Personal Narrative: The Journal For Conquering Middle School

William Zinsser the author of “How to Write a Memior” gives three key phrases for writing a memoir. “Be yourself,” “Speak freely,” and “Think small.” This is a way to organize your memoir however you want it to flow. Walter Dean Myers author of “Bad Boy” follows these three phrases that Zinsser suggests by writing from a child’s point of view, freely but honest memoir, and vivid memories.

The life of an only child can be rough. Growing up, I had many lonely times. During these moments, I turned to writing as an outlet. I managed to love the writing process through journaling and writing creative stories. I found joy and relief in fluidly writing ideas on paper. As I passed through elementary school and middle school, my favorite subject was English because I was able to write creatively and read fiction novels that sparked my imagination. However, my early schooling years did not prepare me for writing in high school, where writing became dreadful.

Cisneros uses writing as a way to escape the bore of reality, and helps to relieve her of past experiences. This can be seen in the vignettes of Rafaela and Mango Says goodbye. In the former, her character is symbolically escaping reality by wishing to escape literally, while in the former, she states how she passes the time when mail comes by thinking up stories, and tells a story in a fashion similar to a flashback.

When life throws you off a mountain, then stomps on your face about 1000 times, it’s pretty horrible. I’ve never been great at dealing with my emotions and that’s not good. I would hold them all in and that went on for 3 years, then I exploded. When that happened, I fell into a destructive state of mind. I isolated myself from my entire family and friends, it got so bad that I hurt myself the summer before I started 8th grade. For the next 5 months, I was suffocating and I didn’t know how to stop. It wasn’t until my mom found out she immediately made an appointment to bring me in for therapy. That’s when my love for reading and writing got its start.

Starting middle school challenges any kid transitioning into a teenager. Simple small changes like going from cubbies to lockers excite students. Bigger changes like transitioning from one all day class to six individual classes and pluses and minuses to letter grades can leave some students shell-shocked with new responsibilities. I remember the struggle I had keeping up with all of this in my first year. I found social studies homework especially difficult for me. I went to class and didn’t give the course work my best effort. As a result, my grades slipped to the point that I had failing grades in a few classes. I didn’t know what to do, and didn’t really want to do anything about it. I was drowning in a pool of laziness. One evening, I nearly began trembling when my mother decided she wanted to check my grades.

Sophomore year was an especially hard year for me. It was my second year at Wahlert High School and because I was the new kid the beginning of freshman year, I still felt like the new girl. Plus, I was trying to maintain my social life, play volleyball, participate in band, choir and show choir, act in plays, and manage school and homework.

Sadly, it was the end of summer and it was the year I was going into 7th grade for junior high! I spent a long time trying to find the perfect school. The junior high all of my friends were going to was Desert Ridge, which was a huge school with many long hallways that never end.It was very close and convenient to our house. My family and I also found a school called GCA. GCA was smaller than my elementary school, probably only one fourth the size. It was not as convenient for us since we live in Mesa and GCA is located in Gilbert. I knew I needed my friends to go through junior high and high school but GCA had higher honors classes that were not at Desert Ridge. I knew that this tough decision was all up to me. It was as hard as picking needles out of a hay bale. So I made it easier on myself by choosing the main pros and cons for each school.

Seventh grade was the year I met Mrs. Flores... I didn 't like her, or her class. For me English class meant complete boredom. My first essay I wrote it that year. The theme was myths. But non of that matters, what matters is that that was the start of something great. Even if I was

At last, my third grade was so exciting because now I get to go to the big kids building. My teacher was Mrs.Dean one of my favorite teachers. In her class it was always my friends, Breann, Autumn, Kimberley, Jada and I. We were bad when we used to go on bathroom break we used to climb the bathroom stalls, we always got caught and in trouble for it. Jada and I would always fight just to see who could win. One of my favorite childhood activity was field day each year in school towards the end of the year I wouldn’t miss this day for nothing. My grandmother used to work at the school, so I kind of had a lead way with not getting in a lot of trouble. One day my grandma had told my cousin Teighlor to sit in the office until she got back, but she left looking for her. When she couldn 't find her she had walked all the way home up Superior hill. One thing we had learned was to never talk to strangers so when a lady offered her a ride she told her no and the lady had followed her home to make sure that was her house. My family had changed from chapter three because my mom had my baby brother and my auntie had twins and so that was very

I’ve had a very on off relationship when it comes to literacy. Up until the fifth grade I wasn’t much of a reader or writer. Then in fifth grade, we started reading really good books. Usually as a class. I found myself needing a way out of this terrible world in the sixth grade. So I started ready heavier books, like the Harry Potter series. I realized that books gave me a chance to visit a different world. One that didn’t have wars or world issues like the ones in reality. By seventh grade, I loved English class. The teacher, the assignments, the environment; everything made it enjoyable. Eighth grade, I had the highest grade in the class, which made everything I did, literacy wise, amazing. I tried really hard on assignments, which ended

Seventh grade was awesome. School was still easy, and every Saturday morning I had a Bar-Mitzvah party to attend. Seventh grade was also really difficult. During fun Bar-Mitzvah parties I forced a smile; the ground was shaking from the music and the stomping of people dancing but I was stuck in my own head sitting at a table alone. Millions of Americans have depression, with a large number of cases developing during puberty, a statistic I was and still am included in. I have depression; no I am not depressed.

Reading is such an important part of life. If you can’t read, you might as well be mute. How could you ever express yourself? Your ideas, your emotions, and passion? Malcolm X (who was, at the time imprisoned.) he “expressed being frustrated with his inability to express himself clearly.” (Malcom X 640) He was envious of Bimbi’s complete literacy and wanted to imitate that knowledge. When he tried to read, the words to him were an enigma. With him only being able to decipher a couple of words. What did he do then? Give up and deny himself knowledge? He found a dictionary, where he then wrote and memorized every definition in the book, building himself and his vocabulary up.

Believe it or not, sometimes a gracious action can bring a huge influence on a person. When I read the introduction that instructor Heller wrote, there is a sentence she wrote: “Sometimes the most influential moments in our lives are smaller moments, events that we may not recognize as influential until years after the experience.” For some reason, I related to it strongly. My story is about my high school experience. Also, I will share some significant moments in my life, and how these smaller moments changed my personality.

Why is writing important? Writing is an important skill to learn and enhance. Writing allows a person to be able to express their thoughts and ideas on to a piece of paper. Writing allowed me, even from a young age, to be able to express myself. Writing allowed me to add my thoughts and feelings on to a piece of paper. Writing is a skill that is necessary for life. Writing gives you the ability to express yourself in ways that talking could not. From a young age, I loved to write. Writing acted as a scapegoat to me. It allowed me to vanish from reality. It gave me the ability to get in touch with my inner thoughts.

High school grows you into the person you are. I have great memories, good and bad, some learning experiences and some that I’ll take with me the rest of my life. My high school experience has influenced my development as a person inside and outside of the class by making me more independent, choosing friends wisely and teachers motivating me to attend college and accomplish goals I have set for myself.