Which comes first: Reading or Writing?

So which comes first, reading or writing? I do not think that we can actually separate these two. Personally speaking, both reading and writing have been playing in my life as far as I know. I always find my time to do volunteer reading in Thai. I read all the time. I need to have books, magazines, newspapers with me wherever I go. I also have to have a diary when I travel so that I can keep my travel journals.

After reading these two chapters, I remember myself as a student working on summary paragraphs, annotated bibliographies, reading and writing (as I am working on my writing assignments and citing the sources), reading before I write (as the way to gain more information on the topic), and writing before I read (as a freewriting approach relating to the topic I will write about). I think that reading makes me a better writer. Personally I love books. I have many books both at home and in the US. I buy so many books that my parents, especially my mom, need to tell me to stop buying because there is no place to store them. She also says that she will build a library for me after I go back home.

I also believe in the connections between reading and writing. I always tell my students to read, read, and read if they ask me about writing. Sometimes my students would ask me about how to be a good writer, my answer is always related to reading. At the moment, I write papers, I will re-read those articles in the beginner's mind. I actually notice that I underline or interact with texts in different parts of the articles depending on the topic/issue I am working on.

I personally like the writerly reader approach. Though I have not tried this, I think that it is a fun and valuable one for me. By thinking as the author, I can read and analyze critically on the writing itself. I will also gain more vocabulary repertoire because I will guess the terms the authors use comparing to the terms I think. This way I can learn both rhetorical moves and vocabulary use. I also think that it will challenge students to do this because they will be more aware of the similarity and difference the authors as well as the way they compose. I can adapt this approach by giving students the paraphrased version of the sentence. Then let them see and work on the cut-into-pieces original articles to form a sentence in which it gives the same meaning as the paraphrased one.

I think that using reading and writing can help students to gain both "ear" and "eye" learning skills because we can shuttle our focus to either on reading or writing lessons. For myself, I used to be an "eye" learner because I need to read and see what it is written down to be sully understood. After working at the writing center, I also become an "ear" learner because I need to listen to students' writings and give them respond. I think this can be done too in the classroom settings where students can do first reading peer response by students reading their papers out loud while other students write down what they think their friend's paper is about, how to improve it, what part they like. The next class we can ask students to read and respond to their friends' drafts.