Another Snow Day

Yesterday was a snow day. Today, I look outside, and see the most snow I have ever seen in my life, piled up as high as a small child. My mind goes immediately to "You're a Good Man Charlie Brown" and the line that Lucy says to Charlie Brown: "Snow grows up! Charlie Brown, Snow grows up!". I picture the snow, not falling from the sky, but growing like grass, until it has reached this amazing new height, encasing everything in its whiteness. Then I think back a day, to the email I received from one of my students. This student, a girl of 12 years, has become my greatest tugger, so needy and yet so giving. She wrote; hi i  wich school was to day i miss you. How can that not tug at your heart?  I wonder what she is doing on these snow days. What is her family life like? What supports does she have? What does she think about all this snow? Does she have a "Charlie Brown" in her background that she relates to? When you teach students from so many other places on our planet, you are always wondering what background knowledge they bring with them. What events happened in their lives before America, and post America, that  play into the personality of the student you see? ESL teachers can't teach only the mind, we have to teach the whole child. This is how so much of our hearts are given away.Is there a better place to make a donation, than a child?