My first memory of language arts

My first memory of language arts was how I didn’t really understand the name. why was it called language arts I thought. I liked just calling it reading or writing. They were certainly two different things to me….which leads to my mixed memories and feelings towards language arts as a whole. I am diagnosed with ADD and weak auditory processing skills and had an IEP all through school. This brings up the unpleasant memories I have of the reading aspect of language arts. I remember sitting in class while the teacher or students would take turns reading aloud while everyone fallowed along in their books. Well that was the worst for me. I never felt like I was able to keep up or stay focused on fallowing along and usually felt lost, because of the auditory dictation and trying to keep up I did not comprehend anything. Writing on the other hand was a release for me. I have always felt as though it came easy for me to express myself through writing, probably because I always have so many thoughts in my head. I liked writing things with a beginning middle and end. I thought it was so cool when we first started learning about introduction, body and conclusion paragraphs. Still to this day I find myself learning and growing as a writer. My English class last fall certainly played a role in that. Now as an adult student I am fully aware of the relationship between reading and writing, what we know as “language arts” or “literacy” and the importance of grasping both aspects to be a successfully literate person.