"The Sleeping Beauty"

By: Mariell Bergh Sæbø

I have chosen to write about the topic; fairy tales. For this assignment I chose the fairy tale by Charles Perrault called “The Sleeping Beauty”. I have not chosen the original tale written by Perrault, but I have chosen a shorter version of it.  It is still a known folk tale, and I believe the children will recognize it. Here’s the link to my chosen fairy tale; http://www.kidsenglishbooks.com/sleepingbeauty.pdf

Sleeping Beauty is about a young princess who was cursed to sleep for a hundred years. She got this curse when she was a new-born and her parents threw a party to celebrate her birth. They invited all of the fairies except one. The one who didn’t get invited got so angry, that she cursed the princess to die on her 16^th birthday. Another fairy saved the princess by putting her to sleep until a young prince would come and awaken her.

From the text

Charles Perrault’s fairy tales always has a moral that shows a patriarchal message, and the stories were meant for the upper-class (Gamble, 2013, p.141). The moral in this tale is that there is no hurry in finding love; true love will come if you wait for it.

The text has a few old fashion words but there aren’t too many, therefor I believe the pupils will understand the text very well. An option would be to make a glossary together with the pupils so that they know what all of the words mean. It is also a familiar tale for the pupils, so I believe they would understand the meaning even if they don’t understand all of the words. There are a few pictures that are supposed to fit the text, but they are not very fitting. You can see a girl and the fairies, but it is difficult to understand what’s happening, just by watching the pictures. Also the pictures aren't very colourful. 

From the text

I believe this fairy tale would be relevant to some of the competence aims after 7^th grade in Kunnskapsløftet. One of the competence aims could be; "read and understand different types of texts of varying length from different sources". For this aim the pupils could read through the text individually or in pairs, and then they could try and understand what the text is about. After this they could; "express and give grounds for own opinions about familiar topics". By doing this the pupils can discuss the folk tale and together come to a conclusion of what it’s about. The final aim I believe can be used with this tale is; "read children’s and youth literature in English and converse about persons and content", this because the children can converse about the characters and content in pairs when they have figured out what the story is about.

Sources:

• Gamble, N.(2013). Exploring Children’s Literature: Reading with Pleasure and Purpose. 3rd ed. London: Sage Publications Ltd.

• http://www.angelfire.com/nb/classillus/images/perrault/red.html

• Utdanningsdirektoratet. (u.å). National Curriculum for Knowledge Promotion in Primary and Secondary Education and Training. http://www.udir.no/kl06/eng1-03/Hele/Kompetansemaal/kompetansemal-etter-7.-arstrinn/?lplang=eng