Gabby's Literacy Timeline by Gabby Gonzalez

Oral Language Growth

gabbgonz — 2025-01-17 03:38:51 UTC

My first word was "mama" when I was 10 months old. I have always been developmentally on track with my oral language. Growing up, I used to struggle a lot with speaking in front of larger groups of people and/or presenting in front of the class but as I continue getting older, it has become a lot easier for me! I have always told myself "It's not that deep" when I have a presentation and/or some sort of speech in front of a larger group to calm myself down and make myself more comfortable!

Getting Into Reading

gabbgonz — 2025-01-17 03:45:33 UTC

In preschool, I was always looking for a picture book to browse through. They were my favorite! I used books to practice my letters and numbers in a way where my mom would point to either a letter or number and I would blurt it out, right or wrong! This turned into one of my favorite "games" and would ALWAYS ask my mom to practice letters and numbers to the point where she probably got very annoyed!

The Beginning of My Reading Journey

gabbgonz — 2025-01-17 03:52:32 UTC

Kindergarten was when I really started to get into reading, as most of us do. At my elementary school, for my class, there was a 100-word challenge that any student could attempt at doing at any point of the school year. The challenge consisted of reading off 100 words from the list in order to receive the certificate of completion as well as a t-shirt. I practiced and practiced over and over again, re-reading the list of words as many times as my mom would let me for the day! This challenge is what sparked my interest in reading because once I completed the challenge, I wanted something else to read!

Becoming a Fluent Reader

gabbgonz — 2025-01-17 04:02:26 UTC

Throughout elementary school, every summer I always participated in the library programs in my hometown. The summer reading challenge program was always my favorite because I had to read a certain number of books by the end of summer. I consistently went to the library with my siblings and my mom every week to get new books. With the amount of reading I was doing, my fluency skills became very good!

Writing Then & Now

gabbgonz — 2025-01-17 04:11:54 UTC

I have always enjoyed writing, especially when I got to high school. In elementary school, I learned how to write regularly and in cursive which led me to really like it. Anytime in school when it was time to free-write or I got assigned a paper to write, I almost felt a sense of relief. Writing short passages or long essays always felt pretty easy for me as my thoughts typically come rushing in when it is time to write!

Reading Today

gabbgonz — 2025-01-17 04:24:24 UTC

Romance has always been my go-to book genre and Colleen Hoover is definitely my favorite author at the moment. I started reading a lot more in 2023, stopped a little bit once I started college, but just got back into reading! I am currently reading Never Never by Colleen Hoover and Tarryn Fisher and really like it so far! One of my new year's resolutions for 2025 is to get back into reading consistently so I'm holding myself accountable!