Froglet Posted February 13, 2012 Posted February 13, 2012 I need to ask what is probably a really stupid question. I have an English unit coming up (I teach a YR/1 mix) for Fairy stories with predictable language and another of Fantasy stories. I would like to move the Fairy stories one to the summer term as I would like to use The Enormous Turnip to tie in with our summer term 'plants and animals' topic. However, my topic for the first part of next term is Castles. Is a castle a fantasy story setting or does it depend on what happens there? Would stories that include dragons be fantasy stories? Are fairy stories also fantasy stories? I.e. could I do Cinder or Sleeping Beauty for a fantasy story this term? If dragons count as fantasy can anyone think of good dragon stories I could do with this age group? Would Robin Hood stories count as fantasy and does anyone know of good child friendly versions? Sorry, lots of questions - I'm not trying to get people to do my planning for me I'm just trying to see if the switch round I want to do is feasible and am having a bit of a mental blank. I've often 'done' QPootle5 as a fantasy story but we've just done work around 'Whatever Next' and we're a bit 'spaced out' at the moment!
Guest Posted February 13, 2012 Posted February 13, 2012 HI We have just had fairy stories and the children asked for robin hood. We used Each peach and Once upon a time as starting stories, then the children asked for Robin hood, Cinderella, Goldilocks and we had to do Little red riding hood as part of a school thing. The boys especially loved the castle play so that stayed with us the whole time, we had a shoe shop for cinderella, we built towers and moats etc for the castles. We also had a fairy tale land themed role play area. I'm not sure though they are fantasy??? not sure to me fantasy is really made up everything about it whereas Robin hood castles are true, kings/queens are true. Dragons are fantasy (although quite like the idea of them being real) I think a fairy story is a fairy story not fantasy??? someone will put me right when i've just googled its coming up things like Harry Potter and Narina make believe. Fairy stories are old stories passed down ?????
Susan Posted February 13, 2012 Posted February 13, 2012 Ive always worked on traditional tales as fairy stories----starting once upon a time and ending with they all lived happily ever after AND fantasty tales are anything else. One year I supported an NQT and we used The Gruffalo as our fantasy tale. I wouldnt use Robin Hood as fantasy nor the other tales you mention personally but its certainly not impossible if you can justify the category to your children. The Gruffalo talks about lots of different homes so maybe a tenuous link for your castle and a dragon could be an alternative creature for a story based on it?? Have fun!
Froglet Posted February 14, 2012 Author Posted February 14, 2012 Thank you - I'm glad it's not just me who gets confused! I don't really count Robin Hood as fantasy - far too real for me! I've been to the library this morning and got a couple of books which I think will work: Monsters Not Allowed! by Tracey Hammett & Jan McCafferty about a monster who comes to school - familiar setting but fantasy creature George's Dragon by Claire Freedman & Russell Julian - about a boy who has a dragon as a pet. I think both of these will work as models for them to write their own stories with a different fantasy creature/or different setting. Then I think we'll move on to something like 'Where the Wild Things are' for a complete fantasy. We did a little bit of work towards this recently with a unit called 'Fictional recounts'.
finleysmaid Posted February 14, 2012 Posted February 14, 2012 (edited) hi Helen i was going to suggest the story Zog for your dragon story (or even shrek?) while searching i came across this...might give you an idea or two http://www.heritagecity.org/user_files/downloads/19-38.pdf Imo i would class fairy stories as traditional tales and fantasy as anything not based on reality...but reading this i'm not sure that this makes sense Edited February 14, 2012 by finleysmaid
Froglet Posted February 14, 2012 Author Posted February 14, 2012 Wow, thank you! I think I would class fairy stories as traditional tales too. It's been one of those questions that I thought I knew the answer to until I really started thinking about it!
Rea Posted February 14, 2012 Posted February 14, 2012 Traditional fairytales not PC enough I read this earlier on today.
Froglet Posted February 14, 2012 Author Posted February 14, 2012 When I was at university I typed up a dissertation for a flatmate. He was doing animation and his dissertation was about how animated film versions of fairy tales 'tidied them up'. The originals were a lot more gruesome than the versions we have today. In fact I still have a version of Snow White (a Ladybird one - I think published in 1980) where when the wicked queen discovers Snow White is still alive she is furious but goes to see Snow White as a bride. The last sentence reads: "As her punishment, red-hot iron slippers had been prepared and she danced in these until she was dead." I'm guessing that isn't in a modern version! The introduction to the collection reads "These tales of magica dn adventure contain simple morals and satisfy the young child's demand for justice. Cruelty and evil are seen to be punished, fundamental to each story is that right triumphs over wrong."
finleysmaid Posted February 14, 2012 Posted February 14, 2012 I do wonder whether some of this problem is that these stories are not hitting the audience they were intended for. Perhaps the disneyfication of these stories has resulted in a younger group accessing them but the moral story is really meant for an older group. Certainly if you were going with reading age as a guide they would be intended for a 10/12 year old. The idea of death as part of 'life' is also diverted away from in modern culture and so some may find this aspect dificult too. Lets face it even the gruffalo has mild peril and danger in it or it wouldn't be such a good story
Panders Posted February 14, 2012 Posted February 14, 2012 Traditional fairytales not PC enough I read this earlier on today. We still tell traditional tales at my pre-school, if it's tooooo scary I moderate my voice, rather than adding to the scariness of it, and the whole point of little red riding hood going off into the woods alone etc. is a good excuse to talk to the children about behaving and doing as they are told by their mums and how silly LRR was to ignore the advice! We took my son, now 25, but then 3 to London to see Snow White the panto. Marti Kane was the wicked queen. Our son had nightmares that the wicked queen was after him for a number of years afterwards and as distressing as it was for him at the time, if it had not been this it would have been something else that gave him nightmares, surely we are designed to have nightmares it's part of our being. I'm not keen on the cleaned up versions of these tales I must admit. But as a previous poster has already said, maybe some are read to children when they are too young.
Rufus Posted February 16, 2012 Posted February 16, 2012 how about using one of my all time favourite fantasy stories 'the paper bag princess'. I've used it with fs and ks1, they all love it, I never tire of it. also if you go on the Robert munch (author) website, he does a really engaging audio version. oh I'm excited now, wanna do it!
Froglet Posted February 16, 2012 Author Posted February 16, 2012 I've never read that, will go and explore it thank you!
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