Sally's Children's Book 8/8

Dazzle the Dinosaur

By Marcis Pfister

Dazzle the Dinosaur (1994) by Marcus Pfister is a narrative that tells the story of Dazzle, a young dinosaur who has unique glittering spines. The story begins when a strange egg appears in the nest of a Maiasaurus. When the egg hatches the Maiasaurs first think it is a normal baby dinosaur until it unfolds a row of glittering spines along its back. The dinosaurs name the baby Dazzle. Throughout the story the young dinosaur and his friend, Maia, explore their world and encounter other dinosaurs, both friendly and frightening. Dazzle decides to leave the safety of his home in order to help his family and friends by finding the Dragonsaurus who has instilled fear in his loved ones. Dazzle and Maia bravely attempt to remove the terrible Dragonsaur from the family's previous cave home, with the help of Dazzle's gleaming spines they succeed.

As discussed by Gamble & Yates (2008) narratives commonly follow one or more of the seven basic plots. Dazzle the Dinosaur displays common ideas from both the ‘overcoming the monster’ and ‘quest’ plot. This is depicted in the text as the Maiasaurus are attempting to overcome the Dragonsaurus. Dazzle and Maia achieve this through embarking on a quest. The overriding themes throughout this book include courage, companionship and family. This is reflected throughout this story as the young dinosaurs bravely embark on a quest in order to help their herd. 

The illustrations play an integral part throughout this story and feature beautiful glittering spines on Dazzle’s back. The spines that are pictured in the illustrations have been created using a holographic foil, which makes them truly shine. This engages students through the unique and stimulating effect that the spines create. This is a feature that is used throughout Pfister’s work and is also demonstrated in his book The Rainbow Fish (1992). By developing this unique element in the illustrations Pfister’s work becomes memorable and encourages students to comprehend the text further.

This story is a great teacher resource and mentor text that teachers can adapt and use in the classroom for various lessons. This includes helping the students understand narratives and their structure as well as integrating aspects of art by adapting the ‘dazzle’ technique used in the story to develop their own creations. This story could also be used to engage students in order to initially introduce the students to the topic of dinosaurs in SOSE.

References:

Gamble, N. & Yates, S. 2008, ‘Narrative: Narration and Structure’ in Exploring Children’s Literature, SAGE, pp. 45-77.