As I sit around this wooden table surrounded by these precious faces, I stand amazed at their bravery, compassion, and capacity for hope. 

This year in Santa Matilde, in place of running my 1st and 2nd grade group, I'm leading a reading group for students 4th grade-9th grade (and one university student). We were really fortunate to be loaned a set of Esperanza Renace (or Esperanza Rising) novels to use with our students. 

This is a beautiful story of hope and learning to overcome. I love meeting each week with my group. It's an hour of building better reading fluency, improving comprehension, practicing dictionary skills and analyzing story components. Those are all things that are important and that, as a teacher, I love to teach. But it's more than just that... 

It's an hour where they increase their confidence to read aloud and their bravery to share. It is seeing their kind hearts, their outrage over injustice, and their continual hope that even the worst situation can improve. I love to see their empathy as they enter into Esperanza's world and learn to see things through her eyes. They are growing as readers and as people. 

These moments around this table with our books in hand is quickly becoming one of my favorite parts of the week.