Grit

What it grit?

Have you ever thought about what is grit? Grit is the power of stamina. It is the strength of continuing long-term goals with perseverance, continuing with life day in & day out not worrying that you might fail at a certain point. It is like you are running a life marathon. That is what is grit. And believe it or not; people run on grit. People succeed on grit.

I am an American-born Citizen. As a child I traveled a lot. I traveled from one place to another and call it home. I wouldn't move around because of my parent's being illegal or because of work issues with them. Like those who move around with their families because they are illegal farm workers On the contrary, my mother could work here legally it was just my father who was the problem. He was young when I appeared into his world. He tired too hard to get me all my needs and even more. That was the problem. He started making stupid decisions which later reflected on me in school and which were the cause of us moving too much. My family only spoke Spanish back then. As a result that was the only language I spoke. It was the first language I learned.

The ability of speaking English didn't fully come to me once I was actually in the 3rd grade. We were here back in LA back then. I was born here in LA and we stayed here less then 6 months before we left to Huntington Park. From there we moved when I was like a year an a half to Rancho Cucamonga then to Ontario, CA. I started school in Ontario. I attended Pre-School then Pre-K then Elementary. I understood when people talked to me in English but because all the time I had been moving from one home in a city to another home in the same city or completely move to another city, I didn't have the opportunity of communicating much with kids or people who weren't my family. At school I was shy and even if I tried to speak English, people would speak to me in Spanish. Later on in the first semester of first grade I started trying out English speaking. I failed. But that didn't stop me. I would practice making the English sounds and tried getting my tongue to work the way my brain was thinking. It took me a lot of years. I felt like I was learning something new and weird.

I knew the basic things by the time I started the second grade back in LA. I practiced every day with my cousin who we were now living with. By the third grade I was proud of what I had achieved. It took me time and I have to admit I still struggle but now its just that at times my brain is slower than my tongue.

Grit should be taught in schools. However I feel like not everyone can learn what grit is. Grit is something one should develop on their own. I mean if students can learn grit the same way they learned how to add and subtract than that's great. But if they can't they can't be forced. If schools teach grit, they should show them examples of when people use grit and what grit is. Then from their they should teach according the students ability of understanding.