C is for Cinco de Mayo

We don't often celebrate Mexican Independence Day, but this year, since we were not doing anything anyway, I decided to make it a true taco Tuesday. We actually have tacos quite often-- sometimes fish, sometimes cauliflower, sometimes grilled chicken or steak, but this time I decided to make old school tacos the way my mom used to when we were kids.

Back then, in New Jersey? Nobody ate tacos. But we were an airline family and some good friends of ours had recently moved to Southern California. Whenever we visited them, besides swimming in their backyard pool and biking to Huntington Beach, we also ate exotic foods such as Jolly Ranchers (also unavailable on the East Coast in the 70s), Farrells Ice Cream, and tacos.

The homemade version we had was Mexican only in name. They were really just corn tortillas warmed in the oven with a slice American Cheese and topped with plain fried ground beef, chopped tomatoes and shredded ice berg lettuce, but we loved them! So much so, that my mom would pack corn tortillas in her suitcase and keep them in the freezer in New Jersey for those California dreaming days when nothing but a taco for dinner would do.

And that is what I made for dinner on Tuesday. Okay, I used cheddar instead of American and we had avocado on our tacos, too, but the simple, clean flavors of corn, cheese, beef, tomato, and lettuce took me right back, not to California, but to our kitchen table in South Jersey. Ole!

Life lesson: Sometimes tradition is the best sauce.

B is for Becoming a Reader

I received Becoming Brianna, the latest book in the Emmie & Friends series by Terri Libenson yesterday. I had preordered it months ago, knowing how popular the graphic novel series is with sixth grade girls, especially, and when it arrived I was a little sad to know that I wouldn't be sharing my copy with any kids this year.

I was also a little excited, though, because my niece Annabelle and I have read the other books in the series together, even though she lives in Atlanta. We had a virtual book group before they became popular by necessity. This year Annabelle is in sixth grade, and my heart goes out to her, because I know all that she's missing at the end of the year. She's an extrovert, too, so that in person connection that all my students write about missing is especially important to her.

I texted Annabelle a picture of the cover as soon as I opened the package, and she replied immediately. When she was younger, she used to be an avid reader, but in the last few years she says she doesn't like it much anymore. Even so, she is eagerly upholding our tradition of reading these particular books together.

As a teacher, it has always been my philosophy to help every student find a book they want to read rather than assign them a required text. Years ago, when graphic novels were enjoying the beginning of what has become a publishing tsunami of popularity, there was a big debate in teaching as to whether reading them really "counted" as reading. In between the firm yes and no positions that educators held, there was middle ground that posited that engaging, easy-to-read books could be gateways for resistant readers, inviting them in to the fold, and helping them to see themselves as people who read.

These days, every teacher I know has a lot of graphic novels on the classroom book shelf, but there is still kind of a bias against them. In my niece's school, students are assigned quarterly book projects and they are required to pick a book that is on or above their reading level. Annabelle is a good reader, and finding a book is often a challenge for her because so many great, high interest titles are below her score.

I have to wonder if there is a correlation between the assignment expectations and her diminishing interest in reading, especially given our mutual enthusiasm for Becoming, Brianna. After all? It's a little below my reading level, too.

Life Lesson: If you want 'em to read, let 'em read what they want!

A is for Andiamo!

As a monolingual language teacher, I confess to being intrigued by the mentions a few of my students have made, both in writing and conversation before school was out, of their Duolingo Streaks. I have overheard them off-handedly compare notes about using the free app to learn Greek, Latin, Russian, and Klingon in their spare time, and I have been a bit envious.

Although I don't really speak (or read or write) any other languages fluently, I took French through college, lived in Italian and Arabic-speaking countries for several years as a teenager, been fortunate enough to travel widely, and have participated in countless Spanish-translated conferences in my years of teaching in this diverse county.

In those situations, as the conversation washes over me, I feel the meaning of these other languages just out of reach, like trying to remember a wonderful dream when I wake up. I want to understand.

And so yesterday, on a whim, I downloaded the app that the kids speak of so casually, so cooly. And friends? My streak is two! I am learning Italian. Or, perhaps I should say, Io imparo Italiano!

Life Lesson: You can teach an old dog new tricks-- with time and motivation.

Alphabetical Order

For the last few years I have assigned abecedarian poems to my students.

Pronounced A-B-C-darian, it is an ancient poetic form guided by alphabetical order. Generally each line or stanza begins with the first letter of the alphabet and is followed by the successive letter, until the final letter is reached. The form was frequently used in many cultures for sacred compositions, such as prayers, hymns, and psalms.

Some 20th century abecedarians are The Gashleycrumb Tinies, by Edward Gorey, and Alligators All Around by Maurice Sendak, both of which are works my brother and sister and I enjoyed when we were teens.

For their assignment, the students are only asked to compose something beautiful: sometimes they make sense; sometimes they are thematic; sometimes they are silly and random. This year, though, like everything the kids have written during our distance learning, the images they chose are revealing.

Here is a mashup of their poems, each line sampled from a different poet:

A is for Amsterdam a city on stilts
B is for Baker's Wife, Be More Chill and Bye Bye Birdie
C is for cool mornings and warm afternoons
D is for Dad that I wish I had
E is for eeeeeeew that’s nasty
F is for fire that lights the night
G is for good boy I am a good boy
H is for hugs lots of people love hugs
I’s for igloo as cold as ice
J’s for jumpy just like mice
K is for kids who play all day
L is for llama, the one that spits
M is for masterminds (I’m talking about you!)
N is for night dark and mysterious
O is for outside where I don’t want to go
P is for pick a card, any card
Q is for quarantine
R is for the common robin, who just had her eggs in my backyard.
S is for school because I am looking forward to going back
T is for toaster strudel
U is for us, we are animals
V is for viral
W is for waltzing silently
X’s for Xmas, that makes me laugh like a silly clown!
Y’s for yorkie, a small, but feisty little dog 🐕
Z is for Zoe who writes poetry

The poems are also a prewriting activity for the May Writing Challenge which is Alphabiography-- stay tuned for more on those soon!

Lighten Up While You Still Can

When I was a teenager, the first part of the weekend was always dedicated to cleaning the house. My mom would pop the Eagles' Greatest Hits into the 8 track player and blast it on continuous loop until our home was clean. Back then, I pulled my pillow over my head and tried to stay asleep as long as I could, but the band didn't make it easy with their breezy sing-along seventies rock, and neither did my mom.

In fact, our conflict over that very chore led to one of my more infamous occasions of disrespect. After studying Hamlet, I pulled my head from under the pillow and snarled, "Do you know what 'termagant' means?"

She did not. "Why don't you tell me?" she replied.

And I was stupid enough to do so.

As I cleaned my own house this morning, though, something there was that made me think a little loud music would lighten the labor. Of course the first sound track I considered was Eagles' Greatest Hits, followed by a couple of my mom's other favorites, John Denver and Fleetwood Mac.

And you now what? The house was scrubbed, dusted, vacuumed, and mopped in quick and easy fashion, before You Can Go Your Own Way was over.

Thanks, Ma.

Family History

Today is my grandfather's birthday. A man who married and had children a little later in life, he was born 124 years ago, in 1896. Granddaddy was 66 when I was born, and despite his energy and independence, he seemed pretty old to us when we were kids. He smoked cigars and a pipe and always wore a tie and a fedora when he left the house; he was a past commander of the local American Legion post, a big booster of youth baseball (there is a league named for him in Maryland), and he thought Archie Bunker was hilarious.

My granddad died the year I was 20, and when I think of him now it seems impossible that I could personally have known and loved someone who was born such a long time ago. He served in WWI, lost a business after the stock market crash of 1929, scrabbled hard to make a living during the depression, and moved the family to Washington, DC at the beginning of WWII, when my grandmother got a job at the Pentagon.

He was in his early twenties during the last pandemic. In fact his mother died of influenza, but not until 1928. She was only 60 then, just a couple of years older than I am now. And the 95 years that separate us in time somehow don't seem quite so unbridgeable as they might have just a few months ago.

Mayday, Mayday

The first of May rescued us from the coldest, wettest April I can ever remember. I'm sure part of the problem was that we were home with nothing to distract us from the weather, but when going outside is one of very few recreation options, you begin to take the rain a little personally. This new month dawned as gray as its predecessor, but by 3 PM blue sky was clearly visible behind and in between clouds more white than gray. And as I write, the sun is shining and a light breeze is riffling through the trees. All that rain really greened up the place, too. Tomorrow is set to be the jewel of the spring so far, temps in the high 70s and sunshine to spare, but the rain is predicted to return on Sunday, and May is actually forecast to be cooler and damper than usual. But that? Is a worry for another day.