Andie Goniwiecha
WRT 150
Prof. Rinke
2/15/13
Literacy
Narrative Process Memo
Literacy Timeline:
As
I began the process of creating my literacy narrative by starting with a
timeline of my life, I decided to start with my earliest memories of reading
with my mom. Although this was an important starting point for my literacy
development, it became more apparent as I looked back on my life that music was
what really helped me to develop as a literate person. I found that I have had
many experiences with music, and it was a bit difficult to get them all down on
paper and organized without putting too much or too little detail about them. Something
that I found interesting about my development in literacy was just how much
music has changed my life and who I am as a person. I could not think of
anything else more important in my life, and that really took me by surprise. The theme and focus throughout my timeline was
clearly my development in music. It was not difficult at all to determine this
theme, because it has had such a huge impact on my life. In creating this
timeline, I realized that I am a very creative person, and that I will always
chose music over reading or writing.
Literacy Narrative:
When
writing my literacy narrative, it was difficult to narrow down my timeline to
create a clear story. I had trouble deciding what was best to include in order
to effectively describe my literacy development. I decided to briefly describe
the most important events throughout my timeline. This included all the
different instruments I have had, and how they have affected me in terms of my
literacy as a person. As I started putting my narrative together, I decided
that it would make the most sense to organize it chronologically. I started
with my first memories of getting into music, and ended with what I am doing
currently with music. The pre-writing strategy I used was highlighting the main
points in my timeline that I wanted to include in my narrative. I did this to
help create a structure or outline for writing my narrative. Although my
narrative wasn’t fully completed when we did peer reviews, I was able to show
my partner the general idea of what I was going to do with it. It was helpful
to receive the encouragement from my partner, and made me more confident as I began
writing my narrative. After my narrative was completed, I did start planning
out my video. It was very different than writing a story because you had to say
a lot in a very short period of time with very little text. This was a
challenge for me, but I feel that I was successful in telling my story.
Animoto Slide Show:
When creating my slide show, I did find it quite
difficult to stay within the time and text limit while still effectively
telling my story. My strategy was to
narrow down my narrative to the most important events in my timeline. The images
I used in my video acted both as a complement to the text in the slide before,
and as a way to provide more detail. I feel that they added a lot to my slide
show and made it even more enjoyable and interesting. The pictures I chose were
mostly from the web, and were used to help the audience visualize what the text
was saying. I did use one picture of me performing on stage with my guitar, and
I feel that this picture helped with the credibility of my story. As I looked
for a song to use in my slide show, I took into consideration the mood of my
story, and also my interests as a person. I ended up choosing a slower-paced
song that featured an acoustic guitar playing throughout it. I feel that this
song was perfect for my video, considering all of my experiences with my acoustic
guitar. As I look back at my video, and the lack of comments, I still really
enjoy what I created and feel that it tells my story very well. I would have
liked to have more time to include more details about my experiences, but I am
happy with the final product.
