My Diary from Here to There: Mi diario de aquí hasta allá

My Diary from Here to There: Mi diario de aquí hasta allá
Written by Amada Irma Pérez
Illustrated by Maya Christina Gonzalez
Published by Children's Book Press/Editorial Libros Para Niños in San Francisco in 2002
Genre: Memoir (Bilingual Multicultural Work)
Ages: Grades 3-5

Summary: This book takes a bilingual account of a girl writing in her diary after overhearing her parents discussing their impending move to America. Amada is very frightened about having to leave her home of Juárez, Mexico and journey to the unknown world of Los Angeles, California. Her five brothers are excited and seem very carefree about the entire thing, but she is very emotional about leaving her best friend Michi and her hometown and worries about not being able to speak Spanish in American or be able to learn English. Her father reassures her that he experienced the same thing when he was younger when his parents moved from America to Mexico and that she too possessed the strength to endure. The family left one night to go to Mexicali, Mexico so that the mother and children could stay with other family while the father went to find work in America and to get the family their green cards. It was a long wait and the boys caused much trouble, but eventually the letter came from Amada's father saying that he had their green cards and that he would meet them in Los Angeles. The entire family was elated to be reunited and Amada realized she did have the strength to survive. In the end, she wrote Michi and told her all about the experience.

Response: This work is actually a fictionalized account of the author's real story of coming to America. Furthermore, the author is currently a teacher in California who advocates "programs that "encourage multicultural understanding!"

I really enjoyed this book because I am interested in the Spanish language and I found myself reading the Spanish portions of the book more than the English ones and just using the English version to clarify words I might not have known. (This book even helped encourage my Spanish skills, so I know it would do the same for young children.)

The illustrations in this book are very well-done.

Maya Christina Gonzalez captures the very essence of the Mexican culture in her vibrate, highly colored paintings. She also depicts the face shapes and the hairstyles generally associated with the Mexican culture. Her illustrations are all double-page spreads that make the story flow just like the lines from her paintbrushes that are very notifiable in her paintings.

Teaching Connections: Since I felt encouraged by this work, I know students would because if they do not know a word, they do not have to ask a teacher or spend time looking it up in a dictionary because it is right there on the same or following page! It would absolutely help ELL students practice English and could even help advanced elementary English-speaking Spanish students to practice their Spanish.

A teaching idea for ELL students is to have them read this work and then write a short diary/journal entry of their own in English about their journey to America and their feelings about leaving home. They could also make a Venn Diagram comparing and contrasting their feelings and attitudes toward moving with those outlined in a book.

Non-ELL students could write a diary/journal entry after reading this book about when they may have felt like Amada. For example, if they have moved, come to a new school, or have even just felt anxiety about some new experience they were dealing with like having a younger sibling, or going on a trip, etc.

(Image retrieved from http://www.mayagonzalez.com/graphics/books/diary.jpg on 7 April 2008)