Scene: Zuni Pueblo, a kindergarten/first grade writers’ workshop. Chatting with Serena, who is writing about her family.
Serena: I can spell Melissa. That’s my sister’s name. Only we call her Medusa.
Me: Does your sister have hair like snakes?
Serena (after a stare): She doesn’t have any hair. She’s bald. She just got born.
*
Zuni: The kindergartners are dictating (and I’m illustrating) their story about a baby mouse carried away from her parents on a kite. I ask them, “What would her parents do?”
Abigail, five, mimes the mouse’s father: Scowling, fists on hips, she shouts, “Get down off that sky!”
*
Betsy James on Writing, Art, and Walking in the Desert