Once Fernanco has made his own paints and bought new brushes, he realizes that he has no paper, so he decides to brighten the whole village of Sabana Grande with his artwork.

Great biography about painter Fernando Espino and is an easy read for kids.

Summary:
This book is about a boy named Fernando. He lives in a village in Sabana Grande in Panama. When school is out for the dry season, he wants to paint. He makes his own paints, following the directions given to him by his teacher, but can't find any paper. He asks his parents if he could paint the outside walls of their adobe house, but they say no. When his parents see how sad Fernando is, they let him paint their house. At first, people thought he was silly. Then when they seen how beautiful his painting was they watched. People came from other villages to see him paint. The neighbors in his village asked Fernando to paint their houses also.

Personal Reaction:
I liked this book because it is an example that if you really love something you will find a way to make it possible. I would read this book to my kids when they get discouraged about something.

Classroom Extensions:
I would read this to my class before learning about secondary colors. The only colors Fernando had were black, yellow, and red. he needed to mix them to make other colors.
This would also be a good book to read before starting a project. Then you can tell the children, that even if they get discouraged to keep trying.

Summary: This book is about a boy whos teacher teaches him how to make paints. He makes his own paint and wishes for paper but no one seems to have any. One day he askes his mother if he can paint on his white adobe house and she finally says yes! He paints wonderful pictures and the while village comes to watch him and wants him to paint on their houses.

Person Reaction: I liked this book because it teaches children that if they set their mind to something they can achieve it.

Classroom Extension Ideas:
1. In the classroom, the children can learn how to make paints.
2. In the classroom, the children can paint on a piece of paper that looks like a house and act like its their adobe house. ( )

Fernando is a boy that lives in a village in Sabana Grande. Fernando made colored paint, out of things in his environment, but he had no paper to paint on. Finally his parents told him he could paint pictures on the outside of the clay and adobe house, he did. Everyone loved his paintings and Fernando ended up painting all seven houses in his village.

This book let’s children know that you are never too young to make a difference. With hard work and perseverance anything is possible.

I would add this book to multicultural week. I would have students pretend that we have no paper and have to go find something else in our environment that we can paint. With our paints we would go walking to see what we could paint on. When the student’s discover that we can paint on the sidewalk, then I will let them. When the students are done painting we will go back to the classroom and write a short paragraph about our experience.