Fort Morgan is a small town community with a small population. This means that it easy for community members to bond and know each other. One way that the people could bond is through books. More specifically, the One City One Book program. The One City One Book program is a way for the community to get together through discussions of a piece of literacy. The book that would be a good option to use is Enrique’s Journey because it is a nonfiction piece of work that has many lessons to teach people, and it is all through a story of a young boy’s journey. This program would benefit Fort Morgan with Enrique’s Journey because it enlightens the people of the community about the hardships other people have that are not in America, it is an educational …show more content…
opportunity during the summer, and Enrique’s Journey teaches people important ideas through its themes. Enrique’s Journey is a great choice for the One City One Book program because it helps people understand the hardships of immigrants travelling to the United States. This would benefit the community because of our diverse culture, and it is a very good thing to know about, especially with all the immigrants. Nazario’s website explains the main idea of the book, “Enrique’s Journey recounts the unforgettable quest of a Honduran boy looking for his mother, eleven years after she is forced to leave her starving family to find work in the United States.” This quote shows how Enrique’s Journey would help people understand what it’s like travelling across Mexico to get to the United States. Another quote that helps with the understanding of the immigrants hardships is from Goodreads.com. It states, “The Mexico/Guatemala border sounds like it's even worse than ours... not necessarily in terms of how difficult it is to cross, but rather, in the absolute brutality of the gangs and bandits that prey on migrants.” This was stated from someone who read the book and had learned this bit of information. Finally, from a person who reviewed Enrique’s Journey, “The twist on this familiar story is that in recent years, a growing number of America’s illegal immigrants are women. Unable to feed and clothe their children, they leave their homes in Honduras or Guatemala and head for a better life in el Norte. Once in America, Mami sends back as much money as she possibly can and promises to return to her children as soon as she builds up a nest egg.” All of this is telling the people on why the mothers do it and how hard it is for them to do it. For these reasons, Enrique’s Journey is a good book to show the hardships of immigrants when travelling through Mexico to get to the United States. Since Enrique’s Journey is a nonfiction piece of work, many lessons are taught through the themes of the book.
Meaning, this book would be perfect to teach students life lessons that are important. Three of the themes that are good life lessons are: family, perseverance and survival, and humanization and dehumanization. All of these are found throughout the whole book which makes them hard to forget. Family is shown throughout the book because when Enrique’s mom leaves, all Enrique wants to do is to be with her. A short summary from Litcharts.com explains why family is such a big theme throughout the whole book. “Enrique’s Journey, as its title indicates, is the non-fiction story of a 17-year-old boy’s struggle to travel across Mexico to the United States to reunite with his mother. The events depicted in the book are set in motion by an initial instance of abandonment: Lourdes’ difficult decision to leave Enrique and his sister Belky in Honduras, while she seeks work in the United States to send money back to her family.” This whole quote shows, even though it was a hard choice for Lourdes, it was the right one because it was to help her family. Another theme that was found in the book that is a good lesson is about perseverance and survival. Survival is a trait everyone has, but this book highlights its importance, especially on the trains. Litcharts.com says, “He gives himself a time limit that shows his perseverance and the gravity of his decision: he will make it to his mother even if it takes a year. Despite the dangerous circumstances jumping trains, facing corrupt policemen, immigration checkpoints and officers, bandits, and gangsters, Enrique persists.” This teaches the readers that it is important to push through every difficulty no matter what, and that it is highly significant to survive to achieve the goal. The last theme that is found in Enrique’s Journey that is a good lesson for readers is dehumanization and humanization. This theme is found
everywhere in the book because the whole book shows Enrique’s struggle against immigration agents, gangs, trains, and the people. “As Nazario strives to humanize these characters through her writing, she also points out the constant dehumanizing situations that they encounter. On the route from Honduras to the United States border, migrants confront countless threats, from physical danger to psychological harm. Many of them are caused by other people who have no respect for their humanity and no reservations about degrading others.” This quote is also from Litcharts.com and perfectly describes how the immigrants felt dehumanized by some people but felt human around others. All of these themes are perfect for a good lesson for people in the Fort Morgan community. If Fort Morgan were to do a One City One Book one year, the best time would be during the summer. It would be the ideal time because teenagers are done with the stress of school and they would be excited to do the activities that come along with the One City One Book project. Since it is in the summer, it would be a great way for the students to keep up and not lose any of their knowledge that they attained during the school year. In an article explaining the summer learning slide, CLA-NET states, “In a study of summer learning slide among elementary school children in Baltimore, Stephanie L. Slates et al found that low-socioeconomic status (SES) students who gained as much as their higher-SES peers in reading or math during at least three of the four summers of elementary school had parents who took them to the library during the summer months, checked out books while there, and read to their children for longer periods of time than other low-SES parents. (2012)” This is saying that while the kids with higher income are not reading, the lower income kids are and are gaining more knowledge from it. Another quote that proves that the program would be highly beneficial during the summer is, “Summer learning loss accounts for two-thirds of the 9th grade achievement gap in reading between students from low-income households and their higher-income peers.” This shows that since students don’t do anything educational during the summer, they lose the knowledge that they learned. A quote from Scholastic says, “Teachers typically spend between 4 to 6 weeks re-teaching material students have forgotten over the summer.” It just again proves why there needs to be an educational opportunity during the summer for students. The One City One Book program would be highly beneficial to Fort Morgan. Enrique’s Journey would be a good book for Fort Morgan to read also because of all the lessons in the book and how it teaches people about how hard the immigrants lives are. The One City One Book program would be ideal to be put on during the summer to keep the students minds working while still letting them have fun. But, the only way for this program to get to Fort Morgan and work is to get people aware and interested! If interested in getting the One City One Book program started in Fort Morgan, contact the English department, school board, public library, or anyone that has an influence in our community! Let’s get this program to Fort Morgan and start making a difference!
It also shows some more common ideas, like how all families have secrets, and in just a short time, someone’s life can be turned upside down and they have to find the best way to stay strong for themselves and their families. The most important thing I learned from this book, is how some people in other cultures find life to be very difficult when they are trying to do what is best for their family. Anita kept saying America is the ‘free country’ and I couldn’t agree more. So many people want to come here for so many different reasons, and it makes you realize that if our country is so great that people from all over the world want to move here, we are very lucky to be so highly thought
Everyone always has a safe place in their hearts for their homes. Home doesn’t always have to be a place where someone just sleeps in. However, home to some people is where they feel comfort. Somewhere or someplace can be one’s home. Some of the characters in Enrique’s Journey by Sonia Rozario and The Odyssey by Homer express the theme of home through an emotional journey. Enrique’s Journey is about a boy named Enrique who goes on a journey to find his beloved mother who he has believed abandoned him. The Odyssey is about a mythology where a hero named Odysseus tries to find his way back to his homeland after participating in a war. Odysseus from The Odyssey shows the theme of home by trying to return home to his family. Enrique from Enrique’s Journey shows the theme of home by looking for his mother who he considers to be his home. Telemachus in The Odyssey shows home when he decides to go find his father,
...rest became a nightmare. Enrique’s time apart from his mother made them more like “strangers” than family. Filled with anger stemming from the years apart from one another, he refused to obey his mother’s wishes to live healthier. While lost in family chaos, he turned back to his addiction of drugs crashing his dream of a perfect family dynamic. Though his dream became a nightmare, he was able to achieve it through one core trait where his inner strength help drive him to not give up his dream of seeing his mother. This signifies that if a person is willing to work hard to achieve their dream through diligence, it can be met. Though the outcome may not be what one hoped for, being able to say you accomplished something is soul-pleasing. His success in making it to the U.S. regardless of many downfalls satisfies one missing piece in his broken puzzle of a life.
I thought that the theme of Growing Up by Gary Soto was to appreciate what you have. Maria's father said "When I was a kid, we didn't have money for vacations. I would have been happy to go with my father." It shows how her father is working hard to make Maria's life better. He is trying to make his whole family happy and make her childhood better than his. It shows later in the story, when Maria thinks that her family is dead. It shows her second thoughts to her
Understanding the life of a migrant child is something everyone should understand, including students. This way it creates a supportive atmosphere on everyone’s behalf. If I were to teach this concept using “The Circuit” I would first begin by having my students read the novel. With each chapter would have questions that go with that reading. For instance, if the first chapter was assigned as a reading I would also assign question such as: compare and contrast your life to Francisco, how would you feel if you were Francisco,
In “The Circuit” by Francisco Jimenez,Panchito, a teenage schoolboy from a migrant farm worker family, illustrates a major quality for overcoming obstacles and adaptability. For example,despite constant moving, a longing to be like other,and a poor education, Panchito goes to school, struggles to learn English and befriends a teacher. He does
Francisco and his family come from Guadalajara Mexico. When Francisco was eight years old. Francisco is a hart worker and love school. He have seven sisters and brothers. The problems was he never be in one place. He always have to move to find a job in the fields. He like the school but he can't a one stable. He repeat the same grade over and over again. In the school he was bolly because he don’t know speak English.
How can one stay on the right path when confronted with so many obstacles? Overcoming hardships is not an easy task, and when faced with poverty and displacement, succeeding in life may seem like the impossible. The novel Breaking Through by Francisco Jimenez is about a family that confronts a lot of difficulties in their life. They move from Jalisco, Mexico to California in the 1940s to leave their impoverishment behind and to start a new chapter in their lives. Jimenez expresses the exertion of keeping his family together while living in poverty, forced labor and discrimination. Despite hardships, success is not impossible for those willing to work hard.
There are several themes to this story, some of which I did not contemplate or realize for years. This book can be seen as unselfish and selfish love between a child and his parent. It is a book about self sacrifice that is taken for granted by a child to his parent. The book is happy, sad, and ultimately about love. The most important lesson of the book I feel is that always taking and not giving is not the best route in life. Those who take always are not as happy as those that give to others. The old adage
One of the lessons and the themes of the book is that no matter what there will be something unexpected that could happen, but we just have to learn how to adapt to it and survive. Many people in life are faced with challenges, and it's up to them if they choose to go with it or fix it. while the father and the son were on the road they started off as a family but the mother could not take the starvation, and the struggle to survive so she decided to give up. On the road they encountered many people who resorted to becoming cannibals and doing malicious things so that they could live. I learned that people will do whatever it takes for them to survive or get ahead in life even when they know that what they are doing isn't right. From the begging all the way to the end it was evident that the theme of hope was included in the book. While they are traveling they encounter many people and the son is the one that keeps his father from becoming belligerent and doing things that he knows isn't necessary. When they see that someone had taken there things and left, they tracked them down to get the stuff back. When they found the man the father wanted to take all of the mans clothiers that he had on but the son made him give them back. While on the road they also met Ely and they gave him something to eat and held conversation with him. When it was time to go they gave a portion of food to him even when the
I believe that I have grown throughout the year. Mainly in my classes, such as English, Cultural Geography, Physical Education, Biology, Algebra 1 and Learning Lab. In my first class, English 9, I feel like I have grown in my reading level and my way of being able to understand what I am reading. For example, in the beginning of the year we read a book titled "Enrique's Journey" which I can easily talk about for hours. The book spoke of a young Honduran boy who attempts to get to his mother in the United States by riding 'The beast', which is what they call a very dangerous train that travels through the border between mexico and the U.S. Also we newly finished another book, called "Raisin in the Sun", it spoke of a story of an African American family during 1959. The characters that are in the book and that lived together are Walter, Ruth, Travis, Mama and Beneatha.They all are related in different ways,for example, Mama is the mother of Walter and Beneatha, and Walter is the father of Travis and married to Ruth. The main plot in this book is money and how it gets between the family and corrupts them.
The film being set in east Los Angeles, the majority of the students are of latino decent. In particular the student Angel Guzman is portrayed as an almost caricature of the typical "cholo" character. The way of life of the students portrayed in the film is one of constant danger from gangs or the police. In a way this is not far from the truth, but the film uses this stereotype and exaggerates to create drama in the film. The film uses many tropes of the "ghetto" life to advance the plot, for example students are forced to sell drugs on the street to support their family, that depend on them. Mr. Escalante is portrayed as the savior character of these kids coming into their live through education, and eventually leading them into college. Having struggled in his own life he relates to the students and works himself into the ground for their success. Mendendez uses the stereotypical portrayal of school used in films, as former teacher and educator Robert Bulman states, "These portrayals always seem to involve ineffective and mean teachers and/or apathetic students. Both are stereotypes and, as a teacher and teacher educator, I know they are wrong."(Bulma
This book is one of an autobiography books and it has much related with today's teenager who lives on the street that makes me a sense of his feeling. This book has too many bad and good things happened in the Chicano environment. Even though this book had so many bad word usage that stop me skip some pages, but when I was reading this book I really felt bad for him because he is not the only person to make his life so difficult, his family, his neighborhood should consider for Luis life. Every person's life
The theme: determination is key to succeed, is something that we use on a daily basis, whether it is to get through the day or to finish an assignment. For instance, if you had a lot of work to complete, showing grittiness would allow you to finish the work and it would benefit you greatly later. Moreover, if you were deciding you may want to try something new, but you weren’t completely sure if you wanted to, so you give up! You would never know what good things could happen to you because you missed out on an opportunity; however, if you showed determination and completed your goal you would be able to reap the benefits. Since the theme is determination I believe that this book would relate to people who want to try new things but are scared too, I think this because they may just need a bit of grit to try something that they might really
The reason why some authors might to talk about a theme that is deep and teaching people lessons is because they want people to understand where they are coming from. In all the writings are teaching us a lesson that we need to understand and learn. When the “Mother to Son” text was telling us about how this kids mothers life is not easy and there were a lot of bumps. That's telling us that not everyone's life is easy. The text states “Life for me ain't been no crystal stair.” This right here is telling us that her life is not the best and that she's been through a lot. Also, the text “If” states “Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it, And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!” This is teaching us that what we have we need to be happy for what we have. Another thing that we are learning about is life. On text C this text is deep in a way it’s teaching us about life the text states “Success is