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Ms. Laning’s Classroom Edit display name

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Throughout the year, my students are reading texts about the experiences of diverse peoples and the ways in which they have persevered despite the challenges they faced personally and culturally. We read about the lives of Helen Keller, Claudette Colvin, and Ruby Bridges to name a few. These texts offer a great opportunity to discuss how identity influences our view of the world and how others view us. The Hmong written language was not developed until the 1950s, which has hindered the amount of literature my students can engage with about their own cultural history. Prior to 1950, spoken language and storytelling was the only mode of recording the unique experiences and histories of the Hmong peoples. Within the last year, Mai Chao, a first generation Hmong American refugee in Wisconsin has authentically recorded a Hmong experience in the form of a novel-in-verse. In "Gathering Fireflies", she tells the story of a young boy who is interviewing the members of his family to learn about their struggles and challenges and how they persevered. "Gathering Fireflies" is an approachable and engaging novel for middle schoolers and will offer a truly unique and transformative experience for my students. This project will fund a class set of novels for my classroom. With this class set, my students will be able to engage meaningfully with the text, analyzing its structure and descriptive details while simultaneously making connections to their experience and learning more about their culture. It is also an opportunity to support emerging Hmong American authors and artists to continue writing and inspire my students to possibly follow in Mai Chao's footsteps.

About my class

Throughout the year, my students are reading texts about the experiences of diverse peoples and the ways in which they have persevered despite the challenges they faced personally and culturally. We read about the lives of Helen Keller, Claudette Colvin, and Ruby Bridges to name a few. These texts offer a great opportunity to discuss how identity influences our view of the world and how others view us. The Hmong written language was not developed until the 1950s, which has hindered the amount of literature my students can engage with about their own cultural history. Prior to 1950, spoken language and storytelling was the only mode of recording the unique experiences and histories of the Hmong peoples. Within the last year, Mai Chao, a first generation Hmong American refugee in Wisconsin has authentically recorded a Hmong experience in the form of a novel-in-verse. In "Gathering Fireflies", she tells the story of a young boy who is interviewing the members of his family to learn about their struggles and challenges and how they persevered. "Gathering Fireflies" is an approachable and engaging novel for middle schoolers and will offer a truly unique and transformative experience for my students. This project will fund a class set of novels for my classroom. With this class set, my students will be able to engage meaningfully with the text, analyzing its structure and descriptive details while simultaneously making connections to their experience and learning more about their culture. It is also an opportunity to support emerging Hmong American authors and artists to continue writing and inspire my students to possibly follow in Mai Chao's footsteps.

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