{"id":13631,"date":"2017-10-10T11:15:00","date_gmt":"2017-10-10T18:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.philosophyforchildren.org\/gaston-by-kelly-dipucchio-and-identity\/"},"modified":"2017-10-10T11:15:00","modified_gmt":"2017-10-10T18:15:00","slug":"gaston-by-kelly-dipucchio-and-identity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/plato-philosophy.org\/gaston-by-kelly-dipucchio-and-identity\/","title":{"rendered":"Gaston by Kelly DiPucchio, and Identity"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/a><\/div>\n


<\/span>In the picture book Gaston <\/i>by Kelly DiPucchio (illustrations by Christian Robinson), a bulldog named Gaston is part of a family of poodles. Although it does not come easily to him, Gaston learns to be prim and proper like the rest of the poodles. One day, Gaston and his family meet a family of bulldogs, and Gaston looks just like all of them except for Antoinette, a poodle, who looks just like Gaston’s family.  <\/span>

<\/span>The parents of each family surmise that the puppies must have been accidentally switched, so Gaston goes to live with the bulldogs and Antoinette with the poodles. Both Gaston and Antoinette soon learn, however, that they don\u2019t feel at home with their \u201cblood\u201d families; Gaston is too gentle for the bulldogs, and Antoinette is too rough for the poodles. The puppies switch back and are happy to be with their original families once more. <\/span>

<\/span>The story ends with an epilogue in which Gaston and Antoinette raise a family of their own, teaching their puppies to be \u201cwhatever they wanted to be.\u201d<\/span>

<\/span>The story raises questions about identity, including:<\/span><\/p>\n

What parts of us are important to defining who we are? What parts aren\u2019t as important?<\/div>\n
How much of your personality and beliefs come from your parents?<\/div>\n
Are we necessarily more like the people we look like?<\/div>\n
What kind of person do you want to be? What kind of person does your family or friends want you to be?<\/div>\n
What kinds of things can we gain and learn from making friends with different kinds of people?<\/div>\n
To foster an inquiry about these questions in a classroom, give each student an index card before reading the story. Ask the students to write down the three most important words or phrases that describe who they are. They could be anything, from something about their bodies, their families, their backgrounds, their interests, or whatever else they find important. You can also frame it as the three things they would say first about themselves when first meeting someone.<\/div>\n
When everyone is done writing down their responses, ask the students to share what they have written. Students will likely give a wide range of answers, and often their answers are quite different from what many adults would say. Whereas adults might respond with things like their jobs, their genders, and their ethnicities, children might list their pets or favorite school subjects as the things most important to defining them.<\/div>\n
After the initial exercise and reading the story, the discussion can use Gaston\u2019s journey to understanding himself as a way to begin exploring how the students understand themselves and their identities.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the picture book Gaston by Kelly DiPucchio (illustrations by Christian Robinson), a bulldog named Gaston is part of a family of poodles. Although it does not come easily to him, Gaston learns to be prim and proper like the rest of the poodles. One day, Gaston and his family meet a family of bulldogs, and … Gaston by Kelly DiPucchio, and Identity<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":12836,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[197,199,211,195],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13631","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-activities","category-childrens-literature","category-personal-identity","category-wondering-aloud"],"yoast_head":"\nGaston by Kelly DiPucchio, and Identity - PLATO - Philosophy Learning and Teaching Organization<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Gaston by Kelly DiPucchio, and Identity - a post from PLATO - The Philosophy Learning and Teaching Organization.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/plato-philosophy.org\/gaston-by-kelly-dipucchio-and-identity\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Gaston by Kelly DiPucchio, and Identity - 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