William Hall Library Class Stories

Yi Ping's Winter

2009-02-07T05:21:00.000-08:00

Today the weather is snowy and freezing. This day there is too much snow. I with my husband together went outside to shovel snow. I took shovel by hand to shovel snow. My husband used the snow blower. We did three hours to finish the snow.

I hate winter. It is too cold, and often snowy. In winter, trees have no more leaves, and gardens have no more flowers. When it is snowy everywhere, I am too scared to drive and walk.

Chinese New Year by Ying

2009-02-07T05:15:00.000-08:00

In China, New Year is one of the most important holidays. It falls on the first day of the first lunar month. People follow many national and local customs. They prepare delicious food, clean and decorate their houses. They paste poems with lucky words on the door. One of the events of the holiday is the whole family gets together for a big dinner. People stay up to eat dumplings at midnight for good luck and health. They eat delicious food with symbolic values. For example, chicken is for good luck. They also exchange greetings with friends and relatives.
During New Year, there is no sweeping because people think it will sweep away good luck. People also have many local customs.
This holiday is exciting and colorful for children. It also brings happiness.

Christmas Time by Yi Ping

2009-02-07T05:11:00.000-08:00

Today is Wednesday December 23, 2008. The weather is rainy. Tomorrow is Christmas Eve. In China we don't have this holiday. I'm Chinese, so I don't have special food for tomorrow. I only hung small color lights on my house in front, to celebrate Christmas and New Year. My neighbors also hung different color lights on their houses in front. At night everybody turns on the lights and the street looks beautiful!

Candy's Christmas Day at Work

2009-02-07T05:05:00.000-08:00

I worked the whole day today, but we closed early, because we had a party at the restaurant.
Tonight I saw Xiaoyan there. Her son works as a busboy there.
During the party, we had a lot of food for dinner. We drank champagne. We were singing, and we had a "lucky drawing" too. Our boss bought many gifts for the employees. Everyone just neede to draw a number and then we get different gifts. I got a hot pot. Xiaoyan's son got a toaster. We were very happy tonight.

Introductions

2008-12-05T18:00:00.000-08:00

Hello, I'm Chris Bourret and I'm an ESOL teacher for RI Family Literacy Initiative - RIFLI. I teach out of the William Hall Library in Cranston. This year we've had students in my morning ESOL class do dialogue journals, which have been excellent. I am really proud of how much everyone has written this semester.
Students have been so curious about what their classmates have written this term. So we decided to put some writings on a class blog. That way they are accessible to the whole class. Everyone chose one piece they really liked from their journals, and then I put the writings here on the blog. We've also been able to add sound to the stories, so you will be able to see and hear each journal entry. Hope you enjoy them!

Irina's favorite holiday

2008-12-05T11:40:00.001-08:00

The New Year is sometimes my favorite holiday in Russia. We usually decorate the fir tree and put many gifts under the tree.

Often, everybody thinks that the New Year brings new hopes with it.

Usually, we say good-bye to the passing year, with glasses of wine. We meet the New Year with a glass of champagne.

The relatives and guests usually congratulate each other. They always dance and sing.

Usually, in Russian we say "How to meet the New Year, just live it."

Maria's Thanksgiving

2008-12-05T11:28:00.001-08:00

11-26-2008. It was a special day for us in the English class, because we had breakfast together to celebrate Thanksgiving Day. I had to go home during class, but came back. We had different sweet things, but my coffee was not missing when I came back to class. Thank you everybody!

November 27, 2008. I made roast pork and sweet potatoes with green salad. I was invitied to three homes, but I could only go to one, my brothers house. I had a great time. I love my family. They made a good turkey. We enjoyed it and watched movies too.

Candy's Dogs

2008-12-05T11:21:00.000-08:00

Today is Thursday November 6th, 2008. The weather is cloudy and raining.
When I got off work and came home, I opened the door. I was surprised to see Gigi. Gigi is my
husband's sister's dog. Bobo is mine.

Last month, Gigi went to Connecticut because my sister in law lives there. I thought Gigi moved. Tonight, I saw her again. I asked my father in law what happened. He said Gigi missed us, and just visited her a couple of weeks. So that's it, my father in law went to Connecticut to bring her back.

When Gigi saw me, she was happy. Bobo, as always, followed her and smelled her. I thought they were missing each other.

Here are the pictures. The big one is Bobo. He is 70 pounds. the small one if Gigi. She is 7 pounds. Enjoy!

Bai Votes in the USA

2008-12-05T03:44:00.000-08:00

November 4th. It's Election day. At 8:30am I go to the Holliman School to cast a ballot. In the parking lot, someone passes out campaign advertisements. Then I go into the ballot room. I am feeling nervous a little bit, because it is my first time to do voting in the United States.

A poll worker lets me show my ID to check the name. After, he gives me a ballot. I make my choices in the boxes. I finish the ballot, and put it inside the ballot machine. I complete my first vote.

When I write this journal, the election of the president has an answer already. Obama became the 44th President of the United States. God bless the U.S.A.

Margarita Leiva

2008-12-03T14:25:00.000-08:00

The name of my little loved ones are Nicholas and Christopher. I met them the first time in September of 2007. When I went to their home they were sleeping. I looked into their cribs and what a surprise! Nicholas had blonde hair and blue eyes and his skin was very fair. Christopher, on the contrary, had black hair, black eyes, and darker skin.

They were born August 13, 2007. They were twins. Nicholas was the oldest and weighed 4 pounds and 2 ounces. Christopher was born 45 minutes later and he weighed 4 pounds and 8 ounces. their temperments also were very different. Nicholas was happy and quiet and Christopher was nervous and sad.

One day the telephone rang and an unknown voice asked me "Are you Margarita?" She was the mother of the babies. She told me that somebody had recommended me as a babysitter. She said she was a doctor, and her husband was one too. At the time I was not working, and I was praying to God to help me to find a job.

I accepted immediately, and that is how I took over my little loved ones. They were just a couple of weeks old. I have been with them for over a year. Now the little boys are running everywhere, and they look so big, healthy and happy.

I take care of them everyday and I do it with all my love. I think they love me too.

Li Yun

2008-12-03T14:21:00.000-08:00

Thanksgiving has passed. We had a party in class before the holiday. Everyone brought a lot of kinds of food. Everyone was tasting and talking and making friends. I brought a little food for my daughter. She liked the cake the teacher's wife made. I liked the party. We relaxed.

On Thanksgiving Eve, my family and I stayed home to celebrate Thanksgiving. I cooked a lot of Chinese food. I didn't have traditional foods such as turkey. It's so huge. We can't eat a lot because there are only three people. We called it "Thanksgiving of the the Chinese Way."

Yi Ping Chen

2008-12-03T14:19:00.000-08:00

Columbus Day

Today is Monday October 3, 2008. The weather is beautiful. Today is Columbus Day Holiday. Many stores have sales. Today I go to "Target" store. There children clothes is very cute and cheap. I bought five outfits for my grandson.

Yang Wei

2008-12-03T14:16:00.000-08:00

I work at a restaurant in the kitchen. My job is cooking. I am cooking vegetables, fried rice, fried noodles, chinese food, and make side jobs with anything. In the kitchen it is a very hard job.

It is summer. In the kitchen it is very hot and in the winter the kitchen is very cold to make side jobs. I like spring and fall because these 2 seasons are warm.

Lily's Thanksgiving

2008-12-03T14:04:00.000-08:00

Thanksgiving

November 27, 2008. It's a beautiful day today. We have a nice Thanksgiving day. I have been in America for six years. I am thinking about my first year Thanksgiving day. It was snowing but today it is sunny and very nice. 6 years ago I didn't know what was Thanksgiving. My family told me about the day that in America lots of people will eat turkey and lots of stores close. And then my family cooked the turkey and showed me how to eat it. Now I know what is Thanksgiving. Today we have a turkey, squash, stuffing, yams, blueberry pie, pumpkin cheesecake and we are all together as a family. We have a good time today. Happy Thanksgiving!

Yan Q Zhang

2008-12-03T13:58:00.000-08:00

Today is Saturday. I took my son Timmy to Pawtucket's ice skating rink. Timmy was testing for skating level 2. He passed all the rounds of the test. He had the passing certificate, and ran toward me smiling. I'm very proud of him.