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.

Thursday, December 17, 2015

The Ladybug Bug

My family and I were driving back home from a day of school. We were all silent and just waiting to get home until my mom spotted an odd car.

The car was a Volkswagen “bug” that we inferred to be new. Its surface was smooth and shiny. It was red with large black spots all over it, with some black at the front of the car.

We could not avert our eyes from the car. We made a big deal out of this car because we had never imagined to see one, outside of a parade, like this. For us it was the black spots that appeared extraneous on the car, especially among the cars surrounding it. We didn’t know what to make of it. My family and I decided to give the car a name, for if we ever saw it again. Since the car was a “bug” car, and the pattern on it looked similar to that of a ladybug, we decided to nickname it the ladybug bug.

Who would drive a car that would stand out so much? Why would they decide to buy a car with spots? Despite those questions we had, we still enjoyed discovering that car.

My family and I saw the car a few more times after that. Mostly when we were driving to or back from school.

Eventually we discovered the person who drove the car. We never imagined the driver to be one of my little brothers’ elementary school teachers.

~ Rafael D.

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4 comments:

  1. AnonymousJanuary 7, 2016 at 10:46 AM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. DevenJanuary 7, 2016 at 10:52 AM

    You used good vocabulary in places that were sometimes appropriate and sometimes awkward.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousJanuary 7, 2016 at 10:53 AM

    I like your vivid description of of the beetle and your families astonishment about seeing this car and how it stood out from all the other ones.

    ReplyDelete
  4. AnonymousJanuary 7, 2016 at 10:54 AM

    I like how you described not just the color of the bug but also what your family thought of it and what you thought of it.

    ReplyDelete

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