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

Buck

His name is Buck, like a deer. He stands tall and prances through the grass, silent and swift.  Except he doesn’t have antlers, instead he has two floppy ears. He doesn’t have hooves either, but 4 tiny paws with sharp nails. He has the longest tail, that is the darkest black, and a beautiful brown coat of fur. His keen sense of smell just makes him more curious and hard to keep track of, and he is very smart for a 7 month old puppy. His big brown eyes will make you melt. After running around for hours he’ll settle down for a nap. His little black nose breathing in slowly, his closed eyes moving around seeing dreams, and occasionally quiet barks. Snuggling up to keep warm, but this is only a nap. Once his eyes are opened again, it starts all over again. 

~ Megan T.

4 comments:

  1. AnonymousJanuary 9, 2015 at 8:37 AM

    I love your vignette! Really nice use of description(:

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousJanuary 9, 2015 at 10:09 AM

    I really like how you described the dog and how you said it starts all over again. :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousJanuary 9, 2015 at 10:11 AM

    Your dog sounds really cute! I like how you made it a cycle and at the end you said, then it starts all over again.

    ReplyDelete
  4. AnonymousJanuary 9, 2015 at 11:07 AM

    awwwww so cute

    ReplyDelete

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