The Secret Language of Comics

Tag: literacy narrative

Literacy Narrative Part 3 Reflection

Student Posts

The entire literacy narrative project has allowed me to meet the course Learning Outcomes through employing the use of technology to make a comic and then using that comic to revise the writing that I had done previously to make said graphic novel. This has allowed me to approach writing as a process that had phases with each phase offering new perspective on another, resulting in a more polished final product. It was very eye-opening to return to the literacy narrative after creating my comic. This allowed me to see how much I could revise my essay and keep a consistent message across both mediums of expression. It also helped me to realize how much I had grown as a writer in this class by allowing me to see how I used to write and rewriting the narrative based on what I had learned through the Learning Outcomes. After having worked in the visual medium, my revisions looked more like adding details that would allow a better picture to be drawn from what I had written. I feel that this would allow for a more cohesive and interesting argument to be made. This revision also involved a lot of omission which was the result of me telling the story through different means. All in all, I am glad that I got to do this multi-step assignment as it has made me more mature as a writer and taught me a lot about expression as a process along the way. 

Literacy Narrative Part 3

Student Posts

I’m reminded of being assigned To Kill a Mockingbird in my 8th grade English course when I think of being trapped into reading. This book, possibly contrary to the popular opinion of avid readers and those who are deeply invested in literature, bored me to an unparalleled extent. I remember struggling to keep my eyes glued to the seemingly never-ending sequence of words on a page. That’s what reading felt like to me, an infinite loop of ink I had to make sense of because my teacher said so. I found it hard to believe that people could enjoy this as a hobby or anything really. One class, I had made the mistake of letting the staleness of reading get to me. Words began to blur and mesh on the page until my eyelids grew too heavy and I fell asleep. I remember being abruptly taken up from my Harper Lee-induced sleep and was embarrassed to find that I was the only student left in the classroom. I was alone in a dark room, my only company being the singular light bulb left on when everyone else left out. This meant that it had become obvious that To Kill a Mockingbird had won the tug of war between itself and me staying awake. I will never forget the consequence that I faced as a result of my disinterest in this book. I spent a while writing that letter apologizing to my English teacher, Ms. KJ, promising change and stating how I would stay awake in future classes. This consequence is what shifted my approach to reading in class as I made a greater effort in reading and participating in class discussions. The unforeseen product of this new approach was the book growing ever more interesting. I had started to give the book a real chance. I began indulging in literature on a level beyond my previous superficial understanding of reading. The more I read, the more reading graduated from being just ink occupying space on a blank canvas. It became a truly captivating story that employed the use of my imagination to place myself in the world created. This new understanding allowed for my next impactful encounter with reading.

I sit in the cool kitchen area and am greeted by the warm rays of the sun as they beam through the kitchen window and kiss my skin. I’m deeply invested in The Family Across the Street by Nicole Trope, almost as invested as my brother is to my left, in his phone. He tries to get my attention but fails against Nicole Trope. I’m fully inside the text. My brother hadn’t removed the veil and uncovered the true beauty in reading, the bona fide light of being able to imagine the story and see the action that is unfolding as I flip from page to page. I’ve never been so invested in a book before. I’ve never been drawn into a book and felt as if I wasn’t just reading anymore. I was fully experiencing it instead. This wasn’t like when I first started reading To Kill a Mockingbird. I began to question my definition of reading. Was this what reading truly was? Is it what it felt like when I was indulging in this book? Is it more than just its definition? After reading the summer reading assignment that I chose, it was confirmed that reading was so much more than just reading. When you read you are drawn into the story and can see, hear, smell, and overall experience the world that the book has created. It’s inviting to imagine yourself through the eyes of the narrator as you watch the plot unfold. Wondering, seeking what’s next as your scramble from page to page. I’m briefly removed from the book as I hear my brother chuckling next to me. I look over to see what he’s watching, only to realize that it’s not as exciting as my book. So I return to the story, told through the, previously, never-ending black ink in front of me that I wished could exceed the bounds of the back cover when I finished reading it. 

You develop a heightened level of appreciation for something you hate, then learn to love. Coming out on the other end of the tunnel, redefining what reading means to me, has allowed me to find joy in it. I recognized the magnitude of difference between my past and current opinions surrounding reading and reflecting on how my ideals changed. I found that I gave myself a chance to experience literacy in a different light, granting me a newfound enjoyment of reading and recognition in its true power and significance in my life. 

Literacy Narrative ReflectioN

Student Posts

Writing the Literacy Narrative felt simultaneously like writing a personal narrative and also like writing a rhetorical analysis essay. I felt like I had to analyze my achievements as a writer but also how my opinions about writing changed over time. “Intuition and Other Thoughts” was written as I wrote any other piece of writing, which was essentially to write every single thought I had, then cut out anything unnecessary and using that big bulk of writing as an outline. Yet, writing “Intuition and Other Thoughts” was unlike anything else I have ever written. The piece ends up being a love letter to my mother and her major involvement in the type of writer I become. It also speaks on my opinion of the writing-and-revising process.

The writing process was different, due to the X-Pages Exercise. It was very similar to what I usually do but much more helpful when clarifying a single scene, which I ended up embedding into the narrative. The scene I described for the X-Pages Exercise became the frame of the tiny pockets of scenes I added in. I do wonder if it made me too focused on the scene of the narrative, rather than the actual point of the essay. It might be my missing of Texas that may have resulted in too much Waco geography knowledge that any person not from Waco will ever need.

I realized that I have a lot of different, conflicting emotions about writing, which I think a lot of people can say. My mother becoming a central figure of the narrative was not what I was expecting, but looking back, it seems obvious that she would be the focus of how I became the writer that I am today. Funnily enough, if my mother would read the narrative, I think she would tell me the same thing she tells me there, “Get to the point! Write about me less.” I think I used to view myself as a really bad writer but came to acknowledge through writing this that even though I may be a bad writer, it is okay because at least I have room to grow.

I think people would find the sentence, “I am a slow learner, a slow writer—a perfectionist when it comes to word choice and each individual sentence but easily lost when it comes to THE BIG IDEA,” most interesting because it describes what kind of writer I am. Most people expect perfectionism to be helpful when writing or studying, but it can result in a pointless, circular, or even boring piece of writing if you lose sight of the big picture.

The Texas sunset in all its glory…and my friend. Throwing a rock into the lake.
Taken by Josie Sim

Narrative Part 1 Reflection

Student Posts

The Shifting tells the story of one learning to indulge in reading and writing on a different level as a result of in-class experiences. These in-class experiences created out-of-class understanding of literacy. Writing this first draft came about as the result of the X-page exercise effectiveness. I feel that that assignment gave me a great foundation in which I have built my essay upon. I especially found the 10 minute free writing exercise to be very beneficial as it pioneered the process of me getting my thoughts into writing. I found that not worrying about how grammatically correct and connected my ideas were allowed me to freely express my thoughts, evidence of effective brainstorming.

Literacy Comic Reflection

Sketches

Now that you’ve completed your Literacy Narrative Comic, publish a reflective blog post of about 500 words about the writing process, paying special attention to how the work you have done has helped you to meet the Learning Outcomes for this class. That post should link to the page with your literacy comic.

Some other questions you might respond to:

  • How was it different to write your literacy narrative as a comic?
  • How did you think differently once the visual component was added?
  • How did that help you to see the story you were trying to tell in different terms?
  • Was your analytical thinking process any different?
  • How have your thoughts about your alphabetic literacy narrative changed in the process of transforming it into a comic?

I’d also like you to discuss choices you made in creating your comic and to explain why you chose the way you did. Especially if there’s something you were really trying to do in your comic which you felt you couldn’t realize as perfectly as you would if you had a lot more time, more resources, or if you could have hired an illustrator to turn your vision into exactly what you wanted. If there are aspects of your comic where you have a clear sense of what you were trying to accomplish and how you would have done so if some things were different, then explain that in your reflection. Doing so allows you to demonstrate that you have the knowledge you need about this sort of writing even if you have not yet developed all the skills necessary to make that knowledge visible in the final artifact you’ve produced.

Literacy Narrative Comic Reflection

Sketches

Now that you’ve completed your Literacy Narrative Comic, publish a reflective blog post of about 500 words about the writing process, paying special attention to how the work you have done has helped you to meet the Learning Outcomes for this class. That post should link to the page with your literacy comic.

Some other questions you might respond to: How was it different to write your literacy narrative as a comic? How did you think differently once the visual component was added? How did that help you to see the story you were trying to tell in different terms? Was your analytical thinking process any different? How have your thoughts about your alphabetic literacy narrative changed in the process of transforming it into a comic?

I’d also like you to discuss choices you made in creating your comic and to explain why you chose the way you did. Especially if there’s something you were really trying to do in your comic which you felt you couldn’t realize as perfectly as you would if you had a lot more time, more resources, or if you could have hired an illustrator to turn your vision into exactly what you wanted. If there are aspects of your comic where you have a clear sense of what you were trying to accomplish and how you would have done so if some things were different, then explain that in your reflection. Doing so allows you to demonstrate that you have the knowledge you need about this sort of writing even if you have not yet developed all the skills necessary to make that knowledge visible in the final artifact you’ve produced

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