Programming Spotlight: Hispanic Heritage Month

Today at Belmont four groups of students engaged in multi-dimensional learning in a program honoring Hispanic Heritage Month.  

Kicking off four weeks of study, we asked students to activate schema around Latin America, and then challenged them to put together a Latin America geography puzzle.  When the puzzle was completed we asked students what they noticed and then instructed them to generate a list of questions they have about Latin America and its people.  --Lori Ikawa and Jessica Fenster-Sparber

Sudden Fiction Latino: Short Short stories from the United States and Latin America

For Passages Academy it seems that Latino History Month and our ELA short story curricular unit are destined to occur at the same time each Fall. Thus, teachers seeking extremely short fiction, totalling about four pages or less, and stories with a connection to Latino/a history, may be interested in this volume.  Although many of the stories will not appeal to reluctant adolescent readers, short pieces by literary greats like Rudolfo Anaya (“The Native Lawyer”) and Gabriel Garica Marquez (“Light is Like Water”), may serve as a worthy introduction to these canonical authors.   “Day Ah Dallas Mare Toes,” by Luna Calderon, and “Counterfeit,” by Edmundo Paz Soldan, on the other hand, have a charm all their own and might just provoke meaningful discussion on themes of truth, deceit, family, and death and the role of names in literary texts and life.  This link from the publisher allows readers to view the entire table of contents, some of which are hyperlinked to permit previews of the text.  --Jessica Fenster-Sparber

Shapard, James Thomas and Ray Gonzalez (Eds.)  Sudden Latino Fiction:  Short-short stories form the United States and Latin America.  New York:  W. W. Norton & Company, 2010.

Stories from Latin America by Genevieve Barlow

This slim bilingual volume of sixteen folktales and legends spans thousands of years and ten countries.  From Columbia’s “Poor Fool!” - the story of haughty Don Ramiro’s amusing comeuppance - to Venezuela’s “The Empty Boat” - the tale of a man’s moral transformation - each story is written simply and elegantly, in language accessible to second language learners and developing readers.  The Spanish and English versions are presented side by side for easy back and forth comprehension checks and back matter includes thorough translated vocabulary lists.  Stories from Latin America also includes a map of Latin America and directions to accessing free MP3 audio recordings of four selected stories in Spanish. --Regan Schwartz

Barlow, Genevieve. Stories from Latin America. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. Print.

Che: A Graphic Biography by Spain Rodriguez

You have seen his face on t-shirts, posters, hats, and billboards. But why is "Che" the cultural icon that he is today? Ernesto "Che" Guevara's life, from his birth to a middle-class Argentinian family to his death in Bolivia, is documented here in graphic format. Most famous for his part in the Cuban revolution, the reader learns about his pre-revolutionary life, his family life, and his revolutionary efforts in the Congo and Bolivia. Direct quotes from Che are used throughout, some including complex political concepts. While the author's stance is decidedly pro-Che, an epilogue discusses the controversy surrounding the construction of Che's image as either hero or villain using sophisticated language. This volume might best be used during Hispanic Heritage Month, for a Global Studies unit on revolutions, or by a student interested in learning more about the life of Che.

Rodriguez, Spain. Che: A Graphic Biography. New York: Verso, 2008.