Initially, you should have noticed that Malcolm X was continuing to build on what he introduced in the first two paragraphs (that we went through together in our introductory video).

1. Where is he? The first sentence says he is in the Norfolk Prison Colony, the specific name of the prison in which he and Bimbi were incarcerated.

2. What is the first paragraph about? As you read, you can see he is kind of summarizing what he previously shared about his reading habit BEFORE meeting Bimbi: "still going through only book-reading motions."

3. Also, what feelings come through in the first paragraph? It's clear that he would have given up if he weren't so motivated to communicate with Bimbi.

4. Next, what was significant in the next paragraph? You should have noticed a shift, where Malcolm X decided to do something about his reading. The first thing I noticed is that he got a dictionary. Why? It says "to study, to learn some words."

After that, I see that he also was motivated to improve his penmanship. Where do I get that from? Malcolm X wrote, "It was both ideas together that moved me to request a dictionary . . ." If you look right before that, you see the ideas of learning new words and of improving penmanship. Nowadays, most people don't worry about penmanship, but back in the 1950s, writing clearly and in a straight line was very important. So Malcolm X wanted to change both.

5. Were there any other tools he requested? It says ". . . along with tablets and pencils." So what is a tablet? Today, a tablet is an electronic device, but back then, a tablet was a pad of paper, kind of like the spiral notebooks you may have used for school. In essence, Malcolm X asked for three things: a dictionary, paper, and something to write with.