Duende dust in a classroom

by Rudy Ch. Garcia

The end of my first year in a new school district and new school as a first-grade dual-language teacher approaches; it's been tumultuous. My evaluation even reads, "Began the year with ineffective teaching." Ineffective, hell--it was total chaos. Several academic and logistical factors made it even more so, but one that carried throughout the year was the insufficient time to set the kids up with norms and routines. When primary teachers attempt to do in ten days what actually takes thirty, everyone pays for the deficit, all . . . year . . . long.

The beginning and end result was that I had four boys who tended to bully, three with possible physical abuse issues--a combination that produces havoc in a classroom.

But teachers work with what they have. They try different strategies, behavior reward systems, consult with others. In the end no one else has to face the daily task of imparting knowledge to the kids except you, no matter how difficult the conditions.

Over the years I'd often heard from other teachers about "that one class from hell" or other descriptions to the same effect. I guessed that this past year was finally my turn, although I know it was not this particular group of kids who created a most memorable gauntlet; conditions set up from the beginning cast their unfortunate lot together.

What I'd implemented to improve behavior, particularly for my four bully-candidates, had worked just partially or temporarily. Conferencing with their parents had its downsides as well. Somehow, such parents can see in my eyes that I know there is or was possible physical abuse going on at home. It originates in my own history in an abusive home. Such parents don't take kindly to me.

So, this week--and only six more till the end of the year--started out similar to the rest of the year: I tried to teach and keep my boys from getting into too much trouble, and they tried to learn while still getting themselves in trouble, especially outside of my classroom.

Yesterday, Friday afternoon. The end of two weeks of testing that taxes and even depresses some kids. They're already anticipating the weekend, and outside it's springtime. Despite all this, I'm getting read to run my bilingual students through their English chant and mime of "Peas Porridge Hot." It's in the curriculum, not my choice.

I divide the kids into teams of girls and boys, with the challenge of which team can run the poem and win all the points. If one student fails to chant or mime a part of the poem, that means a point for the other team. The girls go first and inevitably, two who are BFFs get into a staring match that leads to accusations crossing between them like darts laced with hemlock. In the end the girls' team loses twelve points. They're muttering, cursing, blaming each other or just feeling beat. Some don't want to continue playing and would rather be outside pulling dandelions and blowing the seeds.

The boys go next. That's probably when the air in my room parted and a shower of duende dust drenched them all, because otherwise I can't explain what next transpired.

My main bullyboy, call him Alfredo, pulled away from the line of boys and placed himself in front to address them. He explained how all of them had to speak each part of the poem. Then he demonstrated each of the hands motions I'd taught them, nothing very elaborate. Throughout this, he had their attention, probably because he also happens to be one of the brightest kids and will either become captain of his high school football team and chess club, or leader of a local tagging and window-breaking gang one day.

Even more surprising to me was that when he was done, he returned to the line like he was just another member of his team. When they recounted the poem, they made zero mistakes. It was like watching a drill team or some Chinese acrobatic performance or a bunch of magos under the influence of duende dust.

I don't know whether what happened next was due to that magic dust or came from the girls having watched how Alfredo had performed. But I asked them if they wanted to have another go at it, which they agreed to.

That's when Nancy, we'll call her, stepped to the front of her team and addressed them like she'd been born to lead. Nancy, one of the poorest children who often misses breakfast, enters the room tardy with her hair disheveled and her eyes only half open. Another of my brightest students and best artist; never one to bully, but hardly a proven leader.
 

Nancy had her hands full. The two BFFs who also happen to be among the most vocal, intelligent, adept English speakers and minor bullies themselves had previously outshone Nancy in class activities and assessments. The BFFs were still at each other's throats. The girl's team would never beat the boys with the dissension in their ranks.

Nancy was undeterred. She explained to the BFFs that one should stand in line where she wouldn't see the other's staring, and that the other one should avert her eyes and only look forward. Amazingly, the BFFs complied. Nancy then took her place in the ranks. When they ran the poem, the time they lost just one point. Using my teacher's discretion, on a technicality the boys lost one point and the competition ended in a tie.

I swear, throughout this magic realism scenario, I did no more than keep score and tell the teams when to begin. Yes, we'd previously worked on leaders, leadership and member responsibility to one's group. But their thinking and actions during this poem chant was undirected, at least by me.

I was slightly overcome by what I'd witnessed. Chingaus, I was giddy. I knew it didn't mean the overnight end to Alfredo's bullying, nor that Nancy now had a straight smooth path to career success, but it affected me enough to write this.

I presented Alfredo and Nancy with a book where I wrote a dedication: "To you, for being a good example of a leader." I sent them to the office to read and explain to the principal and vice-principal why they'd won the books. Alfred had been there before, but only to answer for major transgressions. I didn't hear those discussions because I left, confident that the administrators and kids could find their way without me. It seemed appropriate given that I hadn't been needed in all that had already transpired.

I heard Alfredo explain the same thing to his mother at the end of the day, and I shook her hand to congratulate her, especially since she'd so often heard about Alfredo's sometimes daily struggles with his behavior.

In June I'll leave this temporary job and move on to another school or district or an unemployment line. But I'll leave knowing that Alfredo and Nancy, if memory serves them, might carry a lesson for life, one that they taught to and for themselves. And the rest of the kids, including the BFFs, who watched, followed and participated in this small moment, might also carry a bit of what they saw to improve their skills at cooperative participation to broaden their minds.

If I can find the opening that that duende dust emerged from, I'm going to block it from closing and find a way to pry it open even wider. Then I'm going to take a shower in it and maybe finally let out my suppressed joy over watching, not a teachable moment engineered by me, but a learnable moment created by a roomful of bilingual first graders. And leaders.

Es todo, y suficiente, hoy,
RudyG

Don't thank your kid's maestro

by Rudy Garcia

If I believed the establishment press, the politicians and the education conglomerate, I am one of the unclean, even though I bathe daily. I am one of the guilty, even though I pay my taxes and don't run stop signs. I am one of the problems, even though I go to work every day, work until I'm too tired to do more, and put in unpaid extra hours on weekends.

I rank only as medium among my colleagues, some of whom will go to early graves because of their commitment to teaching America's children. But the dialogue on the problems in education centers greatly on how teachers are the problem, especially in educating the children of the poor and working class.

Of course I don't fall for the teacher-problem propoganda. I ignore it to keep myself centered on the children's needs. And I don't hear much from colleagues about what the propoganda does to them. It's sort of an unspoken rule that we teachers avoid discussing what the political climate in this country is doing to our hearts, our sense of self-worth, our estimation of whether our country wants or needs us. To touch and share that subject might open our hearts too much. And--though not in my case--the underlying hurt is best kept hidden so we can all keep on.

Budget cuts, teacher layoffs, slashing of teacher benefits, school closings, privatized charter school take-overs of our neighborhoods, and increased class sizes are constantly in the news because, we are told, after bailing out the banks, mortgage companies and brokerages, there is no money to bail out children, especially the less prosperous.

Of course there is money in the vaults of the richest country in the world. It's just being used elsewhere. It's always been there--for the bailout of the 1%, for the senseless wars and for segregating the minorities into prisons and barrios, at least until the gentry desire the barrios.

The reality that the U.S. is one of the few countries in the world that finances public education by neighborhood instead of nationally, keeps our unfair system in place. It has been that way for too long for many Americans to demand another way. Until that is changed, all the debates about budget cuts and how to close the achievement gaps are relatively useless. And our teachers will just have to keep their hearts closed and struggle on.

Below are excerpts from a study of how local funding of public schools is increasing the education gap between the 1% and the rest of us, particularly the minority poor who I work with. You can go here to see the full article. And if you can read and understand it, there's no need to thank a teacher. We don't do what we do for the recognition, nor for our average salaries. What you can do is thank your lucky stars you at least were born before average, locally funded American schools were replaced by below average locally funded schools.

"A study has dug deeper into the value-added system [of education]. Professors Xiaoxia Newton of UC Berkeley and Linda Darling-Hammond, Edward Haertel and Ewart Thomas of Stanford have analyzed how ethnicity, English language ability, poverty and parental educational levels impact students’ classroom performance."

“The achievement gap between children from high- and low-income families is roughly 30-40 percent larger among children born in 2001 than among those born 25 years earlier,” Reardon wrote. At the same time, he said, “the gap between the rich and the poor has widened significantly, particularly among families with children.”

"The New York Times story cited a study by professor Meredith Phillips of UCLA showing that by the time affluent children start school, they have spent about 400 hours more than poor children in literary activities. All told, affluent children before the age of 6 have spent 1,300 more hours than poor children in places away from home, day care center or school. These places include shopping malls and museums."

"The unfairness of our economic system is a central point of the Occupy Wall Street movement."

For a deeper discusson of questions raised in that article, you can also:

Go here for Lessons from the New Corporate Schooling

Here for Testing, Privatization, and the Future of Public Schooling

Here for Militarism and Education Normal

And here for The Culture of Poverty Reloaded

Es todo, hoy
RudyG

Three who left the school building

Teaching in U.S. public schools isn't a job or just a career; it's a lifestyle. Those unfamiliar with the work envy teachers their summers off and Xmas holidays. But what comes with the job are 10-12 hrs./day and weekends and holidays spent preparing lesson plans, grading papers and filling out forms. Plus, summer hours preparing for the coming year. For a starting teacher in Denver this works out to be $15/hr. With a master's it goes up to $16.50. Excluded from this is what can easily be $3k out-of-pocket that doesn't get reimbursed. We're not in it for the money; we even pay to be a teacher.

In this Great Recession, having any job is good. I know because I'm presently out of work and seeking a new position with such ridiculously low pay. Like Joe Navarro below, teaching is my passion and calling.

Navarro's letter is a great overall treatment of what's wrong with how the country educates our children. Given the direction of the education discourse nationwide, what he writes about California is significant in that it will likely spread to encompass the remainder of the country. That's his letter's importance.

I won't summarize here my last three years working in one Denver inner city school; maybe I'll write a novel about it one day. I'll just tell you about one student who wasn't one of my bilingual students.

Let's call him Pacifico, because his name is antithetical to his school life and role in it. Pacifico's small for his age, white as a snowflake, unassuming, and worse, sports the thick coke-bottle glasses that should have been outlawed decades ago. I never witnessed any of Pacifico's disruptive behavior, but staff would tell me about various incidents. I've no reason to doubt so many testaments.

I'd often see Pacifico sitting waiting in the office for the principal--in trouble again for hitting, cussing, throwing something, somewhere. I'd talked to him a couple of times in passing, but when I saw him repeatedly eating alone in the cafeteria one week, I went over to him. I assumed he'd been separated from others because of his lunchroom behavior.

"Why are you sitting alone? You being punished?"
"No, I don't like being with the other kids; they pick on me."
"You don't want to sit with your friends?"
"I don't have any."

After that I'd occasionally talk with him, advising him that he at least needed to learn how to stay out of trouble. Sometimes I'd just wish him a good morning--this to a six/seven-year-old who seldom seemed to have few good mornings in his school life. He always acknowledged me, sometimes even breaking out with a crack of a smile, but not often.

My final week of school, having joined the ranks of the not-coming-back-next-year, I tended to avoid staff gatherings and talking with anyone, but on the final day I had to go through the office to hang up my room keys for the last time.

Pacifico was there, possibly not in trouble. He came up close, looked me in the face. "I'm going to miss you." He hugged me like we'd always been the best of buddies, now parting, the message being that he too was leaving.

I don't know that Pacifico hugged everyone that day. Or only me. It doesn't matter. Nor do I know where he's going. Like Navarro below, I don't even know where I'm going.

I do know that should Pacifico grow up to be a sociopathic Columbiner and enter my school, his aim will at least hesitate when it turns on me. On the other hand, he may carry the memory of our moments as something positive that eventually contributes to his not entering a school in such a fashion.

Joe Navarro will tell you now about his torment of retiring as a teacher. I won't, and not because I'm nowhere near retirement. It will be because $15-16 an hour is worth it when it comes with the benefits of Pacifico moments. I just gotta figure out a way to still educate our children, what Navarro managed to do for so many years.

Excerpts of Joe Navarro's letter:

Dear Friends, I have come to an important decision. I have accepted early retirement from my school district. My conscience is at a crossroad. Teaching has been my passion and calling. I can no longer deliver the methods of instruction as prescribed by my school district, the state of California and federal mandates.

When I began teaching there were still ideals that included teaching to the whole child, bilingual/bicultural education, content mastery, equality, quality education, developing children into problem solvers and critical thinkers. Since then, the language has been hijacked by politically conservative think tanks and politicians. The quest for quality teaching has been replaced by the quest for best test scores. Scripted lesson plans, rote memorization, English-only education, drill and skill instruction and overzealous test preparation now dominate teaching.

"Education reform" has tapped into the righteous sentiments of people of color who want education to be equal for all nationalities. Phrases like tougher, more rigorous, higher, run schools using the business model, etc. have fooled people into believing that the only problem with education has been that we have gotten too soft on kids to compete internationally.

High performing schools in affluent communities teach critical thinking skills and problem solving, while people of color and poor people receive higher doses of rote memorization and drill and skill instruction.

Current U.S. standards are high. The problem is that there is a double standard of how education is delivered to schools. No one wants to deal with issues like underfunded poor people and people of color; racist policies like zero tolerance; eliminating bilingual/bicultural education or whitening the curriculum.

Paolo Freire argued for a critical pedagogy education system that teaches children how to read, write and do math, but also teaches them to be analytical, critical thinkers and grow up to improve society.
I have defied policies by teaching critical thinking skills, art and culture. My hands are tied in the classroom.

I do not know what is next. It is a bittersweet reality for me. I am also uneasy now that I do not have a job. What's next? I don't know.
--Joe Navarro

To read Navarro's entire letter or if you want to leave him a comment, I encourage you to go the El Tecolote website here to do so.

Es todo, hoy
RudyG

Two early heartfelts

[Jpegs taken from CHAC Valentine's Day showings, 2010 or prior years.]

This first piece doesn't begin in a "heartfelt" fashion, but bear with.

There's an adage about Life being the cruelest teacher: first it gives the test, then it gives the lesson.

Actually, there's something just as cruel that's omnisciently administered in U.S. public schools, that's called the pre-test. Those of you sans children or who've never personally benefited from this experience and don't know how lowly it can make children feel, well, don't despair; at some point in your remaining life you or yours may yet undergo the uplifting rigor of a pre-test.

Why test children--even five-year-old kindergartners--on something they know little to nothing about? For the sake of the BASELINE, a word teachers and students come to know as well as their daily schedule.

A schoolchild's progress (or lack of) and effectiveness of the teacher's skills (ditto), you see, justify the expenditure of millions of dollars and sustain thousands of jobs for "academic" number-crunchers and bean-counters whose existence depends on providing DATA to politicians, education corporations and administrators with the justification for cutting teachers, jobs and closing public schools so charter schools can be opened.

Even Colorado's entry into Obama's Race to the Top includes monies to be used for software, hardware and more numbers-people to cure our academic incompetence in international teaching standards. The thinking is that, if we're behind countries like Singapore, China and Denmark, it must be the teachers' fault.

Those millions of dollars and thousands of jobs might instead have been channeled into classrooms to teach children. Maybe with more teacher assistant paraprofessionals--try raising the educational level of 32 third graders by yourself all day long. Or more education specialists instructing in the classroom--try finding time to give differentiated one-on-one to a special ed kid in that same third grade room. Or more office staff to support teachers with children's behavioral problems and counseling--yeah, try teaching while one kid is hitting others and then being informed, "He's your fault and problem."

But our society doesn't believe in spending money in something so obviously beneficial because its targeted scapegoats are the teachers. The final solution is DATA and the obligatory pre-test.

In my case, for the sake of whatever self-esteem my first graders might salvage from such gauntlets, I regularly tell them that an answer of "Right now, I don't know." is acceptable. Thus I get many pre-tests with such responses. After all, how much would a six-year-old know about an index?

So, this week this teacher gave one of those pre-tests. Among other questions, was the following:
"Explica qué es un diagrama." ("What is a diagram?")

A few students had some idea. Most had none and responded as expected.

But one of the flaquitas, F__, usually does well or better in all subjects, She's a beanpole of unassuming ability, soft-voiced and reserved delight, who even after five months seems to enjoy deliberately driving me pre-testy by holding her pencil like she's attacking a steak, which in real life she probably doesn't do very often.

She also has within her a determination that won't allow her to easily admit failure. So, she tried. And she thought. And she dared to write this:

"Diagrama es el día de las fiestas de las abuelitas." (It's grandmothers' day.)

[Monolingual spoiler: F__ had deconstructed diagrama into "dia", which with an accent is the word for "day" (diá), and "grama" into a pochismo denoting grandmother.]

Amongst the teachers that day, it earned instant, funniest phrase of the week, because it demonstrated her imagination, her attempt to find sense in a nonsensical exercise--no matter her misinterpretation--and belied the intentions of pre-testers.

She brought more than laughter to our end of the building. She rejuvenated my tested-to-death teaching soul with her inventiveness and resourcefulness. Whichever cruel teachers, Life or otherwise, come her way, hopefully she'll continue putting her mind to them and send the inane scurrying.

And that's why I believe the episode with F__ fittingly, heartfelt.

_____________

Denver's CHAC Gallery
Milagros del Corazon
Miracles of the Heart is Underway!

February 12th, Friday night 6 to 9pm at Space Gallery across the street from CHAC is the site of this year's incredible Milagros del Corazon Auction. Join us for our Silent Auction that will feature hundreds of beautiful hearts designed by local Denver Artists, schools and our community supporters. Choose from numerous donated art pieces and services. Proceeds from this event will benefit our year round cultural arts programming!

Live classical Spanish guitar music by James Garcia.

Tickets: $7 per person or $12/couple and may be purchased in advance at CHAC. 303-571-0440 or click here for more info. (Artists go to "Artists News" for latest details on participating in the show.)

About CHAC
The Chicano Humanities & Arts Council (CHAC) was founded in 1978 by a group of visual and performing artists. The organization was established as a place where Chicano/Latino artists were provided with a venue to explore visual and performance art and promote and preserve the Chicano/Latino culture through the expression of the arts.
The gallery offers two shows each month by local visual art exhibits and performances by area musicians, actors, dancers, writers and poets. Other popular annual events include the Members Season Opener in January, Santos & Crosses in August, El Dia De Los Muertos in November and our Luminarias de la Guadalupe & Christmas Mercado in December.

Es todo, hoy,
RudyG

A week as a U.S. teacher

(10-word ultra-flash fiction)

M

Teaching bubbly children to read, watching bureaucracies crush their avidness.

Three hours on my ass; consultants lecture, leech away life.


T

Kids create their own behavior guide; their fairness merits immortality!

One-hour writing, one of math: conformity stinking, formulaic repression.


W

NO child left behind(!) where exclusion would let her blossom.

Creating scary stories after school with seven giggling Bram Stokers.


Th

Our contract again renegotiated, our professional self-esteem slavishly recheapened.

Assessment day: standardized scoring and tracking of beautifully unique children.


F

Berated for arriving late, humiliated, like teachers deliberately invented entropy.

FAC arrives, flooding our empty arteries with inebriating, deceptive palliatives!


S

Twelve hours, six days, teachers' sangre, lágrimas stained many blackboards.

Grade homework, prepare lessons, parent letters, Monday-lecture vaccine, etc.


RudyChG

The heat is on who?

"How many of you ever had your lights, heat or water turned off in your house?" Almost every hand goes up.

I'm starting a lesson with my second graders to combine the economic recession, their upcoming Christmas that may not be as bountiful as last year's, and addition problems using what their list to Santa might cost their parents.

I got the idea for the lesson from one of the boys walking up to me last month and saying, "We don't have any water." At first I thought he meant we were out of the bottled water in our room. (Bottled water delivered to a high-poverty school classroom?--that's a story for another day.) But then I realized he meant his water at home.

I wasn't surprised at the raised hands; it's almost as many as got raised when I ask who had parents or relatives lose their jobs this year. Such is common knowledge among teachers who work in poverty/working class neighborhoods.

Anyway, out of the lesson we learned that most kids' lists came to a few hundred dollars. By the time we were done, I'd led them a little way down the path of harsh reality, maybe preparing them some for a leaner set of gifts under their tree. I'm their teacher, it's some of what I need to do so they know, rather than worry.

When I was growing up in San Antonio, I remember we occasionally got our lights, heat turned off for FTP. It's a cyclical poverty thing where poor people get physically and financially punished for not having the finances to keep up with the crucial bills. Sometimes it meant warmth became more crucial than nutrition, so we starved so we wouldn't freeze.

As I started this piece, my knees still had not regained most sensation, and my breathing was still short and shallow. It was 50 degrees in here and kept plunging trying to match the 20-degree temperature outside, which will be the high for today.

Because I mostly pay my bills on time, I ignored the notice stuck in my door when I got home last night, the one that said the gas had been turned off. Ignored it because it was about a house on the next block, not mine. I knew nobody could possibly confuse my block with the next one over.

Later when I noticed the house getting chilly, I assumed the worst--that my furnace was out. Naturally I couldn't get a hold of my favorite repairman: I was told he was out drinking in some bar that no doubt had nice-warm heating.

When I tried to use the oven at 3:30 this morning to get some of the same, and I found the dog had moved from his usual pillow to a nice-warmer one on our couch, the stove wouldn't work, and that's when I remembered the note stuck in the door, the same note I'd so nonchalantly scoffed at.

I immediately called Xcel Energy, not realizing it would take 3 calls, all the way until 10:30--not 8:00am like they promised--and my threat of filing a complaint with the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) before nice-warm heat started coming out of my heat registers again.

"On Saturdays, the only trucks that are out are answering reports of gas leaks, and your problem will be taken care of after that. No, I can't guarantee your service will be on before the afternoon." That's the gist of what the Xcel 800-number people told me. Turned out not to be true. The threat of a PUC complaint put me at the front of the line, the guy showing up not 20 min. later.

I realize that in the middle of this recession-not-yet-a-depression my situation pales against what some families are enduring. I'm at least not some homebound old lady who doesn't know about the PUC. I at least don't have a newborn infant that would have been endangered. I at least have the money to keep my heat turned on or the credit to get it turned back on, if need be.

Nevertheless, I thought it ironic how my temporary predicament coincided with the math lesson. For a few hours I got to be a little like one of my seven-year-old students, I got to remember what it's like not knowing when I'd be nice-warm again.

The furnace has now been blasting for almost an hour trying to get the house back to such a temperature. My knees are still shocked but my breathing's improved. The dog's decided even though the heat's returned, the sofa's a preferable nice-warm place to lay his smelly self on. If the dog smell doesn't come out of the couch, I'm sending the bill for a new one to Xcel Energy, possibly along with an aromatic piece of the evidence.

As you rush out to maybe blow money on stuff no one really needs, keep in mind you should set aside money to pay today's heating bill. And if there's a note stuck in your door when you get back, do read the whole thing and assume the worst.

I won't end this with some doleful attempt at "please remember the cold, shivering children." For one thing, you might have been one of those once, will probably never forget it, and don't need me to remind you. For another thing, it might make you want to give money to the "energy assistance program" in your area, the one to help people struggling to keep the lights and heat on. Literally, that wouldn't help any of my kids who next January inform me their heat's been turned off. What we need is turn off the system that physically tortures kids born to poor or unemployed parents.

But I will end this on something more in keeping with the season. Relish the warmth around you--the wool blanket you so wisely bought, the spouse, family who occasionally show up, the two cats (one for each foot), that money in the savings account you left untouched, and that furnace you can afford to have checked every so often. Then like Ramos said yesterday, "Let the tunes fill the room as you wrap that last minute gift, trim the tree, suck down the eggnog,… a warm tamal, a cold beverage."

[NB: I did file a complaint with the PUC. Suggested new regulations penalizing erroneous disconnections and providing aggrieved customers like myself some sort of justice. Maybe the heat's on them now.]

RudyG

A late sharing of a Valentine

"Use the content-rubric to rate the students' writing from 0 to 2: zero if their response lacks an introductory thematic sentence and closing statement, 1 if they show evidence of either."

As I tried following these instructions during an after-school staff meeting, I found it impossible to determine whether my first grader A___'s writing in Spanish lacked theme and closure, or contained both, for that matter. But my confusion wasn't due to what she'd done or her lack of trying.

In her five months of struggling in room 103, A__ had regularly filled a half-sheet of paper with letters she carefully scribed while sounding out each syllable. And although her lettering was wonderful, in fact her compositions were unreadable, oftentimes even to their author. That hadn't stopped her.

Problem was, A__'s written words lacked most of the vowels, some consonants, and each of her lines normally contained only one space separating two long clusters of indecipherable prose. At the same time, such work showed improvement since she'd entered first grade almost unable to read.

"Zero if the response lacks an introductory--" I repeated to myself. How could I know if it did? She might have a strong thematic sentence and an even better closure, but I was expected to give her a zero simply because I couldn't decipher her heroic compositions. I was tempted to leave an N/A, which translated as "not observed," but then I would have had to explain my veering from the grading system.

During those five months A__ had managed to reach a 6 reading level, which put her on the path of failing to reach grade level by the end of the school year. I had worried about her in other ways, wondering if her belabored development was a sign of ADHD, dyslexia, or an even more serious learning disorder.

Teachers worry about such things, sometimes more than they should. For various reasons, every year we have kids who can't, won't or don't make it. We don't reach them. It's not just in writing; it's in every subject and can even encompass their growth as little human beings.

Anyway, A__'s prospect of going on to second grade with skills, abilities, and knowledge she'd need to survive, much less prosper, didn't seem likely. I would need to "staff" her, which would mean a meeting with a team of professionals to determine how best to meet her needs, since her teacher hadn't been able to do it.

I didn't mind the implicit idea of failure in this, since I know I'm no master teacher. It was the implicit branding of A__ that I dreaded. She and her parents would suffer the too common stress and even humiliation of a student diagnosed as failing.

Given her and my situation, I'd begun having her sit regularly with others at my table, instead of writing independently.

One morning she asked, "Cómo se escribe Hawaii?" I wrote it on a note for her, even though spelling U.S. states wasn't how I had intended to help her. When she showed me her completed sheet, I was surprised she hadn't done the usual half-page. There were only five lines. Less than thirty words. But each one was spaced. Almost no letters were missing. And I could read them. A__ had made a qualitative leap! We celebrated her achievement that day with song, dance and chants.

But A__ wasn't done.

A couple of days later she wrote seven lines. While the spelling and spacing was about the same, she had added something new. Sentences. With capitals and periods. Even the lone sentence that wasn't grammatically perfect was close to.

A__ who was at level 6 in reading had made a syntactic leap that those at level 16 had only begun to tackle, in some cases not as successfully. We celebrated again, only harder. A__ had become not just the class model for persistence, but also our model for something higher--writing excellence.

The composing of a few five-word sentences may not sound like major achievement, but in this case it was sufficient to affect a heart that often gets hardened by the job of teaching in U.S. classrooms. I felt good.

But she wasn't done.

For our Valentine's party, we worked like Santa and his elves do on the 24th, in our case, getting the kids' cards for their parents ready. I'd sent blank cards home for parents to make one for their kid, and my plan was to have each parent and child share theirs in front of the class.

As they took turns reading aloud, I realized I didn't know what the kids had written, even though I'd helped them with revisions. I'd been too much editor and not enough listener. Some of the more advanced ones had created some great, even beautifully poetic pieces, which I wish I could share, but can't since you're not a part of room 103.

When A__ finished reading to her father, I realized again that I hadn't heard what she'd read. All I'd heard was her loud, proud voice smoothly and unhesitatingly enunciate every word, from beginning to end. To me, the content, though intelligible, wasn't the most important thing.

When I looked at the faces of the parents who didn't know of A__'s past, I so much wanted them to know what she had struggled through, what her achievement amounted to.

I began explaining the significance of the words that she had very fluidly read to them, how wonderful it was that she could even read her own words, and how proud they should feel for her. I was only able to mutter out half of this as I made my way to where we'd posted a display of A__'s recent gains. I did manage to point to it. That's the most I'm capable of while crying.

One by one the parents approached to examine her work, nodding and talking amongst themselves. I couldn't make out what they said because I was all choked up with my own heartfelt pride in her.

Unintentionally, A__ had accomplished one more thing. I'd challenged the class to write something so excellent it would make their parents cry, promising a prize to whoever succeeded. But all the parents had succeeded in holding their emotions back. Only the teacher had succumbed. By default, A__ had won the prize.

I lay claim to A__'s reading as my best Valentine, which makes it worth a lot higher than a 2 on a content rubric. Teacher's prerogative. That's all I wanted to share.

But then again, A__ may not be done yet.

© Rudy Ch. Garcia 2008

Poetic Medicine

Beyond poetry’s elegant use of language, it has the power to heal. Deeply.

John Fox explores this capacity in Poetic Medicine. Through the use of poetry, writers/readers can gain access to the restorative power of creativity. This a different tack than the general premise of art therapy, in which psychology is used to interpret and shape work. Fox believes in the inherent power contained in the actual process of writing, in naming and describing one's own reality.

In the chapter When God Sighs, healing from loss, illness and death are explored, with the idea that writing can be a vehicle to confront and transform our feelings about these difficult subjects. Through this process of naming and claiming, I've written about childhood abuse, and through poetry and scripting performance, tried create something hopefully, universal in its scope.

In Poems of Witness in a Conflicted World, Fox uses the chapter to call on writers/readers to look at social issues, take a stand and publicly comment on them. The idea of bearing witness is taken to a new level, as Fox insists that the writer can be a be a challenge to the status quo, and should take on that role as challenger as an explicit responsibility. Again, in asking an audience to take a hard look at the culture-wide ambivalence toward violence, I try to echo Fox's sentiments in personally bearing witness and asking others to share in that. The cultural issue of violence and our ambivalent, voyeuristic relationship to it continues to be a theme for me, and I hope to create dialogs with the audience on these issues.

Throughout the book, Fox uses works by famous and unknown writers to illustrate how poetry sheds light on dark places and shapes hearts and minds. While the book also contains writing exercises, its strength is its call to writers and readers to root themselves in the beauty, the struggles, and the daily life that surrounds them. I found the general perspective, his direct writing style, and excerpts of a vast range of poetry an incredible resource. It reinforced why I write, the reason I choose the subject matter I choose, and my understanding of who is my audience.

Poetic Medicine Bag: (From the Poetic Medicine website)
Exercise 3: Prayer Poems

Prayer is a way to communicate with the Divine.

Prayer is a way to love the spirit of whatever is dear to you. Prayer is a way to let your heart cry out. Prayer is a way to come exactly as you are to the Unknown, the mystery of it all. Bring to your prayer what is raw, what is sublime. Prayer is a way to welcome a wider vision of life for you. Are you aware of the silence that your prayer words join with? Prayer is words strung like beads on the thread of your silence.

What fertile silence do you long to enter? How does this kind of silence effect your world?

How does divine guidance respond to your plea for help? What oppressive silence do you want to break? And by saying what? Who reaches your heart in those times when no one else can?

What are you in awe of? What do you want to praise? What awakens your heart to great joy?

Try writing a prayer of your own. Here is an example:

The Dreamer

Pour my eternity
into the chalice of today
Let me drink, drink, drink
my journeys down
and travel the night on three white horses
I with a rose
dangling from my mouth
a star in each eye
a sun in my heart
and the moon to give my crossroads light.

--Sherry Reiter from Finding What You Didn't Lose: Expressing Your Truth and Creativity Through Poem-Making

Lisa Alvarado

Poetry For The People, National Latino Writer's Conference, Palabra Pura

Poetry for the People: A Revolutionary Blueprint
Lauren Muller (ed.)

Poetry Month has got me by the inspiration. Last week I wrote about Poetry Everywhere, and this week I want to profile a book that excites, that teaches, that challenges, Poetry for the People: A Revolutionary Blueprint.

Revolutionary. It's not a word you hear much in conjunction with writing, but I still believe words have the power to change hearts and minds, to change history. Whitman, Sandburg, Neruda, Rich, Piercy, Giovanni, and Jordan herself have all lived it, breathed it, put the word to paper, and the word became wildfire. We have only to look at recent history to know the White House would rather not have poetry in it. That kind of incendiary truth is more than an inconvenient one.

But beyond the title, why is this book revolutionary? It came out of a series workshops for artistic and political empowerment aimed at students and Oakland area residents, led by June Jordan, under the auspices of the University of California at Berkeley. One need only to read her preface to the syllabus to see that there is a fundamental difference in this work than what is commonly offered in mainstream education. An excerpt here, provides a perfect illustration.

• We reach toward the development of literacy in today's world literature of poetry.

• We divide the course of study evenly, between the scrutiny of published poems and the development of new American poetry to be written by the students themselves.

• We present this new American poetry in public readings open to the entire San Francisco Bay Area. These readings are invariable factors of our coursework.

• We publish student poetry in suitably splendid form, and distribute these anthologies at the student readings and through the kind offices of Berkeley bookstores, such as Black Oak Books and Cody's. This is an integral part of our coursework.

• In conjunction with our course work, we invite one or more visiting poets to present their work....Obviously, our guiding criteria, in addition to the excellence of poetry, is the relentless pursuit of ethnic, racial, gender, and linguistic diversity. (Such poets included: Jimmy Santiago Baca, Marilyn Chin, Thulani Davis, Cornelius Eady, Joy Harjo, Li-Young Li, Donna Masini, Adrienne Rich, Nzotake Shange, among others.)

• All students regardless of academic status (Freshmen to Graduate) are eligible for for enrollment.

On a more basic, and even more fundamentally profound basis, is the the title of the workshop, Poetry for the People, and Jordan's definition of who is constituency.

• "The People" shall not be defined as a group excluding or derogating anyone on the basis of race, ethnicity, language, sexual preference, class or age.

• "The People" shall consciously undertake to respect and to encourage each other to feel safe enough to attempt the building of a community of trust in which all may be truthful and deeply serious and the messages they craft, and the world they contemplate.

• Poetry for the People rests upon a belief that the art of telling the truth is a necessary and healthy way to create powerful, and positive connections among people who, would otherwise, remain (Unknown and unaware) strangers. The goal is not to kill connections but, rather, to create and to deepen them among truly different men and women.

Once participants were recruited, they met once a week for three hours. Each session starts with an open mic period, during which people try out new work. Then June, a guest speaker, or several student poets lectured a particular poetic genre, history, or tradition. Corresponding to assigned readings, the lectures provided a foundation for in-depth study of different traditions of American poetry---African American, Asian American, Chicano/a, Irish, Native American, women's poetry, and "White" poetry--poetry written by white men established inside 'the canon."

This is precisely the direction I needed I for workshops with variety of youth groups here in Chicago. The groups consist of new poets, whose goal was to craft original material to be performed in the schools and in the community-at-large. I offered a selection of texts, using Jordan's model as a guide. The cross-pollination, the dialogue, the debate that arose with these young writers would have done Ms. Jordan proud. This book is more than a guide, it's a touchstone.

Finally, here's my Cliff Notes recommendation for this book. The world needs more chispa words, needs more hearts and minds on fire. Poetry for the People: A Revolutionary Blueprint is eloquent fuel for that. June Jordan's legacy continues to push me, to make me question why I do what I do as a writer and a teacher, and more deeply, as a human being.

ISBN-10: 0415911680
ISBN-13: 978-0415911689

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Other Important News: Do not miss this year's National Latino Writer's Conference, held at the National Hispanic Cultural Center in Albuquerque, NM. http://nhccnm.org/

This three-day conference that takes place May 17-19, 2007, invites all writers published and unpublished, to participate in workshops conducted by nationally and internationally known authors in the genres of poetry, fiction, screenwriting, playwriting and news writing. Panels of editors and publishers representing such presses as Arte Público Press, Warner Books, Curbstone Press, Simon and Schuster, University of New Mexico, Arizona and California Presses and many others will speak on the process of getting your work published. Agents will be available for consultation and interview.

In addition to the aforementioned workshops and panels, there will be an open microphone reading at which time registrants can read from their work to an audience of authors and publishers. A Thursday evening social and Friday night banquet will captivate participants into further discussion and networking. Presenters Include:

OSCAR HIJUELOS [Fiction] was the first Hispano to win the Pulitzer Prize for his second novel, Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love which was made into a movie starring Antonio Banderas and Armand Assante. His novel, Empress of the Splendid Season was published in 1999 and his latest, A Simple Habana Melody was published in 2002.
www.answers.com/topic/oscar-hijuelos

LORI CARLSON [Youth Literature] is an editor, translator and author of Caña Quemada Burnt Sugar: Contemporary Cuban Poetry, Translations and Originals. Among her other publications are Red Hot Salsa: Bilingual Poems on the Young Latino in the U.S. and The Sunday Tertulia, both published by HarperCollins.www.cbcbooks.org/cbcmagazine/
meet/carlson_lorimarie.html

BRAULIO MUÑOZ [Fiction] is the author of an award winning novel, The Peruvian Notebooks. He is on the faculty of Swarthmore College and has also published A Storyteller: Mario Vargas Llosa Between Civilization and Barbarism, published by Rowman & Littlefield in 2000. In addition to literary criticism he also has published another work of fiction, Alejandro y los Pescadores de Tancay which was published in Italy in 2004.
www.uapress.arizona.edu/BOOKS/bid1708.htm

KATHLEEN de AZEVEDO [Fiction] is the author of an award winning novel, Samba Dreams. She is on the faculty of Skyline College and her work has appeared in numerous publications including: Los Angeles Times, Americas, Boston Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Greensboro Review and many others. Her novel Samba Dreams, "reflects the conflict between the Brazilian and the American culture: the sensual and the pragmatic; the myth of self-determination and the myth of El Dorado."
http://labloga.blogspot.com/2006/02/spotlight-on-
kathleen-de-azevedo.html

PAT MORA [Youth Literature] is a nationally prominent poet/writer. Among her many writing awards, she was the winner of the 2006 NHCC Literary Award and author of Adobe Odes. Her many books of poetry, fiction and children's literature have made her one of the most productive and respected Chicana writers on the literary scene. www.patmora.com

BENJAMIN SAENZ [Poetry] is a prolific poet and fiction writer. He is the author of Dreaming the End of War. He is on the faculty of University of Texas, El Paso and his latest book joins his many others. A former roofer, onion picker, janitor, theologian and Catholic priest, Saenz is now a prize winning essayist, novelist, poet and activist passionately in love with El Paso and its peoples. www.benjaminsaenz.com/Pages/
BenHome.html

BEVA SÁNCHEZ-PADILLA [Playwriting] is a native New Mexican, identifies herself as a literary media and performing artist. Her six produced plays include: La Guadalupe Que Camina, Mali and Maya: A Story of Malinche, Letty y su Mama, Contradictions Split-Rebozo, and An Altar for Emma. As part of her workshop on playwriting, she will perform segments from two of these plays.

ALFREDO CORCHADO [News writer] is a renowned investigative journalist with the Dallas Morning News and previously with the Wall Street Journal and the El Paso Herald-Post. He has won several awards for his coverage of Mexicans in the United States through special projects including: "The Mexicanization of the United States," and the "Disappearing Border." His reporting led to an internal U.S. inquiry and the removal of heads of the Immigration Customs Enforcement agency. His reporting on drug violence along the border led to the discovery of crimes committed in Texan cities under the order of Mexican drug cartels. Google Alfredo Corchado + Dallas Morning News and visit http://www.findarticles.com/p/search?tb=art&qt=%22
Alfredo+Corchado%22

YOLANDA NAVA [Marketing] Director of Marketing for NM Monuments of DCA. She is a specialist on writing for marketing and commercial media. Author of It's All in the Frijoles, Nava is an Emmy award-winning broadcast journalist, author and motivational speaker. Her book was winner of the Latino Literary Hall of Fames' 2001 Best Self-help Book Award and was also featured in the Writers Corner of Spirituality.com. Google "Yolanda Nava."

JAVIER GRILLO-MARXUACH [Screenwriting] is a writer for major TV serials like Boomtown, Medium, Lost, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, Charmed and many others. He also writes his own comics with titles like Super-Skrull which he did for Marvel Comics Mini Series and Middleman, which he did for Viper Comics. He hosts a weekly video show performed entirely by Grillo-Marxuach. New episodes appear on his main website, RadioFreeJavi.com or Google "Javier Grillo-Marxuach."

This three-day conference costs a total of $300.00 including all meals. Previous attendees receive a "founders discount" of $50.00 if you register by February 1st. Travel and lodging will be your responsibility. Participating hotels are listed on the registration form. For more information please call 505.246.2261 x148 or email katie.trujillo@state.nm.us.

Take at look at some of the luminaries that will be there, mi gente, Pat Mora, Oscar Hijuelos, Jose Montoya. Don't miss this fantastic event!

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Más y más -- from the northern outpost of Aztlán

Palabra Pura

April 3, 2007 – To celebrate National Poetry Month, the Guild Complex’s bilingual reading series, Palabra Pura, will feature internationally acclaimed poet Victor Hernández Cruz in a reading on Wednesday, April 18, 2007. Palabra Pura features Chicano and Latino poets reading work in Spanish, English and a combination of the two languages. The series offers Chicago’s large Spanish-speaking population, the third largest in the United States, a venue to read their poetry as originally composed and helps audiences learn more about the strong tradition of poetry in Spanish. A special emphasis is placed on poets who have recently published books or won recognition for their work.

Exploding onto the poetry scene in the 1970s with a distinctive voice in the Nuyorican school of émigré poetry, Victor Hernández Cruz probes the grammatical and syntactical conventions within English and Spanish to create his own bilingual idiom. He is the author of numerous poetry collections, most recently The Mountain in the Sea. He will be introduced by award-winning journalist, Achy Obejas, who will also lead a question and answer session following the reading.

Palabra Pura is a collaborative project between the Guild Complex, Letra Latinas of the Institute for Latino Studies at the University of Notre Dame, the Rafael Cintron-Ortiz Latino Cultural Center at the University of Illinois at Chicago, Arena Cultural and contratiempo. Co-sponsors for this special presentation are The Poetry Foundation and HotHouse, the center for International Performance & Exhibition. This series is partially supported by a grant from the Illinois Humanities Council.

Palabra Pura continues its second year of programming with the Victor Hernández Cruz reading this Wednesday, April 18 at HotHouse, 31 E. Balbo, Chicago. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. The reading begins at 7:30 p.m. Admission is free. 18 and over. For more information, please check the Guild Complex website http://guildcomplex.org, or call 1877.394.50

And to further entice you, The Poetry Foundation's website is posting an interview conducted by Francisco Aragon with Victor Hernández Cruz, plus five poems with commentary by local poets.

Get a glimpse of this spare and evocative poetry at the following:http://poetryfoundation.org.

5 poets comment on 5 Victor Hernández Cruz poems
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/features/feature.
onpoets.html?id=179552

Francisco Aragon interviews VHC:
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/features/feature.
onpoets.html?id=179553


It's a taste of what will be a can't miss night of poetry in Chicago!

Lisa Alvarado

Let the Words Reign

This month is National Poetry Month. What I'll be doing to celebrate is featuring two of my favorite poetry how-to books. I'll also be interviewing and reviewing Margo Tamez, on her life as an indigenous woman in the Southwest, what it means to be a poet, and give you a look at her books, Naked Wanting and Raven Eye.

Mind you, as a poet myself I'm biased, but I agree with Neruda's assessment that when dictators take over, one of the first groups they come after is the poets. Why? Better writers than I have put to paper their thoughts. Let me share them with you.

“...Poetry is a way of taking life by the throat.” Robert Frost, American poet, 1874-1963

“Peace goes into the making of a poem as flour goes into the making of bread.” Pablo Neruda, Nobel Prize Winner for literature, 1904-1973

“Poetry is nearer to vital truth than history.” Plato, 428 BC-348 BC

“Poetry is thoughts that breathe, and words that burn.” Thomas Gray, English Poet, 1716-1771

“A poem begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness.” Robert Frost, 1874-1963

“Poetry is language at its most distilled and most powerful.” Rita Dove, Former U. S. Poet Laureate, born 1958


Words to think about, I hope. Now, take a look at the first book I've chosen, and I think you'll see where the rest of the month is headed.

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Poetry Everywhere
Jack Collum and Sheryl Noethe

In 1972, Jack Collum left factory work to become a poet, his co-author , Sheryl Noethe, taught poetry to the deaf. Both of them are NEA Poetry Fellowships recipients and together they've written a book on their favorite subject -- the teaching of poetry writing to young people. The following excerpt is a summary of their philosophy:

..writing is the better world, a refuge and solace where imagination is king. We can offer this sustenance, this self-creation to children, making their lives richer and happier, giving them more alternatives. Writing is a grip on existence and empowerment, and a way to listen to the inner truth of the self. The poet enters a previous dialogue with all previous poets, singers and writers. You keep great company.

This illustrates the ways in which the poet becomes a kind of modern shaman, a bridge to the past, linking this world and its inhabitants with that of our ancestors. I've personally experienced the power and transformation in the process of writing, of naming, of coaxing out out one's own truth from those places in yourself that are used to silence, to secrecy. I know the synergy that happens in writing. You open yourself, and whatever story is in the universe and in your own body gets catalyzed and the process of writing then catalyzes you further.

I was fortunate enough to work with About Face Theater, (an LGBT youth theater group) here in Chicago, where I held a day-long workshop using many of the exercises in the book. I wanted that kind of experience for them -- a means for them to uncover their own story, connect with the collective story, with all of it shaped by culture, class, race and sexuality. Poetry Everywhere was a superb, accessible tool in working with a diverse group of young writers and performers, giving them flex and structure.

To put a finer point on it, logistically, this is an extremely detailed text, with sixty exercises that involve students in such far-ranging forms as haikus, villanelles, acrostics, lunes, sestinas; as well a variety of approaches to free verse. In addition, these more traditional forms are interspersed with word games and icebreakers to help keep the teaching and the sessions fresh and lively.

But ultimately, it is the approach that is most compelling aspect of this book. Once again, I'd like to quote Collum and Noethe's own words.

Your job as teacher is to tell every student what is right with his or her work. This calls for wit, compassion, and a huge frame of reference....When you point out to your students where they are best in their work -- the funniest, or most imaginative, or truest to their vision -- you give them success and in return, they give you their trust. They write in the only way beautiful things are created -- from the heart, without censorship or fear. That's when you get the poetry.

On a final note, it delighted me to no end that one of the authors is a solid working-class man, a brother from the ranks of the factory. That's my story, too. You just never know where people like us will end up next.

ISBN 0-915924-69-2

Lisa Alvarado