Hamad Mohammad

Professor Rebecca Agosta

UWRT 1101-035
October 1, 2015
My Literacy Skills Development
When i went to high school, in my first year my mom told me how my uncle died in the
invasion of our country (Kuwait). She told me that those days were very terrifying, miserable,
and full of events that till this day we hear them from our elder family members who
witnessed them. Curiosity builded up, i wanted to know what happened, what my uncle
faced, what people of my country felt like back then, what we lost, and how the invasion
ended, by whom, and how the happiness was like at the day it ended. Because of my
curiosity, i started going to our schools library every day, at our first break between classes.
It was my first time to actually go to a library, choose a book and read it. i guess its because
I've never noticed any of my family member spend time reading a book other than my dad,
and to be honest he mostly read the newspaper. I went to history section in the library, i was
looking for a book about the invasion, which i found one about Kuwait's invasion,
i borrowed it because i didnt have time to read it at school, so most of the reading occurred at
home, a brief information about what I read was about the loss of souls and also the million
something gallons of oil that was burned back then, which not only caused the country to go
down in financial state, but it also affected the environment, from acidic rains to the
contamination of water (oil spills), a lot of lives were lost due to it, even animals didnt
survive. I figured out later that the more i read, the more i enjoyed reading, and the more i
became curious about what I've been reading about. Books titles later on started to interest
me, specially book about science fiction.

Reading opened new doors in my life, i started to know a lot of things about different subjects
that i like, and subjects that made most of the people i meet, be impressed with what i know.
As an example, after reading about the invasion, I started reading about Kuwaits history and
how it begun its development. My dad noticed the books that i bring from school almost
every week, i remember one day he came to my room and saw me reading a book, that he
read before, and we started talking about it, also he suggested couple of books to read. You
might think this is normal, but for me, I value my dads interests, which surprisingly met mine
as well.

I figured out that people these days don't read books at all and that because, no one really
motivates them to read, no one gives them a book and tell them try to read this book, you
might like it, also from my point of view, i see that the family play a huge rule in it, if i had
an elder brother, and i saw him reading a book, i might be interested in reading one, or maybe
i would join him to read a book or maybe to suggest couple of writers and authors.

In my senior year in high school, having in mind that I'm going to study abroad, that I'm
going to face a new society that I've never interacted with before, also i have to get used to
and acclimate with their culture and their traditions, so, I started to read about American
culture on the internet (Wikipedia), not to mention that movies, different series, and late
shows (Conans OBrien show) helped me to understand the American life style and the way
they talk, also i learned what does the American dream means and how it is like to live the
American dream. Also i didnt only gain knowledge, but i also learned how to pronounce
words correctly and how to speak with an American accent ( almost American but not
completely ).

Being Arabian kind of made things difficult to me, because i used to translate almost most of
the words in my mind to Arabic so i can understand the whole sentence, not to mention that
reading was one of the hardest task that i had to get along with, specially because its my
second language not the first. So I started taking extra English classes back in Kuwait to
improve my skills, those extra classes taught me to read better and faster, plus it taught me to
write better. Over time i improved and i started to see higher grades in school and better
feedback from my English teacher. After finishing high school, i traveled to America to
complete my studies as a mechanical engineer, but the problem was that i needed more
language practice and more skills, so i enrolled in the ELTI (English Language Training
Institute) program in University of North Carolina Charlotte. The program consisted of seven
levels, the first level is for those who barely know anything about English, and the seventh
level is for those who are advanced English students. To be in the right level, we had to take a
replacement test. It tested our reading, writing and speaking skills. Based on the test, i was set
with level 5 students. If i were to say how much i benefited from this program i would
seriously write a whole essay about them. The teachers working in the ELTI program knew
how to teach their student perfectly. Our teacher used to give use lots and lots of exercises
and also not to mention IELTS practice test to improve our score every time we take the test.
IELTS is an English test that scores your writing, reading and speaking skills. It is required to
those who are international student to see if they are applicable for university classes.

The mind works similarly as the muscle works, thats what our teacher used to tell us. We
exercise so the muscle grows, so as the brain does, we take test, lots and lots of assignments
to exercise our minds, therefore, we end up with better skills and better understanding. In my
experience, that is true hundred percent, because the more practice the more my score on the

IELTS test improves. For example, my first IELTS test i got a (5 out of 9), and the second one
was exactly the same, so i asked the teacher to give me extra work to do, and the third time i
got a (5.5 out of 9).
I wasn't happy with the result since the university I want to enroll in requires at least (6.0 out
of 9). The next semester i did my best and worked hard. After my 4th attempt, i knew that i
didn't waste my time on anything. I got a (6.0 out of 9) which i was really happy about back
then.