Multiculture Folklore Literature

Summary of the book: 

The Rough-Faced Girl is a Native American Cinderella story. The story is based on a Native American village, where an old poor man has three daughters living in a wigwam, and an invisible being with his sister lives in the village in one of the wigwams. The sister has told the village that only the one that can see the invisible being can marry him. The two oldest daughters are cruel and heartless to the youngest daughter, making her tend to fire, feeding the flames wood. The youngest daughter gets the name Rough-Faced Girl because of all the scars on her arms, hands, and face from the fire, along with her rough, burnt hair. The young daughter wants to marry the invisible being. She states that she sees him everywhere around her. The invisible being gives his love to the Rough faced girl. The invisible being and his sister can see the rough-faced girl's inner beauty and kind heart. 

 

Evaluate Genre/ Illustrations:

The book Rough Faced Girl represents multicultural; it shows the Native American version of a Cinderella story. The story portrays the same concept as the traditional Cinderella story: true love lives within a person. Folklore genre qualities are seen. An example is the story explores a significant universal theme, and the spoken language is rich with natural rhythms. The illustrations offer authentic cultural detail, seen in the Native American designs on the wigwam, clothing, and the character's physical appearance in the book's pictures. The illustration extends the story's narrative, for example, the image of the invisible man with the rainbow bow and the picture of the invisible being the rough face girl sees within nature, etc. The pictures in the book are vibrant natural element colors that visually represent how a Native American Village would appear. The illustrations are by David Shannon. Shannon has illustrated books such as The Ballad of the Pirate Queens and Encounter, How I Became a Pirate, and Pirates Don't Change Diapers. David is also a writer; he's written A Bad Case of Stripes, No David!, along with several other children's books (Wikimedia Foundation, 2023). Shannon received the Caldecott Honor for No David! (Wikimedia Foundation, 2023).

 

Motivational Activities:

After reading this book, I would have the students do an activity comparing and contrasting The Rough Face Girl story with the traditional Cinderella story. Open class discussion about the similarities and differences in the two stories once each group has completed the activity and presented their findings to the class. 

 

One of the activities I found was the one pictured above, which is having the students describe Rough Face Girl. You could put several different descriptive words on the board and have the students place which words describe Rough Face Girl to the picture, and as they add the word, have them explain why that describes her. I would add blank sticky notes in case the students have a descriptive word they would like to have that's not on the board. 

 

Personal comments/ Author background information:

I enjoyed this book; this is a story I have never read before; however, I will add it to my classroom library there are. There are so many learning activities that can be done with this story. I like the fact that it's multicultural; this is a way for the students to visually learn about Native American culture, such as clothing, housing, etc. The author of The Rough-Faced Girl is Rafe Martin. He is a storyteller and writer. Martin has been awarded many awards for his books, 2008 recipient of the empire state award a once in lifetime award, the 1996 American Folklore Society award for Mysterious Tales of Japan, the 1993 Best Bookseller for The Rough Faced Girl, along with many other awards (Arthur A. Levine, 2011). Martin is the author of several children's books, including The Boy Who Lived with Seals, The Banyan Deer, and Mysterious Tales of Japan (Arthur A. Levine, 2011). 

 

 

References

Arthur A. Levine, editor and publisher of H. P. (n.d.). Rafe Martin Author & Storyteller. https://www.rafemartin.com/index.html

Martin, R., & Shannon, D. (1992). The rough-faced girl. Scholastic.

Wikimedia Foundation. (2023b, June 25). David Shannon. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Shannon