Customer Reviews

The Cave Painter of Lascaux (A Journey Through Time)

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I purchased this book last year and read it to my Kindergarten students when we were learning about cave art (I teach elementary art). They enjoyed the story and it gave them a good introduction to cave art. Today I was browsing on this site and happened to click on this page to see if anyone had reviewed this book. When I read the editorial review, I was puzzled. It seems as if the reviewer read a different version of the book than the one that I have. The book I have is about a girl whose class goes on a field trip to the Lascaux caves. This part of the story is not realistic, because the cave is closed to the public. While there, she gets separated from her group. As she is wandering through the cave the flash on her camera goes off and she catches a glimspe of the fantastic paintings of animals on the cave walls. All of a sudden, she feels a tug at her camera strap. It is a caveman who is trying to keep her from falling. It turn out that he is not a real caveman. He is an expert on the stone age and a tour guide. He's dressed like a caveman for the tourists. While they are talking, a real caveman appears and tells them about how real cavemen dressed and lived. When the girl hears her tour bus honking and realizes that she has to leave, the real caveman gives her his necklace, she says goodbye to both cavemen, and she hurries to catch her bus. There is absolutely nothing in the story about a caveman attempting to start a fire with two sticks or the girl giving the caveman matches. I wonder if the reviewer read an earlier version of the story that was changed before it was published in the United States.

I am an elementary school art teacher, and this book was a perfect addition to my unit on the Lascaux cave paintings. I read this book aloud to all my second grade classes. This book can be read aloud in ten to fifteen minutes which is perfect for my classes. My students thought the book was funny and they were engaged in the story. After the story, there is some additional useful information on prehistoric artists. Great Book!

When Anna and her classmates go on tour to see the famous cave paintings in Lascaux, France, she gets separated from her group and meets a tour guide dressed as a caveman who explains to her some of the wonderful things she see's in the elaborate cave system. Then Anna and the tour guide meet someone else dressed as a caveman -- and he's the real thing! He is one of the artists who drew the famous paintings of humans and animal life on the walls of the cave. Their new acquaintance tells them what life was really like back in the Stone Age. Eventually Anna is able to rejoin her classmates and has learned a great deal about not only the cave paintings, but the people who made them. A superbly written and illustrated picturebook story by Roberta Angeletti, "The Cave Painter Of Lascaux" is further enhanced for young readers with a section about what archaeology has taught us about people of the Stone Age with respect to who they were, where they lived, what they wore, what we speculate they believed in, and how it's thought that the beautiful cave paintings in Lascaux were created so long ago. "The Cave Painter Of Lascaux" is as entertaining as it is informative and a welcome, enthusiastically recommended addition to school and community library picturebook collections for young readers.

I am very happy with the product and the speed of delivery.