Potomac's eighth grade English students read and discuss The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros. The book is a series of short vignettes that together capture the characters, setting, and stories of a particular neighborhood in Chicago. The vignettes are written from the perspective of a fictional narrator and are based loosely on Cisneros's own experiences as well as those of her students. Some of the vignettes are humorous or action-packed; some are heart-wrenching or shocking. All are deliberate in their use of figurative language, poetic elements, grammar conventions, and pacing.

Each eighth grader composed at least one vignette for inclusion in this digital collection. They wrote in the style of Sandra Cisneros, as they interpreted it based on their notes and our class discussions, yet they set it in a time and place of their own choosing. While some of these vignettes are based on the author's personal experience, many of them are purely fiction, an imagining of characters and circumstances that seemed ripe for this assignment. Students also used this assignment to experiment with new vocabulary words and techniques involving punctuation and sentence structure.

We encourage you to leave comments below vignettes that strike you in some way. Please keep your comments positive and specific; this is not the place for critiques or suggestions. Enjoy the creativity and vibrancy of these students' literary efforts.

Wednesday, December 24, 2014

Breach

I stumbled to Independence Avenue on 6th Street, a slight drowsiness in my step. The sky gray, glass teardrops slipping off the edges of the dark clouds. I was visiting the Air and Space Museum with an unenthusiastic group of classmates murmuring rude things under their breath. It was going to be the average field trip. The average field trip. When we arrived at the entrance of the museum, I noticed a large crowd blocking the entrance. I stopped to see what all of the commotion was, and found myself in the middle of a throng of dark suits. I turned, only to find that my class had left. Gone. Nowhere in sight. The amoeba of black and white began to move towards the street taking me with it, as though a wave had risen from the ground and was slowly pushing me toward a black limousine. I tried to stay calm but I was helpless, this had to be a mistake. The next thing I knew I was in the back of the limousine slowly drifting away. It only took a few seconds before everyone realized a huge security breach had occurred. There I sat, confused, terrified, and officially a threat to his security. There he sat, the President of the United States.

~ Luke P.

7 comments:

  1. You did a good job at setting the tone of the vignette at the beginning, through your descriptions of the weather.

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  2. I absolutely love the cliff hanger at the end

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  3. Gave me chills!!1!!!11!!

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  4. Awesome cliff hanger

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