Evaluation

Gerald McDermott is a gifted storyteller and illustrator who graduated from the Pratt Institute. The pictures in this story are both intricate and unique. He uses vivid colors and black cutouts/geometric shapes to create his illustrations. Probably one of my favorite parts of this story is when the boy solves the Sun God’s riddles correctly and no words are written for four complete pages. The author is inviting the reader to use his imagination to imagine what the boy is doing in that very moment. These four pages would be a great time for the class to come up with a list of predictions together. This is a fabulous book to incorporate into the Native American unit at school. The teacher could focus on four different Native American Tribes and find books that illustrated the myths and tales that belong to each one. Afterwards, the children could create their own flip chart that has the name of the tribe on the front and four or five interesting face about the trip on the inside. If you are a really adventurous teacher, you may have the students create their own native American illustration that mimics the work McDermott does in “Arrow to the Sun.”