that it would not be a waste of my time on the first day of class. The teacher Ms. Donovan was very helpful, always willing to look at my work before I turned it in. She was the one who taught me to write with rich detail and to never leave anything out. I went from writing narrative stories with no description to writing narrative stories that were almost all descriptions. It became hard for me not to describe an object in my writing or not to give reason to why something happened. It was a good thing I learned this because I didn’t read, and that’s where you pick those types of things up.

Reading books was never fun to me but I have learned that there are some books out there that I enjoy to read. Out of the twenty or so books I have I read I have only enjoyed about half of them. It takes a special book for me to like and want to keep reading. I like books with action in them, something that I can get excited about. I want there to be a character that I can relate to in some way or a character that I look up to because of what they have done. One of my favorite books is “Always Running” by Luis Rodriguez. It talks about growing up in L.A. and cursing the streets with gangs. I liked this book because it gave me reason to keep reading. Everything that the writer wrote pulled me in closer and closer, always wanting more. It is books like these that I enjoy, books that keep me on my toes. Another one of my favorite books is “Of Mice and Men” by John Steinbeck. I like this one because the story was so good. My favorite scene is where Lenny has to tell George that she killed the girl. This ruins all of the plans that Lenny and George had. I like this scene in the story because the way that Steinbeck makes George react later in the book makes me as a reader want to keep reading. It never got boring to me and most books that I do read always seem to have boring storylines or boring characters. It takes a special book for me to keep reading.

            Reading and writing is one of the most important skills that anybody can ever have in this world and I am fortunate enough to have them. Right now they are important to have because in order to make it through college you must have them and be able to do each one well. Reading is more than just reading the words on the page. Its understanding what the writer is saying being able to apply that meaning to something. Inside of school reading and writing is helping me get good grades and understand what I am learning about. Outside of the classroom reading and writing is helping me communicate and get things done. Without them I would be lost and the whole world would be a mystery. Once I graduate reading and writing will be crucial. In order to become a firefighter you must have good communication and writing is a big part of that. Being able to effectively say what I want to say is going to be very important in the future to my own success and the success of others. There is no doubt that reading and writing will stay with me for the rest of my life.

            I never thought I was a good writer until I got into high school and that’s where I really started to develop my writing skills. I never believed that I was and believing that you are good at something is the first step to actually being good at it. I never enjoyed reading as a kid, I would much rather be outside or inside watching a good movie. Writing was hard for me at first because I did not understand what it took to be a good writer. I only found out when somebody told me that I was.