The Dot

Reynolds, P. (2003).The Dot. China: Humen.

ISBN 978-0-7636-1961-9

In this story, a young girl named Vashti is having trouble with coming up with ideas of what to paint in art class. Her teacher suggests she make a single dot and see where that takes her. Vashti does as she’s told but is unimpressed after she makes her dot and goes home rather discouraged. The next day the teacher has framed Vashti’s dot and this makes her want to do an even better dot. She takes her dot back and adds and adds to it until it is quite beautiful and unique, despite only being a dot. When another student begins to struggle in the same way, Vashti is quick to share the lesson she learned exactly how her teacher showed her.

I would love to read this book to 3-5 year olds because I think there is a certain level of frustration that some children have when it comes to expressing themselves creatively. With children becoming used to using their fine motor skills, the images they portray are not always how they want them to be, and sometimes they simply do not know where to start. This story would be a good example of how art doesn’t necessarily have to look like anything, its self expression and can look however you want and still be beautiful. 

I love how the story uses coloured backgrounds to reflect how the characters are feeling. Red for frustrated, green for stubborn, you could point this out to young children and ask why they think the background is red and if it might be because of how a character is feeling. While the main character stays black and white, the author used watercolour and tea to illustrate this book which gives it a light and carefree type feel. It is very pleasing to the eye because the images are in the middle of a white page and are simplistic. When I look through this book I feel very calm and elated by the characters expressions and body language. In order to promote interest in this book, I would put all different kinds and colours of dots all over my classroom before the children came in for the day. We would paint dots and draw dots and finger paint dots. Have an entire dot themed art lesson before reading this book.

In order to present this book creatively to the class I would choose from any of the following:

1.     Felt Board Story: I would need lots and lots of dots for this story, as well as a felt piece of paper, a teacher, Vashti, a group of people felt, little canvases with dots already on them and one canvas with one black dot and Vashti’s signature, with one little boy at the very end. I would prefer to hand make these felt board pieces because I am a very creative person and I think it is within my skill level, plus I have very specific ideas of what I want them to look like. I would chunk the book from the levels of Vashti’s confidence. Starting with her being frustrated and feeling bad about herself to starting to understand how to be artistic and finally being proud enough to share what she’s learned with the little boy. I would also stop on the page where they are in the art gallery and ask the children which of her artwork is their favourites and why.

3.     Clothes Line Story: I would use a clothes line that shows each stage of Vashti’s personal experience and leading it back to her teaching another student the same thing. Using hand-drawn images copied from the book I would display each emotion of Vashti’s and perhaps even ask the children what they think she is feeling before reading that section of the story, this book has a lot of expression and would be easy for children to articulate how she is feeling. I would give out blank paper before the class and ask each child to draw one dot, then use their art on the story clothesline instead of Vashti’s. This would make the children feel like they are a part of the story and would be very exciting to see their artwork shown creatively with a story. I would pause and ask whose dots were whose when I came to new ones and ask why they made the dots they way they did. Why they chose the colours, etc.

4.     Dolls: I would use these dolls my grandmother used to make when I was younger that have no faces and children can draw on the dolls face with washable markers to show each emotion during the story. My grandmother used to do it with me and my cousins and I always remember one story turning into an hour long session of us discussing what we were drawing on the dolls faces and showing our grandma how “angry” looks on our dolls. We had a large mirror that I would try to get to see what each emotion looks like and then draw it to progress the story. I would need probably about 6 or 7 of a Vashti doll, one teacher and one little boy. I would use a small piece of paper for her drawings and have them pre drawn. With each emotion I would have a child colour in an article of clothing on “Vashti” and so by the end when she is happy and proud of herself she is all coloured and bright while the little boy is introduced black and white like Vashti was at the beginning.

An extension that could go well with these would be for children to bring in any books, clothing, toys, etc. That have a kind of “art” that the children find beautiful. I could get co-workers to bring in different pieces of their favourite artwork to show how much variety there is in art. Also could have the children have a self lead art session where they can make their own art, simply draw or paint whatever they like no matter what it might be and put them all together in a collage on the wall.