pickIn connection with Cart's From Romance to Realism, Mexikid depicts the liminality found within young adulthood. The Martín family's journey is funny, heartwarming, and inspiring. Pedro illustrates the joy, confusion, embarrassment, and hilarity of transitioning from childhood to young adulthood. While still interested in “infantile“ games and toys, he understands real-world, “adult“ concepts, which is a beautiful and scary thing for young adults.
Mexikid would be a fun and unique mentor text to introduce students to the world of creative writing. Literature takes so many forms outside of plain words on a page. If I used Mexikid as a mentor text in my classroom, I would encourage students to share their life story with me in words and images like Martín does. This activity would be a great way to introduce students to using mentor texts and get a glimpse into my students' lives!
I admire how Mexikid tackles relevant issues surrounding Mexican-Americans in an age-appropriate way and a truly funny manner. The stylistic choice of a graphic memoir style subverts the humdrum of prose that many students so dread reading while conveying meaningful messages. While the Mexican-American experience is not one-size-fits-all, I feel my students will feel seen and validated in their experiences through Pedro “Peter“ Martín.
pickMy Own Lightning (Wolf Hollow 2), by Lauren Wolk (2022)
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Premise: After getting struck by lightning, a 1940s Pennsylvania girl begins to see the world—and people—around her differently.
Review: With the first book in this series being such a triumph for me, I was a bit unsure what to expect with this sequel. But wow! I think I like it even more! Cont.
pickThere is something so compelling about graphic novels, and this one was so so good! I loved the ways that the art corresponded to the words on the page to create such an interesting and immersive story. Like I mentioned for “Flying Lessons“, using texts such as this that explore new mediums with our students can make such a huge difference in their journey as an English student. Pedro Martin is an amazing storyteller and I loved every second.
pickThis was a really lovely middlegrade read. Ellen is on a class trip to Barcelona. She's Jewish, she's autistic, & she has a great dad. But she feels like her best friend is pulling away from her. When they get put on different teams for a group project, she has to learn how to make new friends & set boundaries in her relationships. There's also a new classmate who uses they pronouns, who makes Ellen think outside the binary categories shes used to
so-soI think if it weren‘t for the graphics I wouldn‘t have really enjoyed it at all. As the story continued I started to get a little disconnected because of the dialogue being so young. I can definitely see elementary students eating this story up especially Hispanic kids who can relate to Pedro‘s family dynamic. So, It‘s important to be willing to read about different cultures and their life experiences to have more broad perspective of life.
I love how we are getting to see some of the unfortunate realities of the world through the eyes of a child. For, example when the family is crossing the border into Mexico and they get some of their stuff stolen by the guards and the dad is trying to talk their way through that tense situation. It got so real! To experience something like that as a kid had to of been very frustrating and confusing.
I had never heard of a graphic memoir before and I was so surprised that this isnt done more often! Actually being able to see the family and looking at how their personalities are shown through the images made it much more fun to read! This is a great way to get younger audiences more interested in reading and to stay engaged with the story.
