Grandfather's Journey

One of Allen Say's most widely known texts is entitled Grandfather's Journey, and it was published in 1993.  One key aspect of this text is that Allen Say both wrote and illustrated the story, and it is a Caldecott Medal winner for the illustrations present within the text.  In researching Say' work, he described his writing process as one where he first draws the pictures and then later comes up with text to correspond with the pictures in order to tell the story.  Within this particular text, Say describes his grandfather's decision to the move to America while detailing his own love for two countries and the constant struggle he undergoes for being in love with two separate countries.  The illustrations in this story serve as resource to guide readers as the paintings tell a story of their own and are very visually en-capturing to readers. Within the text itself, this story would appeal to younger and older readers alike as the words are very simple but they key concepts behind the text can be extended into a social studies unit in order to further explorer the concept of immigration and assimilation into a new country.