Distant Together

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  Cover of Distant Together

Inspiration

The mental health toll of COVID-19 will far outpace its physical consequence. Through both its direct and indirect effects on the family, the pandemic may adversely impact the experience and wellbeing of young children, who lack age-appropriate resources to fully understand and cope with their changing circumstances. While a number of books have been written for very young children, not all fully engage with children's cognitive (including imaginative!) capacities during this developmental period. Concomitantly, we believe that this pandemic has also increased Sinophobia within the United States, and we are seeing some of those dynamics trickling down to influence children's perception of the world around them. We believe that our children's book offers an opportunity not only to strengthen children's knowledge of and ability to cope with COVID-19 in an imaginative and fun way, but also to foster inclusivity and perception that we are, as we always have been, distant but together.

Inspiration from the book thus draws from these observations and also from the authors' work. Daniel M. Friess is combating COVID-19 among homeless populations in Los Angeles, and Kathy Trang is studying the impact of COVID-19 among refugee populations globally.

What it does

Our picture book presents COVID-19 to children in the form of an adventure book. Danny, the protagonist of the story, shares many concerns that young children his age have regarding the pandemic, as he finds himself unable to go to school, be with friends, or see his grandmother. His growing frustration evolves into a dream sequence in which he is Danakos, a character he plays as in his favorite game War and Wizardry. Together with his best friends, Danakos goes on an adventure to rescue his grandmother from the CoVs, which are viruses causing COVID. Through this dream sequence, Danny learns what CoVs are; how they infect people; how to cope with change; and how he and his friends can play their part in stopping COVID-19, who may not involve magic, swords, or fire.

How I built it

Daniel Friess and I (Kathy Trang) wrote the story, and Kaitlin Banfill illustrated the book using watercolor. I then used Photoshop to color-correct the images and InDesign to layout the text and pictures.

Challenges I ran into

We had to rewrite the story several times to ensure that the plot was both imaginative, intellectually stimulating, and accessible to children. Concomitantly, while we wanted to build a rich world within this storybook, we also wanted to leave certain details open so that children reading the book can imagine themselves as Danny. In addition to the revisions that enabled us to meet those criteria, we found that the drawings critically enhanced story-telling and aided imaginative flair.

Accomplishments that I'm proud of

We are proud of how the story came together and how the drawings alongside the text engage readers' imagination, both playing a part in immersing them in this joint adventure.

What I learned

We learned that much can be accomplished through teamwork and that there is significant opportunity to translate complex epidemiological or medical concepts into accessible formats for people of varying ages and backgrounds.

What's next for Distant Together

We are interested in translating the text into Vietnamese, Mandarin, and Khmer first (reflecting the language background of our authors) then disseminating the book in elementary and junior high schools to widen its accessibility and impact.

Built With

• indesign
• photoshop
• watecolor