More than three‑quarters of students from low‑income households
Data about students' economic need comes from the National Center for Education Statistics, via our partners at MDR Education.
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The English learners in my high school classroom love to read and discuss new texts. However, it can be a challenge to find texts that explore exciting and complex themes while remaining accessible to students in the early stages of their language learning process. In a classroom full of twenty different personalities, it can be even tougher to find a book that each and every student can connect to and get lost in. That is why I'm so excited to begin reading "Under The Mesquite" by Guadalupe Garcia McCall with my ESL 2 class. The book tells the story of Lupita, a teenage girl from a close-knit Mexican-American family who must take charge of her siblings after her mother's cancer diagnosis, all while trying to find her own voice and pursue her own dreams. Her story helps us consider: How much should we sacrifice for our families? How do we find our own voice and strength? How do we honor our families, our cultures, and ourselves?
The books we choose to study in class are essential: they become the basis for our academic discussions, the exemplars for our writing, and the anchor for our yearlong exploration of identity, culture, and perspective. Your donation would make a huge impact on my students' learning. Because funding is so limited, students in my class often have to share books with their classmates. Having a class set of this book would mean that each and every student could engage with the text directly. Through this work, students will build reading comprehension skills and analyze key questions of what it means to come of age at the intersection of two cultures.
About my class
The English learners in my high school classroom love to read and discuss new texts. However, it can be a challenge to find texts that explore exciting and complex themes while remaining accessible to students in the early stages of their language learning process. In a classroom full of twenty different personalities, it can be even tougher to find a book that each and every student can connect to and get lost in. That is why I'm so excited to begin reading "Under The Mesquite" by Guadalupe Garcia McCall with my ESL 2 class. The book tells the story of Lupita, a teenage girl from a close-knit Mexican-American family who must take charge of her siblings after her mother's cancer diagnosis, all while trying to find her own voice and pursue her own dreams. Her story helps us consider: How much should we sacrifice for our families? How do we find our own voice and strength? How do we honor our families, our cultures, and ourselves?
The books we choose to study in class are essential: they become the basis for our academic discussions, the exemplars for our writing, and the anchor for our yearlong exploration of identity, culture, and perspective. Your donation would make a huge impact on my students' learning. Because funding is so limited, students in my class often have to share books with their classmates. Having a class set of this book would mean that each and every student could engage with the text directly. Through this work, students will build reading comprehension skills and analyze key questions of what it means to come of age at the intersection of two cultures.