EED203L – Study Guide Summaries

STUDY UNIT 1
Children’s literature and reading

MAIN ROLE AND PURPOSE OF READING

Reading.......
• Offers enjoyment
• Develops language
• Develops reading skills
• Stimulate imagination
• Promotes appreciation and understanding of the self through comparing own problems with those of a literary character
• Widens horizons by being introduced to new places and different cultures
• Leads to discovering of moral values

TYPES OF LITERACY
a) Cultural literacy = cultural, social and ideological values that shape our reading of texts
b) Critical literacy = ability to respond critically to intentions, contents and possible effects of messages/texts on the reader
c) Visual literacy = interpretation if images/signs/pictures and non-verbal (body) language etc
d) Media literacy = the reading of TV and film as cultural messages
e) Computer literacy = ability to use and assess information from computers

VISUAL MEDIA vs READING WRITTEN TEXT

Visual media are instant, transient and passive.
Reading is active; it engages your mind, emotions, imagination and can be revisited and savoured.
The visual show you all that there is to see, but a book allows you to enter the secondary world of imagination.

There needs to be a balance between reading an viewing. Children will become lazy are reading, if, at a flick of a switch, they have
access to instant entertainment.

Television programmes and films, based on novels, plays and stories, have the power to influence people’s reading patterns.
Example: when the television series based on the children’s classic “Anne of Green Gables” was shown, bookshops experienced
an influx of sales of the actual book, which many people thought has gone out of print. The success of the television programme
encouraged publishers to bring out new additions of all the books in the series – thus introducing a whole new generation of
readers to the novels.

WHY SHOULD TEACHERS KNOW ABOUT CHILDRENS LITERATURE?

Reading means much more than just decoding words and signs – it means the whole process of making meaning.
It is important for the teacher to have a good knowledge of books and stories, so you can nurture and develop a love for reading in
children.

You cannot assume that learners have a rich background of reading experience at home. As a teacher you need to create an
enriching reading environment in your classroom by providing a variety of stories. In this way, learners will be able to make up the
backlog with which they arrive at school.

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN STORYTELLING (ORAL MODE) & STORY READING (WRITTEN TEXT AS LITERATURE)
Oral mode = combination of both the oral and written word.
The oral story has been imprisoned in books, but it has found wings again on the lips of the story teller.

BOOK LITERACY = literacy means to be able to read & write.

Book literacy would suggest someone who is able to read a book, from left to right; having the book the right side up; knowing that
pictures and chapter headings all give clues beyond the text.

STUDY UNIT 2
Importance of stories in child development

The age-old words “once upon a time...” leads children into the world of the imagination.
Plot = the actions of the story unfolds when the main character faces difficulties and then solves it, either on its own or the aid of
another character.
Audience (reader) will identify who is the hero or the villain.
Happy ending (where good triumphs over evil), it will bring a sense of closure – a sense that justice has been done.
EED203L – Study Guide Summaries

Emotional response of the child is most important.

Most stories have an underlying moral/lesson for the child to learn, which is absorbed unconsciously. Children often know this
underlying moral/lesson, but often do not have the vocabulary to express the hidden meaning.
By constant exposure to stories, children will make sense of their world and will begin to see what is and what is not acceptable
behaviour.
Happy ending to stories is of great importance, because the child’s world can be a very frightening place, and the child needs all
the reassurance that they can cope with the growing up process.
Stories have the power to enchant and delight.
Children act out situations similar to those they have encountered in stories and most times behave in the same way that the main
character did.
Stories are likely to deal with the emotions of the children were experiencing in their own lives.
Stories can have a therapeutic effect on children.

STORIES CAN HELP CHILDREN TO:

• Understand what it means to be human
• Learn to cope with the real world
• Get in touch with their own feelings
• Develop confidence
• Find meaning in life

CHARACTERISTICS OF A GOOD STORY

A good story....
• Provide enjoyment
• Deal with issues, meaningful to child’s life
• Shows emotions a child can relate to
• Involve a fast-paced plot, with an introduction, development, conflict, climax and happy ending
• Includes characters who are clearly defined, credible, show strengths and weaknesses, and grown and develop in the
course of the story
• Are written in a style that is clear and uses language suitable to the child’s level
• Have pictures/illustrations that enhance and complement text
• Have a realistic dialogue and not too many descriptive passages

STUDY UNIT 3
FOLKLORE: folk-tales; fairy-tales; myths; legends & fables

FOLKLORE is a general term for all the types of traditional stories: myths, legends, sagas, folk-tales, fairy-tales, and fables. As well
as the customs, beliefs and superstitions that a community has in common.
The term folklore is an all-embracing term for the ‘traditional beliefs, customs, popular superstitions and legends of people’.

MYTHS AND MYTHOLOGY

The word myth comes from the Greek ‘mythos’, meaning a tale/story from early civilizations which explains the mysteries of natural
phenomena, or is an account of the deeds of a god/supernatural being.
Mythology is the term we use to describe the system/cycle of myths built up by a particular civilization, for example: African,
Egyptian, Roman or Greek mythology.
Mythology also refers to the discipline of studying, analysing, discussing and comparing myths from all over the world.

LEGENDS AND SAGAS

Legends and sagas often tell the story of real kings and heroes who lived before any written records were made. Their deeds were
glorified and embellished; these heroes have been deified and most seem to have received supernatural guidance from ancestors,
magicians, wizards, mystics or seers.
Myths and legends overlap because often the tales of the legendary heroes were of their battles with the gods.

FOLK-TALES
Folk-tales are simple stories where the plot, setting and characters reflect the culture and their places of origin.
There is often a clear moral to the story in an idealised world: the good and humble are rewarded and the foolish are punished.
There is little or no element of magic in folk-tales

FAIRY-TALES
EED203L – Study Guide Summaries

Have all the elements of folk-tales, but are embellished by images of magic to entertain and amuse.
Fairy-tales depict worlds of wonder, enchantment and possess glamour and romance beyond the everyday.
Convey a fantasy world with creatures from another world, such as:
*mermaids, hobbits, fairies, elves, monsters, giants, unicorns, orges, goblins, leprechauns, tokoloshe and dragons.
Fairy-tales are not just magic and wonder, but also deal with important themes – they hold up a mirror to the real world, but do not
reflect the world as we exactly see it. The fantasy and magical elements help to disguise some of the serious and more troubling
aspects of real life.
Fairy-tales helps children to understand and make meaning of the adult world around them.

THE FABLE
Is an animal tale which has a moral.
Recommends a high ideal of conduct but also shows how to save one’s skin and remain on good terms with those in power.
CHARACTERISTICS THAT CONTRIBUTE TO EASY READING AND LISTENING
1. Time-ordered story structure
• First.... then.... after this... finally – provides structure for the story
2. Repetition and redundancy
• Repetition of main themes, for example: ‘3 little pigs’ – each pigs encounter with the wolf follows the same pattern: the
pig builds a house, the wolf comes and ask to be let in, the pig refuses and the wolf then tries to blow the house
down.
• Repeated word for word phrases such as: ‘I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll blow your house down (3 little pigs); ‘Not by the
hair of my chinny-chin-chin’ (3 little pigs); ‘Fee-Fi-Fo-Fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman’ (Jack and the
Beanstalk).
• Folk-tales makes use of redundancies. Such as: the wolf in the 3 little pigs is not merely going to blow the house
down – he is going to huff and puff and blow. Saying the same thing more than once, or in more than one way, helps
learners get the idea, even if they have miss it the first time.
• Value of repetitions for learning language = new vocabulary; grammatical structures in context; improve fluency and
automatic in recognition of language.
• Repetitions make the story easier understandable. Repetitions make the story predictable and give learners less new
language to understand.
3. Predictability
• Predictability helps learners develop strategies to figure out the unknown words from the context and to understand
the main idea of the story more clearly.
• Folk-tales are predictable in the following ways: *the repetitions of main events/themes not only reinforce vocabulary
and grammatical structures, but also help the listener to predict what is coming and thus facilitates understanding;
*the moral quality that underlies most folktales also makes them predictable.
4. Simple grammar
• Folk-tales tend to have simple grammar – sentences are short and simple past and present tenses are used.
• Relationships between ideas are simple and sentences are connected with ‘and’ & ‘but’.
5. Concrete vocabulary
• Concrete language is much easier to grasp than abstract language.
• Vocabulary of folk-tales are concrete and most of the words refer to things you can see, feel, touch and smell.
• Illustrations and pictures instantly convey the idea and thus helps learners to understand the new language and
understand the story more easily.
• Folk-tales are very good for general vocabulary building.
6. Concrete ideas
• The difficulty and level of abstractness of the ideas, affect how hard a text is to understand.
• In folk-tales, the goals are plain and concrete which makes it easier for learners to understand.
• Abstract qualities such as: greed, patience, humility, arrogance, foolishness and sneakiness is presented in concrete
images which makes it easier for learners to understand.
7. Illustrations
• Illustrations provide information to help reader figure out parts of the text that is difficult. For example: a learner that
has never encountered a ‘dwarf’ before, can figure out what it means from the seven little men in the
picture/illustration.
8. Unique reader-writer relationship
• Folk-tales put the reader and writer on different terms – they have a peer relationship.
• Readers interact with with stories, questioning whether they agree with the writer’s perspective and conclusion;
whether they like the writer’s style & content; whether the ideas are logical and supported.

9. Common elements across cultures

EED203L – Study Guide Summaries

• Social, moral and relational themes that lie behind the stories, tend to rise above local cultures.
• Attitudes of characters reflect pride and humility, greed and generosity – these characteristics are common to all
humanity.
• Food, family and music appear in tales from all cultures.
• Weddings/births and celebrations occur in all cultures.
• Using tales from children’s own cultures is likely to increase interest, motivation and positive attitudes.

INTEGRATING FOLK-TALES WITH LANGUAGE SKILLS

Folk-tales are useful for promoting listening, speaking, reading and writing skills. Such as:
Listening
• Stories read aloud by teacher
• Tapes of stories
• Folk-tales from other cultures, as told by learners
• Dramatic presentations of folk-tales
• Jig-saw and information-gap activities
Speaking
• Learners telling stories from their own cultures
• Discussion activities
• Creating and presenting stories dramatically
• Jig-saw and information-gap activities
Reading
• Jig-saw reading
• Individual, extensive reading
• Analytical reading: comparison/analysis/contrast etc
Writing
• Writing summaries of stories
• Composing original tales
• Responding to stories on personal level
• Writing new endings to existing stories
Pronunciation
• Chanting rhymed portions of tales and repeated refrains to practice aspects of pronunciation like: stress, rhythm, and
inotation.

STUDY UNIT 4
Myths & Legends

WHAT IS MYTHOLOGY?
Myths are the attempts of human beings to explain the origins of phenomena in the world around them.
Myths are the substance of religious beliefs and they are an important part of humanity’s attempt to understand the actions/ways of
the gods.
Writer’s sum up myths as a range of stories to attempt to answer the question – ‘where do we come from?’

FUNCTIONS OF MYTHS
1. Attempts to answer questions such as: who made the world? How will it end? Who was the first person? What happens
after death?
2. Justify an existing social system and account for traditional customs

WHERE DO MYTHS COME FROM?

There are 4 theories about the origin of myths:
1. Scriptural theory = myths are derived from the narratives found in Scriptures of all religions
2. Historical theory = all gods were once human beings, who achieved immortality
3. Allegorical theory = myths are allegorical and symbolic, conveying moral, philosophical and religious truth with some
historical fact.
4. Physical theory = the elements (air/water/fire) became objects of religious adoration and the principal deities (gods) are
personifications of the powers of nature

Myths are neither dead nor static – myths develop and change as people move, and as cultures mix and re-create new societies.
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CLASSIFICATION OF MYTHS
• Sun myths
• Fire myths
• Star myths
• Moon myths
• Myths of the origin of human beings
• Myths of death
• Hero myths
• Beast myths
• Culture myths
• Soul myths
• Myths regarding taboo
• Myths of punishment
• Myths of rewards
• Dualistic myths – the good fighting the bad

LEGENDS AND THEIR PLACE IN MYTHOLOGY

The word ‘legend’ literally means ‘something to read’.
Legends are often stories of human beings’ engagement and struggle with the gods.

Differences between myths and legends:

• legends are more recent stories
• myths are sacred and have a spiritual dimension
• in legends, the main characters are humans and they are considered to be secular

The hero of the legend is ‘a cultural/national hero, embodying all the ideal characteristics of greatness in his time’.
The expression ‘he is a living legend’ can be understood as somebody that is noteworthy or famous.
The legendary tales of King Arthur and Robin Hood embody qualities that the particular culture of that time needed to believe in
such as:
King Arthur and his knights appealed to the need for justice, chivalry and moral greatness.
Robin Hood became the champion of the common man, suffering great poverty in times of ruthlessness and corruption.

STUDY UNIT 5
Myths, legends and children’s literature

Myths and legends are successful stories – they contain heroic action, suspense and conflict, sometimes within the hero and often
between characters.
There is often major conflict between the main character and other forces (supernatural/nature) which results in gripping reading.

Mythology provides a natural and basic source of stories for children because children have the capacity to suspend disbelief and
to accept imaginative explanations for natural phenomena as well as scientific explanations.
Children are endlessly capable of believing and not believing, as we can see in the games they play, which are often based on
either currently popular books or on TV programmes that have generated a new mythology.

Traditional stories lay down the framework on which all other stories are built and they convey many of life’s mysteries and truths
about being human.
These stories carry a rich store of cultural knowledge to which children should be exposed.

STUDY UNIT 6
Folk-tales, fables and fairy-tales

Folk-tales bear the characteristics of strong oral tradition. The characters can be humans or animals.
Fairy-tales feature strong magical elements and characters are mostly human.
Fables are animal stories in which the characters symbolise different types of people and they convey a clear moral message.

All these 3 types of stories contributed a major role to children’s literature.

PS: Read the different types of stories, as discussed on pg’s 62-66 SG.
FOLK-TALES
EED203L – Study Guide Summaries

• Also called ‘moral tales’

• Characters are mostly saved through their own goodness or wisdom, and show positive character traits such as:
obedience, kindness, patience and compassion.
• Sometimes the wicked are brought to justice in unexpected ways, even if the hero/heroine has been wronged/destroyed.
PS: read the story “The Queen Bee” in Grimm’s Fairy Tales.

FABLES
• Short tale, featuring talking animals representing certain human characteristics.
• Fables teach a moral lesson.
• Although short and simple, the tales are complex because of the abstract concepts it conveys to readers.
• Most of the Fable collections, originate from Ancient Greece such as Aesop’s Fables.
• Uncle Remus Tales Collection (American, Joel Chandler Harris).

FAIRY-TALES
• Stories about a hero/heroine who is often poor and friendless at the beginning, but after many adventures, usually
involving some elements of magic, he/she succeeds and ‘lives happily ever after’.
• Fairy-tales cover a wide variety of narrative techniques.
• Fairy-tales leave factual reality behid and escape into a fantasy world of talking animals, unusual plant growth, orges,
witches, giants and gingerbread houses.
• Consists of various creatures, which makes fairy-tales so magical and interesting.

STUDY UNIT 7
Fairy-tales and their importance in the lives of children

Fairy-tales enable children to confront the reality of their sub-conscious fears/terrors and nightmares in the guise of a tale which
they can experience in secure surroundings of their home and family.
Fairy-tales are a means of coming to terms with the world as it is.
Children need to understand what is real before they can differentiate between fantasy and reality, BUT the compilers of this
module believes that reality and fantasy are intertwined, and that we should not deprive a child of imaginative literature.

INFLUENTIAL COLLECTIONS
1. Charles Perrault (1628 – 1703)
• French collector
• Translated into English as Mother Goose’s Tales, which means ‘old wives tale’.
Popular stories:
*Cinderella
*Little Red Riding Hood
*Sleeping Beauty
*Puss in Boots
2. Jacob Grimm (1785 – 1863) and Wilhelm Grimm (1786 – 1859)
• Grimm brothers studied German law, but became interested in the history of folk-tales.
• Through interest in German law, they became involved in the field of Philology = science of languages and historical
study thereof.
• Translated into English in 1823, known as Grimm’s Fairy Tales.
• The Grimm brothers collected folk-tales, using close friends and neighbours as sources.
• They visited villages and spinning rooms for research.
• Main source was Katharina Viehmann, a tailor’s wife – she supplied over 20 new tales.
• They insisted on the importance of oral versions and promoted the tales as part of the legends and myths of the
German nation/people.
Popular stories:
*Rapunzel
*Hansel & Gretel
*Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
*Rumpelstiltskin
*The Bremen Town Musicians
*The Frog Prince

3. Hans Christian Andersen (1805 – 1875)

EED203L – Study Guide Summaries

• Danish
• First collection of fairy-tales was published in 1835 and translated into English in 1846.
• His fairy-tales differed from others, in richness of their descriptions of nature.
• Consist of humour, wit and striking remarks.
• He gathered most of his stories during the times he spent with his grandmother.
Popular stories:
*The Little Mermaid
*The Ugly Duckling
*The Red Shoes
*The Princess and the Pea
*The Staunch Tin Soldier
*The Emperor’s New Clothes

THEMES AND CHARACTERISTICS OF FAIRY-TALES

Themes
1. Reversal of fortune
• Magic treasure
• Loses through foolishness
2. Conflict
• Sibling rivalry
• Relationships between step-parents and step-children
• Betrayal
• False accusations
3. Spells
• Cast into deep sleep
• Changed into a rock
• Frog turned into prince
• Character often rescued by a kiss or a prince; tears of grief or an act of sacrifice
4. Relationships between supernatural beings and human beings
• Human being is loved by supernatural being (fairy/mermaid/beast)
• Witches, giants engages in a battle against human beings
• Human being sells their souls to evil spirits
5. Relationships between humans and animals
• Animals often have human-like tendencies
6. Test of courage/authenticity
• Hero must prove his worth or identity
• Includes: wanderings in distant places an quests for something precious or an object that is difficult to obtain
7. Commands (obeyed/disobeyed)
• Main character breaks a command and has to make a sacrifice
• Touching of the forbidden and its consequences
8. Opposing values
• Based on the tensions and consequences of the conflict between opposites: promises (kept/broken); gratitude and
ingratitude; light and darkness; good and evil.
Characteristics:
1. Human beings does not have complex motives and temperaments
2. Fairy-tales hold a mirror up to the real world, but do not reflect the real world as we know it/see it.
3. Fairy-tales deals with complex issues, such as:
• Fears (abondement/evil)
• Deep emotions (hatred/jealousy)
• Seeking the meaning of life
• Understanding good and evil
• Developing a moral sense

FUNCTIONS OF FAIRY-TALES
EED203L – Study Guide Summaries

• Enable children to make meaning of their inner world and the world around them.
• Facilitate growth of an emotionally and psychologically balanced human being.
• Learn the structure of story – promotes reading progress and own storytelling abilities.
• Through fantasy, everyday realities of familiar settings, events and objects are reshaped, rearranged and transformed.
• Fairy-tales can deal with abstract subjects in and imaginative way that appeals to the child’s capacity for enjoyment.
• Evoke a strong emotional response and appeal to the child’s subconscious.
• Child seeks moral truth and reassurance, rather than factual and realistic correctness.

THE VALUE AND IMPORTANCE OF FANTASY & IMAGINATION

• Fantasies shape the unconscious, thus contributing towards personality development.
• Fantasies give us hope and the inner strength to cope with the adversities of life.
• Through fantasy, children can express themselves freely through painting, games and their own stories.
• Folk-tales and fairy-tales feeds creativity.
• Through fantasy, children learn to create their own stories in which they subconsciously express their secret
wishes/anxieties.
• Through fantasy stories, children learn that others have the same feelings and fears, and that there are ways of
overcoming fears successfully – children will thus feel part of a common humanity.

FAIRY-TALES IN DISREPUTE
Fears that adults might have for their children, regarding fairy-tales:
• Children might get carried away by their fantasies
• They will believe in magic
• They will become so overfed with fantasies, that they will be unable to cope with reality
• Fairy-tales are escapist and therefore undermine the child’s grasp of reality
• The elements of violence and cruelty sometimes fond in fairy-tales have a potentially negative effect on a child’s
behaviour.

POSITVE QUALITIES OF FAIRY-TALES

• Provide enjoyment
• Contribute to language development
• Evoke a strong emotional response
• Help a child to identify with a character
• Develop empathy and contribute to growing awareness and sense of belonging
• Fairy-tales carry important messages to the conscious, pre-conscious and the unconscious mind
• Happy endings is a source of hope for the child
• Feed the child’s imagination
• Helps the child to deal with real issues in life
• Offer psychological truths that the child can apply to his/her own life
• Convey important moral and cultural values
• Contribute to child’s sense of story, awareness of structure and patterns in stories
• Instil an awareness of what it is to be human.

STUDY UNIT 8
Fantasy and Realism

WHAT DOES REALISM OFFER?

• Offers new experience
• Reflects society’s values and norms
• Shows life as it is and includes a range of situations, human emotions and responses
• Helps children mature intellectually and emotionally by enabling them to experience different aspects, by reading about
how others cope in different situations
The realistic story can seem like a clear window on the world.
However realistic fiction may be, it is still invented and therefore not real.

WHAT DOES FANTASY OFFER?

• Pleasure and delight
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• Cultivates the imagination

• Enables readers to discover different ways of seeing and looking at the world
• Leads to a search for deeper meaning and universal truths
In fantasy, children find their love for adventure, nonsense and humour. Their everyday world is enriched; their aesthetic needs are
satisfied, because they appreciate a story well-told and their imaginations are stretched to help them identify and re-align the
natural with the supernatural.

To make a story successful, there must be a happy balance between fantasy and reality – a story that looks at the realities of a
child’s experience, while the fantasy element offers comfort and re-assurance.

Questions to ask of both fantasy and realistic fiction:

• Is the story authentic?
• Does it ring true?
• Are the characters believable?
• Is the story feasible?
• Does the story cater to both the child’s emotions and intellect?

We must remember that stories help children to make meaning of the world. The stories they encounter enrich their language
development.
They realise that through language, we convey meaning and they find in language more than a means of getting things done or
understanding how the world works. They use the language they are learning in an active search for personal meaning.

PS: read articles on Harry Potter (pg 103 – 106) in SG.

STUDY UNIT 9
Racism, Sexism and Classism in children’s literature

RACISM
Racism is an attitude of mind.
Racism is an ideology that is realised through structures of power relations in the interface between ethnicity and culture; economic
and social processes, individuals and institutions.
Racism is multi-faceted and dynamic and must be seen in terms of power an xenophobia, racial prejudice, bias, ethnocentricity,
discrimination, power in all its manifestations:
• Ideological and material
• Overt and covert
• Hidden and blatant
• Individual and institutional
• Structures and systems
• Policies and practices (direct and indirect)

Language that is patronising, demeaning, disrespectful and exclusive, helps to perpetuate racism.
Calling people names is one example of how language can harm and cause others hurt.
The schoolyard rhyme ‘sticks and bones can break my bones, but names can never harm me’, was not created without reason.

SEXISM
Refers to the tendency to present men as superior to women.
Sexism promotes the superiority of one sex above the other.
Insulting and hurtful words used to call women:
*bird *cherry *cow *chick *bitch
Stereotyping can also cause harm such as:
*dumb blonde *career women is cold and un-feminine

CLASSISM
Classism is the notion that to be born rich and belong to the upper and middle classes, is better that belonging to the lower classes.

RACIST/SEXIST/CLASSIST TEXT
Racist text would suggest that some races are superior and other is inferior and that this is natural and right.
Sexist text perpetuates the idea that men are superior to women.
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Classist text renders class differences and confirms the view that to be born into the middle and upper classes is better than to be
born into the working class.

PS: Read Appendixes in Study Guide for examples of Racist, Sexist and Classist tex