Entry 1. What is Literacy?

Literacy means that a person is able to not only read, but also comprehend what is being communicated. One must also be able to take what they comprehend, develop their own ideas, and convey them through writing.  

A literate person is someone who can read and write clearly and in a way that can be comprehended by others. This is also someone who can communicate their ideas in more than one way. 

When developing these definitions, I reflected back on what the word itself means in its most basic form. When considering literacy this way, it relates to being able to read and write. However, I believe that there are deeper components to literacy such as comprehending what you read and having your writing be understandable for the intended audience. 

When considering who or what may have influenced the development of my definitions, I am brought back to high school. Often times an insult that was used by my classmates was calling someone "illiterate". This was something used when the person said something that made no sense, was hard to understand, or others thought was stupid (instead of saying "that was dumb/stupid" they would say "you're illiterate"). Because of this, literacy was then understood by me as effective communication, and a literate person was someone who could communicate their thoughts in a way that allowed for easy comprehension by others. 

I believe that I am a literate person, and I think this post is proof of that. Not only was I able to read the prompt and comprehend what it was asking, but I was also able to create a response and communicate it in written format. This post can then be read and understood by others due to the effective communication, grammar, sentence structure, and spelling used throughout the post. Because of the ability for others to read and understand what I am writing and trying to portray through this blog, I believe that I am a literate person.