Michael Watts Capstone Reflection Essay An essential component of this class is the process of exercising selfreflection.

Throughout this semester, I have learned so much about myself. It is truly amazing how I have learned how to analyze my literacy in order to learn more about myself. At the start of this class, I thought of literacy as merely the ability to read and write. However, through careful research and exploration of others literacies, I have derived a new meaning of the term literacy. In my opinion, literacy is the process by which one communicates and interprets. Literacy is much more than the ability to read and write; it focuses on how one reads and writes and what sponsors and/or affects the way they read and write. Literacy, though it may be similarly grouped by locational dialects, is unique to an individual. Everyone exercises his or her own literacy. This just goes to show how much personality contributes to ones literacy development. One of the most defining moments in this class was our research on Yang Li. I have always wondered about how Americas language and culture affects foreigners and the struggles they go through because of it. The written case study on Yang Li allowed me to see a new perspective on confliction between two different literacies: Chinese and English. It was astonishing to see how culture plays such an important role in literacy and socio-emotional qualities. Researching Yang Lis case study is what allowed me to understand the true meaning of literacy development. Yang had to step outside Chinese boundaries in order to develop an American literacy dialect.

He went through many personal struggles in his literacy development, but it just reinforces the fact that literacy and its development is a process.