Multicultural Literature: The Legend of the Indian paintbrush by Tomie DePaola:

    This story is about a young Indian boy called Gopher.  From a young age he made toy warriors from scrapes of leather and wood.  He never went and played with the other boys because he was smaller than them and couldn’t keep up with them riding, running, or shooting their bows.  One night Little Gopher went into the hills to think about becoming a man and the sky suddenly filled with clouds.  A dream-vision came to him and a young maiden and an old grandfather appeared in the clouds.  They told him that he would make brushes from animal hair and paint on animal skin for the people of his village.  The young maiden showed him a pure white buckskin and told him when he found one to keep it for one day he will paint the colors of the night sky.  Years later after he had been faithful to his dream-vision and painted diligently for the village, he found a pure white buckskin.  He tried and tried but he could never find the right mixture of color to be as brilliant as the night sky.  One night he had another dream-vision that told him to go up on the mountain and there he would find the tools that he needed to paint the color of the sky.  When he went up on the hill he found just that, he found paint brushes filled with all of the colors of paint that he needed.  He left those paintbrushes up on the hill and the next morning they blossomed into the flower now known as the Indian paintbrush  After that day he was known and loved by the people of the village and his new name was He-Who-Brought-The-Sunset-To-The-Earth. 

    This story is one that does a great job of depicting this Indian village.  I do not know how considerate the facts or illustrations are.  The old folktale of the Indian paintbrushes however, has been passed down for generations.  I think this book has a great purpose in the classroom as a way of showing how stories and folktales can be passed.  As an activity I would have my students create their own painting similar to the ones that Little Gopher would paint.  We would first research more paintings that the Indians would have done at this time, then I would give my students creative reign to paint a picture that they think would look authentic to this village.