Today in Colombia is Valentine's Day or, in Spanish, Día del Amor y la Amistad. I highly prefer the latter title as it's literally translated into "Day of Love AND Friendship." It's a much more inclusive name and not-so-depressing for the singletons.
Coincidentally, yesterday I administered a spelling test from an american-published resource that had a fill-in-the blank question that looked like this:
Keesha ___________ valentines in the month of ______________ .
This sentenced was followed by another fill-in-the blank question that looked like this:
His birthday is in __________________ .
This week's words followed the short 'e' pattern and included the words sent, February, and September. Quick 3rd-grade quiz for you: Using the words sent, February, and September, fill in the blanks in the sentences above not using a word more than once. As an love-sick or love-lacking American would do, you would probably fill in the blanks as such:
Keesah sent valentines in the months of February .
His birthday is in September .
Did you pass?
Upon checking my students' tests, I was quickly appalled by how many students were mixing up the months of February and September. I circled their wrong answers with green pen and marked '-1' with some satisfaction...
...that is until the fourth test when I realized how culturally IGNORANT I was being. My realization hit me like a ton of bricks: VALENTINE'S DAY IS IN SEPTEMBER IN COLOMBIA! DUH! I had to return to the three tests I had graded prior and humbly write 'OK' in place of my '-1' like this:
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