Community Connections - Rafael Rosado

This morning, Red Oak welcomed local illustrator author Rafael Rosado for a visit. Rosado is co-author of the Beware series of graphic novels which feature three children, each uniquely equipped to battle medieval challengers including giants, dragons, and wizards. Many ROCS students feel in love with Claudette, Marie, and Gaston this year as various students brought Giants Beware! and Dragons Beware! to school. We invited Mr. Rosado to come visit following the release of the third book in the series, Monsters Beware! 

At the start of his presentation, we took a poll of how many students had read each of the books in the series and nearly every student raised his or her hand at least once. Mr Rosado was impressed and said, "It's great to know how many of you have read the books! Now I know I'm taking to real fans."

During our time together, Mr. Rosado talked to the students about his artistic practice - how he and his long-time friend and collaborator Jorge Aguirre develop storylines and characters. Everyone was fascinated by the research process he uses to capture details of clothing and buildings that bring readers into the Middle Ages. He talked about the process of turning hundreds of digital drawings into a book and he shared comics he drew when he was a boy growing up in Puerto Rico. 

The kids had lots of questions including, "How old are the characters?" "Why do you write numbers on the bottoms of your drawings?" And "Who has the original book?"

He led a few student volunteers through a lively readers' theater activity and then walked everyone through the process of drawing Claudette. It was a special morning and everyone left inspired. 

Look for Rafael Rosado on an upcoming episode of WOSU's Broad and High and watch for footage from his visit with Red Oak!