Editor’s Note: The following essay was a winner in the Informational category of the 2023-2024 First Year Writing Contest. It was nominated by Professor Susan Pilaud.
When I was in sixth grade, I was placed in an ESL class. If you don’t know what ESL is, it stands for English as a Second Language, an extra class that immigrant students are placed in to help them learn the language. It’s a very helpful class that many immigrant kids find incredibly useful and engaging, a class that would teach them to read, write, and speak the language of the new country they’re living in. Despite having lived in the United States my entire life and speaking English fluently, I was placed in this class after a move to a new town. This unexpected turn of events would not only influence my passions but also shape my identity as a writer.
As the school year began, I eagerly embraced this new chapter, ready to make the most of it. After the first week or so of school, a teacher I didn’t recognize came into my classroom and asked for me. I remember feeling special that I was the only one getting taken out of class. She brought me to the library and introduced herself as my ESL teacher, explaining what ESL is and what we would be doing during our time together. She explained that she would be taking me out of one of my classes every other day to do her lesson instead and that I wouldn’t have to make up any classwork that I missed while I was with her. I remember being confused, not understanding why I was in her class if I already spoke English.
My mom was a lot angrier when I told her about it that night than I expected. She said it wasn’t right and called the school to set up an appointment with the principal as soon as possible. The principal told my mom that because it was listed that my family speaks a different language at home, I was required to take an ESL class. My mom argued that I didn’t take any extra classes at my old school and English was still my best subject but she refused, saying that it was their policy. I ended up having to take the class, despite my mom’s strong feelings against it. I didn’t understand why she was so upset at the time, racism wasn’t really something I had experienced
before but looking back on it now I see how insulting it was.
During the next class, my teacher gave me my first assignment. It was simple, write a two-page short story so that she could see what writing level I was at. Creative writing assignments were always my favorite. I loved being able to fully and freely express my writing ability while getting instructive and helpful criticism. I got to work as soon as I got home, jotting down ideas and looking up one-sentence prompts to kick off. I eventually got the idea to write a fantasy story about a goddess who met a boy who feared gods. She teaches him about the stars and history, tells him stories of gods and mankind, and watches him grow into a man before he goes off to travel the world. He eventually dies, caught in the crossfire of an ongoing battle, and the goddess is left to cope with her grief. It wasn’t a revolutionary plot or anything, but I poured my heart into it and I was proud of my work.
I had finished the assignment so early I wasn’t sure what to do with it. I re-read it over and over, trying to find mistakes and spots that needed editing but I couldn’t find anything else to change. I took it to the school’s librarian, who had already been helping me with some other assignments, and asked her to look it over for any errors I missed. After reading it a few times over, she handed it back to me with a smile and said it was perfect. She told me it was one of the best short stories she had ever read for someone my age and that she was surprised by the quality of my writing. Needless to say, I was feeling real confident after that.
When I turned my work in, my ESL teacher was shocked I had written five pages and even more so by my writing. After reading my story, my teacher apologized to me. She knew I shouldn’t have been in that class but there was nothing either of us could do about it. For the rest of the year, I was basically a teaching assistant for that class. I would translate for other Brazilian kids and help them understand the work assigned. Since I didn’t have much to do for most of the class periods, my teacher suggested I write my own book in my free time. So I did.
I would work on it constantly, at home or school, while my teacher would edit it and make suggestions anytime I brought it to her. I spent the whole school year working on it and continued to work on it in the summer, even after I transferred back to my old school. After a year or so of writing, I decided to scrap it and start over since I started to hate my writing at the beginning of the book. Since I started it so young, my writing style had been changing and evolving from page to page as I grew up. Through my writing and re-writing process, I learned to love my work even when I hated it. I couldn’t read almost any of my older writing without cringing, but it was also encouraging to see how far I had come compared to just a year before.
Receiving encouragement to write an entire book when I was just eleven years old was what made me want to be an author. Suddenly, it wasn't just a hobby I enjoyed, but something I'd enjoy doing for the rest of my life. I enjoyed writing and storytelling and the feeling I got when others liked what I made. The more I wrote and the better I got, the more confident I became in not only my work but in myself.