Intonation is the rise and fall in the pitch or tone of your voice as you read aloud. Use this passage to practice reading with proper intonation. Print a copy of this passage from InsideNG.com to help you monitor your progress.
He stands up as I run to him. I cry angry tears.
A moment like this comes for every immigrant child.
It is hard to leave a home you know. It is even harder to make another place home. Everything is new. Everything is strange. Everything is different.
I tell Papi how I feel.
“I hate it here! I am not like them, and they are not like me!” I say to him.
Papi pulls out a handkerchief and hands it to me.
My father, the gardener, looks at me intently for a few moments. Then he asks, “Carmita, do you remember our mango tree in Cuba?”
“Yes,” I sniff. I am curious now.
“Do you know what it means to graft a tree?”
I nod. “You take a branch from one tree and attach it to another tree. The branch and the tree grow together. Right?”
“Sí, that is right,” Papi says.
My father tells me that I am like a branch from that Cuban mango tree. He says Georgia is like the magnolia tree. I must wait. Eventually, the mango and magnolia will grow together.