Dude

Dude 

written by Aaron Reynolds

illustrated by Dan Santat

Published: 2018

Dude is a picture book that follows a platypus and beaver who want to go surfing with a shark. The three sea creatures go swimming, but they run into trouble when they get closer to the shore. 

Picture Text Interaction: Within this book, the illustrations hold the role of establishing the story. Since there is minimal text per page, the illustrations expand and add to them so that readers are able to understand. Without the illustrations, readers would be unable to comprehend the book. 

Analysis/Activity: Below is the activity Composition that Generates Plots, which enables students to understand how compositions of pictures help to generate and support the plot within a story.

	At first sight, you see...	And then you see...
First opening	There are two animals that have surfboards and there is an ice cream store next to them. There is a speech bubble that says the word “dude”.	We notice two other animals and the caution sign and the animals looked worried when they see the caution sign.  There are a lot of rocks in the ocean.
Second opening	There are speech bubbles with a white background that jump off the page. The animal’s face looks like they are close to the front of the page. The beaver and platypus both have emotion on their faces.	The reflections in the water and the shark fin in the back corner. There are also two mini pictures within the main image.
Third opening	There is a shark on the page. There are four different pictures.  He is eating an ice cream cone.	He offers the ice cream cone to the beaver who is then saying no. The beaver is looking around waiting for the platypus to return.
Fourth opening	It is a darker scene. There is a shark. It is a top view of the shark. There are two other images on the next page that include the shark, beaver, and platypus.	The shark has a bathing suit on him. The characters are confused as to where the shark is going… we infer that through the question marks.