From One Valley To The Other: A Pen-Pal Project

Celebrating Hispanic & Latinx Heritage Month

This project is a part of the Hispanic & Latinx Heritage Month celebration because it supports a Latino teacher or a school where the majority of students are Latino.

Compare the Rio Grande Valley, Texas to the Connecticut River Valley, Massachusetts - these are two "worlds" that are so uniquely different while at the same time we share the same nation, the same dreams, the same values. With my pen-pal project, my students will be able to write for the purpose of building connetions, understanding, and most importantly, friendships with students that are, while American, so very different from the type of people they see from day to day. I worked for the past two years as a paraprofessional in a special education classroom in Granby, a small Western Massachusetts town that is largely homogenous and White. Now I am a special education teacher, concentrating on Reading and Language Arts, in the Rio Grande Valley, Texas working in a school that is still largely homogenous but concentrated with Mexican-American students. My students (both current and former) want to connect with peers outside of their areas. When I discussed the pen-pal project, my student's faces lit up so quickly. The questions were honest, sincere, and big and extensive... "what are they like up in Massa--" most of them couldn't pronounce it fully. They're eager to share their experiences in the Valley with those of students of my friends and former colleagues in Massachusetts. My students will be working on writing projects to send to the students in Massachusetts - they will be going through all of the steps of the writing process with the purpose of engaging their penpal and new friend. We will be including brief reading activities that we will generate as a class for their pen-pals. I would like to gain access to a cheap digital camera to be able to send pictures of my students and to enlist them to take pictures of the Rio Grande Valley so that their penpals can get a sense of where they are from. I would like our colleagues in Granby to do the same. Add language to a list that includes racial and ethnic difference that make these two Valleys so unique. The vast majority of my students are Limited English Proficient (LEP) and are so eager to practice their relative new language skills and are excited to make new friends in another part of the country! To make this project a reality I am requesting $500 in funding. This includes roughly $300 to go towards a digital camera and $200 that would go towards postage, envelopes, and art supplies such as color pencils and construction paper that will be used for the rest of the year. My students in the Rio Grande Valley deserve to have connections to other parts of the country. This project will expand their knowledge of our country through personal connections with peers in an area very different from where they are situated. In closing, we can build bridges of understanding and compassion beginning with small projects such as this one - it is an investment in our future.