Love Reading free essay sample

Looking back, I can see what a long roller coaster ride I went on before realizing how fun reading could be. At my private school in Ghana we would only get assigned books from the teachers which were clearly chosen to make us hate reading because they were so uninteresting. That being said, I never really thought much about reading until I came to the United States. Coming here and being exposed to the wide variety of books in the library was like being at the candy store. It really showed me there was more to reading than the boring books my teachers gave. Moving from a different country did prove to be a challenge when I realized the literary skills thought in Ghana were completely different from that of the U. S. , so one can imagine how terrified I was when I had to take a reading placement test. Let’s just say I was good enough to go into 3rd grade but had to be put in ESOL, a class that helped foreign students with their English. We will write a custom essay sample on Love Reading or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page I wasn’t embarrassed but rather grateful that I had an opportunity to improve my reading skills. ESOL did a lot for me in my writing skills, unlike reading which was so frustrating. I was able to read but not with the speed and precision that my classmates could. Being able to read quickly while articulating and pronouncing words correctly was a challenge because it was very difficult to do with my Ghanaian accent. Though improving my reading skills was a challenge for me I still love to read, until I was asked to read out loud. Because I was in ESOL my 3rd grade teacher never picked on me whenever there was a class read aloud, and that was completely fine with me. After a while I guess she assumed I was ready to in front of the whole class†¦ I wasn’t. I remember that day, my heart beating rapidly against my chest, my palms began to perspire, and although I only had to read three lines, I was petrified. With a lot of effort I began to read and being from another country I had an accent which slipped out while I read. So with the accent and not being very good at reading came the snickers. I had only heard one person at first, then two, then three, and when I was done reading I looked up to see several of my classmates staring at me giggling. I knew I wasn’t perfect at reading but I hadn’t thought I was that bad. Oh I was livid! Not just because of that incident but because it happened every time I was asked to read out loud. What really irritated me the most was that my teacher was completely oblivious to what was happening and I was too embarrassed to say anything, so I slowly began to feel complete animosity towards reading. With that out the window went my passion for. I did try at times to read out loud on my own so I could get better but I didn’t have the patience or the time for it so I just stopped reading. Throughout my elementary and middle school years I only read when I had to and absolutely avoided reading out loud whenever I could. Soon reading became so tedious that I couldn’t even stay awake long enough to read a book for more than an hour. Whenever I was assigned a book from school I wouldn’t even bother reading it, I’d spark note it or just ask someone else who read it to tell me the important parts. Altogether I just stopped caring about my school work and my grades started to go down fast. Since I never read the books assigned to me whenever we had a test on them I would fail. I became extremely lazy and procrastinated a lot. Of course my parents weren’t going to have me failing so they forced me to go to the library for books. Being the rebel that I was, instead of checking out novels I would get comic and picture books that I was way too old to be reading. As I started reading more comics I began to grow very interested in them. When my parents found out I wasn’t actually checking out real books but â€Å"cartoons† as they called it, they decided to pick books out for me instead. So I stopped reading again until I got into high school. When I got into high school I was thrilled, but then hit with the realization that I would be going to college in four years, which meant no more laziness. I also realized that if I wanted to pass my classes then I would have to read whatever was given to me and not spark note it. I quickly changed my demeanor about reading. The first book that I actually read individually was Speak by Laurie Halse Andersons. While reading Speak on my own I feel in love with the plot and couldn’t put it down until I was done. After reading Speak I was hooked on reading. I went to the library to many different unique books that were interesting. I began picking out books that I’d lost track of time, next thing I knew I had at least eight books in my hands. After that reading became a very exciting adventure for me. When sophomore year started I spent a majority of my time reading. In English that year â€Å"A Midnights Summers Dreams† and Animal Farm were my favorite books to read. They both had such great storylines which kept me so interested that I didn’t mind writing a paper on them. After I had finished reading my books for school, I’d go to the library and check out as many books just to read for fun. I read so much in school that both my friends and teachers started to get irritated by it. During class or while having a conversation with friends I would always have my nose in a really good book. Some teachers even tried to take away whatever book I was reading. Even though I read and still do read a lot just for the sake of it, it’s really helped my reading skills that I use now; I’m able to read a lot faster and efficient than a majority of my peers who chose not to read at all. Reading is something you’ll almost always find me doing on my free time. I absolutely don’t mind being detached from the social circle because I â€Å"read too much. I always find that whatever is going on in the book I’m reading is much more interesting than the latest gossip. I also able to expand my vocabulary and knowledge through all through many books I read. Though those aren’t the reasons I read. I read to escape into a different world where I don’t have to worry about anything else and it’s just me and my book. Even though I’ve had a long love hate battle with reading, I’m glad that I was able to find out that reading can be very a delightful experience and proud to say that I’m a book loving book worm!