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Home > The 21st Century Classroom > #vted Reads: The Last Cuentista


	Podcast:		The 21st Century Classroom
	Episode:		#vted Reads: The Last Cuentista
	Category:		Education
	Duration:		00:59:19
	Publish Date:		2022-06-08 15:36:12
	Description:		Lovely listeners, welcome back. I'm Jeanie Phillips, and on this episode, I get to talk about "The Last Cuentista", a book by Donna Barba Higuera. It's a fantastic middle grades book that touches on the tension between technology and organic life, duty and desire, along with what we know about identity -- and how we know it. It's also a book that asks us questions, like: how are you keeping the young people in your life plugged in and growing? And: Do you know the stories they tell about themselves? And most importantly, do you know how to help them tell those stories? My guest today is Ornella Matta Figueroa, who works to support storytellers out of trauma, with Safeart, out of Chelsea, Vermont. She's also part of the Vermont Education Coalition. This is Vermont Ed Reads, a show about books, by, for and with Vermont educators. Let's chat. The 21st Century Classroom · TheLastCuentista Jeanie: I'm Jeanie Philips and welcome to #vted Reads, we're here to talk books, for educators, by educators and with educators. Today I'm with Ornella Matta-Figueroa. And we'll be talking about The Last Cuentista by Donna Barba Higuera. Thank you so much for joining me Ornella. Tell us a little bit about who you are and what you do. Ornella: Thank you so much for having me. My name is Ornella Matta, and I'm coming to you from the Vermont Education Coalition, also co-director of Safeart, which is a nonprofit based out of Chelsea. We address trauma and communities to creative expression and storytelling. Jeanie: I can't think of anybody more perfect than to talk about this book, The Last Cuentista. But before we get to this one, what are you reading? Right now, Ornella? Ornella: Right now, I'm revisiting bell hooks Teaching to Transgress, and seeing it with these eyes that have gone through the pandemic and have lived the last few years is a totally different experience. And trying to figure out how do we create liberatory classroom? So that's my work of the moment. Jeanie: We can always learn more from bell hooks I find every time I read her, I have a new full body learning experience. Ornella: Same. Absolutely. Jeanie: Well, let's it's tempting as it would be to talk about bell hooks right now let's, let's come back to The Last Cuentista, which is a book that starts the very beginning of this book, we know that the world as we know it is ending, a comet is going to strike Planet Earth in the year is like 2060 something and I wondered if you wanted to just give our listeners a little snapshot of who our main character is and what's happening in her life. Ornella: So, how old is Petra? Jeanie: I think she is like 13. Ornella: She 13 or 14 years old? Jeanie: I think she's on the cusp. She's like 13? Ornella: Yes. So, we have Petra, and the book opens up with storytelling and this very moving goodbye between Petra and her grandmother. And there is a lot of you know, anticipation of what is going to happen next? What is it that we have to do? We start and see the relationship between Petra and her family, and we start to understand the earth. It is a little bit, you know, prophetic almost in a sense of, ooh, “A lot of this introduction sounds a lot like the worsening of the earth today.” And yeah, so the main character is Petra. And we meet family. In the beginning of the story, I would, I would say that. Jeanie: And Lita, her grandmother is a storyteller. And, and Petra aspires to be like her when she grows up. Ornella: A lot of inner conflicts we're seeing between the family, what the who Petra wants to be versus who her family wants her to be? While all of this chaos is happening, and they're trying, you know, they've been selected. And there's also this new one, so who gets to live and who gets to die? Jeanie: More about the selected - what are they selected to do? Petra and her family. Ornella: Selected to be leaving Earth and one of these shuttles, that's supposed to be,
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