Local students received gift of books for the holidays through nonprofit’s program

Published January 5, 2023 on MorganHillLife.com

Winning essays also published in the January 11 – 24, 2023 print issue on page 11

From left: Kaylani Nguyen, Cinda Meister (co-owner of BookSmart), Andy To, Nathan Arriaga, Emily Shem-Tov and P.A. Walsh STEAM Academy fifth-grade teacher Sarah McDonald. The three students’ essays won the 2022 BookSmart Community Advantage Gift of Reading Essay Contest. Photo by Marty Cheek

 

By Staff Report

The BookSmart Community Advantage selected five essays written by local children as part of its fourth annual Gift of Reading Essay Contest.

In December, local school children received gifts of books and hands-on science kits through the program organized by the non-profit associated with local bookstore BookSmart. The group partnered with other local organizations to sponsor this year’s drive to provide books to children in the Morgan Hill and San Martin area.

The writing contest invited students in November to interview an adult who lived in the 20th century and to ask them about their life as a child, then pen a short essay about how childhood life in the past century was different from their own. More than 30 students talked to friends, relatives, and teachers and learned about their home lives, school experiences, technology, and other topics of interest. The students’ essays reflected on what they had found interesting.

“A panel of local judges, all incredible authors and teachers themselves, did the difficult work of picking winners from the wonderful submissions,” said Emily Shem-Tov, an organizer of the contest. “It was clear from the essays that the writers learned a lot of surprising things about what life had been like for their elders.”

Sarah McDonald, a 5th grade teacher at P.A. Walsh school used the writing prompt as an exercise in her class.

BookSmart Community Advantage partnered with the AAUW-Morgan Hill, The Friends of the Morgan Hill Library, and the Alpha Gamma Chapter of Morgan Hill to sponsor this year’s drive to provide books to children in the Morgan Hill and San Martin area.

 

Faith Pereira’s essay:

Childhood in the 1940’s was much different than childhood today. Mrs. Titherington was born the year 1941 in Stockton California. Unfortunately, her mother died giving birth, and sadly her father didn’t want her. He gave her to his sister, but she didn’t want her and couldn’t stand her. Fortunately, her other aunt and uncle adopted her, bringing her into their home with four older cousins, who then became her brothers. Her closest brother was four years older, and he cared for and protected her.

During childhood her family didn’t own a tv, they only had a radio, which she didn’t enjoy listening to. In her free time, she played with all the kids in her neighborhood. They played outside for countless hours and had so much fun especially in the summer when the children would stay out till night. It sounds stupendous. Most homes in America nowadays have multiple TVs where kids can watch and play countless movies and video games. At home she loved playing the piano and reading. Her favorite book was The Secret Garden. She said it made her feel like she had a “bosom buddy.” One thing that hasn’t changed is children still enjoy reading and find companions in books.

Interviewing Mrs. Titherington was fun and interesting. Although her life started out hard, her aunt took her in and cared for her and provided a good childhood. I think her story is admirable, and it was interesting to learn about childhood in the 1940’s.

 

 

Jonathan Shin’s essay:

Have you ever wondered about the life of elders or parents? Well, it’s time to imagine, feel, and reflect about someone I interviewed who was born far away from the United States, South Korea.

During his childhood there were almost no computers except telephones so kids called or played with each other. Of course, all the homework was done by hand.

At that time, in the elementary school, each class had at least 60 students and at least 10 classrooms for each grade, so that a total number of students was about 4000; 6 grades x 1O classes x 60 students. It was so hot in summer and cold in winter, but only an old style fireplace like stove that consumed wood and coal to produce heat, available in winter. And the outdoor gym was huge as a football field.

His chores and homelife were studying because teachers gave them a lot of homework even for holidays and breaks. But in free time, he read his favorite biography books because he can experience things in the book more than in “real-life.”

After Interviewing my dad it was interesting because I never expected to hear that there weren’t ACs or heaters. And also I never expected to hear that there were about 4000 students in his school and over 60 students in each classroom, plus that students need to do homework even for holidays or breaks. Also another surprising thing was that there weren’t that many electronics as we have today.

 

Andy To’s essay:

Did you know that life back in the day for my teacher was so much cooler than life now for her? Life back then was a very different society then life now. Especially the things we think are important now were mostly not important back in the day. The interesting facts I will be explaining precisely about are cell phones, cars, and outdoor activities.

Cell phones were a thing back then, yes it actually was. But, it did not have lots of features that we have today. You had to press a lot of buttons in order to call someone. You even had to be both home at the same time in order to call each other. If you wanted to call someone without being home you had to use a payphone to call somebody. In accordance with that, you both could use payphones, but you had to know exactly what time and what area to call that person. This seems a lot different than cellphones now, because we can call each other anywhere, anytime. Something funny is that my teacher would have to say embarrassing things on the phone, but she would not have to, because she would just tell them, “I will tell you at school tomorrow, bub bye!”.

How do you think people drive? You would drive with cars, kind of obvious. People would use old cars with not many features. There was not even AC or GPS, if you were trying to drive somewhere far away, you would need a paper mop or you would probably get lost. It would probably also be hot or even cold in the car. Another example of a car’s feature back then would be that little to no cars even had automatic windows. You had to spin a lever in 0rder for the window to open, it would also be a type of exercise. Today, we usually press a button to pull down the window, it is very easy.

Outdoor activities were one of the best ways of exercise back in the day. This would probably be the main entertainment when you were younger too. For example, when my teacher was little she would rollerblade and mostly play handball. She and her friends also rode bikes and skateboards. It seemed fun and exciting, also a good way of exercise aside from pulling down car windows.

As you could observe from reading, cellphones, cars, and outdoor activities back in the day were very different from activities in the modern era. While I look at the things I wrote, the things in the previous generation are very fun to learn about. It contained a lot of action and activities. You should find out more about what your teacher did back in the day!

You may ask how it felt interviewing my teacher, well my teacher had lots of things she did back in the day. While interviewing my teacher it was fun and interesting. When she told me about herself when she was little it showed me there were a lot more things back in the day than I thought there were.

 

Nathan Arriaga’s essay 

Would you be interested in interviewing somebody like one of your parents? I interviewed my teacher to tell her what was different back and the days compared to now. And you will learn the 3 things, which I think is interesting, later on. And I found most interesting that School was different back then, people wore different clothes, and she had different cell phones (house phones). ·

One thing was her school was kinda different. It was different because she had More homework than we have today. And that her homework would take much longer to do than now. She said that “when I was in school, we had lots of homework”. “I would have to read, do around 20 math problems, answer questions for social studies, and do worksheets for language practice”. Which I think is a lot of homework. And nowadays for homework we just have to read and do 4-6 math problems.

Another thing is clothing styles were different. The styles were different because people wore lots of baggy jeans and T shirts, but now not a lot of people wear baggy jeans but still wear T shirts. And they were the primary things people would wear. Also back in the days, people didn’t care much about shoes. So probably people didn’t have nice shoes.

Finally, the last thing was before, she had different cell phones called “house phones.” Instead of having a cell phone, (which weren’t invented yet} she had a house phone, which was a phone that was connected to the wall. She said that ‘We only had house phones, and they were plastic, they also had buttons you needed to press to dial a phone number.” But nowadays phones are made of glass and we don’t have any buttons to press.    Also, she said, if you wanted to get in touch with people, they needed to be at their house. Or else you didn’t know what happened to them or where they were. But nowadays you can call people when they aren’t home and when you aren’t home.

I found most interesting while interviewing my teacher that school was sort of different back then, people mostly wore different clothes, and she had a different phone called a “house phone.” I think the things I learned, from my teacher, were very interesting and unique. I think you, readers, will find it interesting interviewing somebody you know and should do that.

My experience when I interviewed my teacher was very interesting because I learned a lot of facts I didn’t know about my teacher. Like how school was back then and what people wore back then. But the most interesting thing for me was how school was back then. Because I learned that my teacher had much more homework than we have today.

 

Kaylani Nguyen’s essay:

Have you ever thought of the comparison between back then and now? Things back then were very different from what we have in this world today. My class and I interviewed my teacher; Mrs. McDonald, and the three things that I decided I will talk about are outdoor activities, what kind of fashion they had, and what was trendy back then.

For outdoor activities, Mrs. McDonald said that she had rollerbladed a lot as well as biking. “We rode bikes a lot, and lots of my friends had skateboards too.” Now, I rollerblade with my friends and sometimes bike ride with my dad.

Another thing is style and fashion. She had said that they wore baggy jeans, t-shirts, and flannels. My teacher said, “flannels were a thing back in my day, whenever it was cold we would wear our flannels, but when it was hot we tied it around our waist.” Nowadays, girls wear ripped jeans, baggy jeans, leggings, crop tops, and t-shirts.

Last topic is trendy things. My teacher had said Guess was a brand that they wore back then, they also wore long dangly earrings, and flannels. “trendy things back then were long dangly earrings, a brand of jeans called guess, and flannels.” Today, the brand Guess is still available to shop at. Now people don’t really wear flannels but me and my mom like to match sometimes and wear flannels. Today, there are many earring designs but I wouldn’t say there is a specific popular type.

When me and my class interviewed Mrs. McDonald, I thought the topics outdoor activities, style, and what was trendy back then was interesting. I think my teacher’s life back then was pretty cool like our lives right now. You should talk to your teacher about what it was like in their era of time.

It was informative because we got to hear things from Mrs. McDonald’s life when she was a child. Also get to hear stories from her childhood. I think everything was very interesting but a few topics caught my attention. Now, things are different but now people are bringing back stuff from back in the day.