Drawn Together
“Sometimes you don’t need words to find common ground.”
“Drawn Together” by Minh Lê is a wonderful story about a grandfather and grandson learning to connect with one another despite the challenges they face speaking to one another. Dan Santat’s illustrations beautifully represent how these two people communicate through a shared love of art. Their two unique styles blend together representing the relationship between a grandfather and grandson.
We love this story because it highlights a struggle that many families have. Sometimes it is difficult for older family members and younger family members to connect - especially now that we have the added obstacle of social distancing because of the pandemic. Every family can relate to that in some way or another.
We also love that the story highlights the experience of an Asian-American family, specifically. The book shows the stark contrasts between the boy and his grandfather. Their food preferences, language, and artistic styles are each shown to be opposite. In that difference, however, something new and wonderful is created when they are brought together. That is a beautiful representation of why we think diversity in life is so magical.
Teachers
Ask your students critical questions about the language in books. In this story, the book features the Thai language and the writing is unique and quite different from what the English language looks like. What other languages do your students speak? What languages do their family members speak? Have students bring in samples of different languages they find or are exposed to at home. Perhaps there are even stories in other languages that your students could read and share with the class.
Some Things to Think About…
Discussion questions:
Have you ever had a difficult time explaining your thoughts and ideas?
How else do you communicate besides using words?
What does body language tell us and how are various behaviors and messages delivered in one culture or another?
Activity idea:
Play Pictionary! It’s a great way to practice communicating through drawing. If you don’t have the game, that’s fine. Just practice drawing pictures with your friends or family and guess what each other is trying to say. Bonus - Pictionary can even be playing on Zoom and Facetime!
illustrated by Dan Santat
