By Jeanne Gilliam Fain & Christina Davidson
As the fourth grade students move toward the end of the book, they begin to discover that the definitions of citizen, American, Mexican, immigrant, and illegal have multiple interpretations. The discussions include a look into Mari’s life, her status as an immigrant, and the lack of power that she has over her life. Fourth graders thoughtfully tackle the issue of immigration as they moved to think about the consequences of breaking the law within the United States. They begin to question the depiction of the border and implications of following and breaking the law. Continue reading
Today’s post is a continuation of the presentation with Jerry Pinkney, Jacqueline Woodson, and Vaunda M. Nelson that I attended on March 10, 2013 at the Tucson Festival of Books. The presentation was entitled “The Choice to Make a Difference”. This week, Vaunda M. Nelson describes the writing of her book 
While folktales and fables are traditional literature of a secular nature, myths are sacred narratives. To people within a particular religious group, myths are true accounts of past events. Myths explain how the world came to be and how people’s behavior, societal customs, and institutional norms were formed. The main characters in myths are usually gods or heroes with supernatural powers and the humans with whom they interact. “…Myth might be defined simply as ‘other people’s religion,’ to which an equivalent definition of religion would be ‘misunderstood mythology,’ the misunderstanding consisting in the interpretation of mythic metaphors as references to hard fact” (Campbell 27). 
Fables are another form of traditional literature. They are short stories written in prose or verse. The main characters are most often anthropomorphized animals whose behaviors demonstrate moral lessons. Fable tellers and writers end their stories with a maxim, or a statement that encapsulates the moral. The most famous fables in Western culture are attributed to a Greek named Aesop. 
The week’s selection