Islandborn

Book: Islandborn

Author: Junot Díaz

Illustrator: Leo Espinosa
Genre: Multicultural
Major Awards: 2019 Pura Belpre Honor
Age Group: 1st - 3rd
Summary: 

Everybody at Lola's school is from different places, Lola is from the Island. When the class is told to describe and draw the country they were from, Lola had a hard time remembering her life on the Island and this makes her sad. Her teacher encourages her to ask around and see if they remember anything for her to draw. This makes Lola really excited to a point where she actively writes does everything that she finds out. After a while, she has her own collection of ideas so that she can start drawing her picture, full of colorful doodles about the island, where she's from, and everything she had written down in her book. When she went back to school the next day, the class gathers around to look at everybody's artwork. Once it got to her drawings, she opened up her book with all her illustrations and out burst the island!

Evaluation & Comments: 

It was my first time reading this book and I absolutely loved it! The book was full of beautifully colored illustrations that have so many details that are worth noticing and pointing out to the students during read alouds. I think, out of all the picture books I've read so far, this might be in the top for favorite books because it has a cute story, message, and illustrations. This book could be used to teach students about culture because this is relatable to student's lives as they are going through school in the book as well. Along with that, everybody in the classroom is from somewhere different and everybody is uniquely different. That is so important to learn and remember, and that is something the book teaches. For activities, I think it would be fun for the students to make a book, like the students do in the book, and show it to the whole class. Another alternative to that activity is that we can have them bring a couple items that represent them and their culture or background and do a show and tell.