Kimberly, a parent, claims that her 7-year-old daughter cannot go to sleep unless she reads a page out of the Cinderella storybook. The daughter loves the book, and it has been read to her so many times. Yet, somehow, each time it is read, she gets overly excited. Kimberly’s daughter is not different from many toddlers out there who enjoy a good fairy tale, be it watching or reading. Fairy tales are short stories with mostly mystical beings such as dwarfs, unicorns, fairies, witches and topped up with prince and/or princess to add icing on the cake. The purpose of these short stories, as most people believe, is not only to entertain but also to instill some form of values to the children. However, it has become a concern as to when fairy tales are appropriate for children. This essay shall explore the discussion, while analyzing how fairy tales can be used as tools for education.
Fairy tales can be used to serve a number of purposes in a child’s life. For instance, they can be used to educate, entertain, teach subversion, indoctrination, and empowerment ( Veraksa, 2011). To demonstrate how all these values can be derived from a fairy tale, let’s take an example of a fairy tale written by Hans Christian Andersen (2011), The little Kitchen Maid. The Little Kitchen Maid is a story of a princess who loses her mother and so the King wishes to marry her. The Princess refuses to accept the proposal of the King and often cries to herself. She often goes to a window and look out at the courtyard. On two occasions, she notices an old lady begging, and each time the princess goes down to give her gifts. The lady then tells the princess to get a gift of a priceless dress from her father.
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On the third occasion, the old beggar gives the princess a coat that when worn, would send her to a far destination. When the princess’ father pushes on with his will to marry the girl, the Princess uses the coat to escape. In the far land, she is treated as a slave and works for a king. One time, she decides to go to church dressed in her expensive clothes. The townspeople did not recognize her on the 1 st Sunday, but on the second, she accidentally leaves her shoe behind, and the King takes it. The King then searches the whole village for the owner of the shoe. When he finds the Princess, he takes her as his Queen. The story ends in a celebration. This story of The Little Kitchen Maid has a number of morals. To begin with, it educates on the need to be Kind to beggars as you never know how they can help you in the future.
Secondly, the story can be used to educate children on the importance of patience and perseverance. In the story, when the princess is taken as a maid, she perseveres all the hardships that come her way. At some point, the King mistreats her and the other servants mock her. However, she does not give up nor does she become angry at her master and her colleagues. In the end, her reward is being the queen of a new land. Children who are introduced to this story from an early age face the probability of growing up with patience, kindness, and humility. It is important to let the children know of the morals of such stories after reading to them ( Veraksa, 2011) .
Another value that makes fairy tales to be appropriate for children is the fact that they aid in helping them learn indoctrination. Indoctrination refers to a situation where an individual is made to believe a certain set of values without questioning them. For adults, it becomes difficult to change their minds about certain things as they already have set values. Therefore, as a parent or teacher, it is more likely to influence a child to follow certain principles ( Veraksa, 2011) . Most of the time, fairy tales have a common learning objective. This is that good deeds are always rewarded and bad deeds always end up in failure and misfortune. These fairy tales encourage children to do good deeds without critically thinking about them. The tales sell this message more by making bad things happen to royal people who end up taking back royalty.
A perfect example of a story that can be used to teach indoctrination is The Pancake House , by Hans Andersen (2011). This story is about a brother, Hansel, and his sister Grethe. The two are sent by their parents to go pick berries and wander off to the forest. They come across a house made of candy and pancakes and are automatically drawn to taste the goodies. Unfortunately, a witch captures them and locks them in a cage for several days. All this time she feeds them with a lot of food with the aim of making them get fat so that she can eat them. Events take place, but the efforts of the witch are in vain. Hansel and Grethe manage to escape after killing the witch and rush back home to their parents who had lost hope of ever seeing them again.
For starters, this story shows that not all that glitter is not gold. Children are always drawn towards things that excite them such as candy and play items. However, they forget that the world is a cruel place, and harm may come their way. In order to make them accept such a value of not always being greedy or needy, Andersen writes this epic story of the two siblings. If only Hansel and Grethe had focused on what had taken them to the forest, they would not have been captured by the witch. This also brings about the issue of obedience to parents and subversion. When one does not obey, that is, being subversive, they face the dangers of getting in harm’s way. With such morals, a child will do her best and avoid disobeying their parent or being greedy.
One other intriguing fairy tale by Andersen (2011) is the story of Snow White . This story talks about a young beautiful girl whose skin is as white as snow and lips as red as blood. She is raised by a stepmother who is only concerned about being the fairest of all the maidens in her kingdom. However, each time she asks her magic mirror who is the fairest of them all, the answer is Snow White. For this reason, she plots to have the princess killed. Her efforts turn out futile as Snow White is saved by 7 dwarfs who take care of her. When the evil stepmother finds out that Snow White is not dead, she pays her a visit, disguised as an old lady. Her first attempt is unsuccessful but the second is. Fortunately, a maid accidentally removes an enchanted ring from Snow White’s finger and she comes back to life. The story ends with Snow White getting married to a prince.
Again, this story shows that evilness bares no good fruit. Another value that children can learn from this story is empowerment. Throughout the story, Snow White is visited by her evil stepmother who is disguised as someone else. Each time, she helps her out of the kindness of her heart. Two times, her kindness has brought harm her way. Yet, on a third occasion, she is still ready to help. In as much as she dies, she is brought back to life and a huge prize awaits her. This story teaches children to feel empowered when doing good deeds. At times, the results may not be instant. Misfortunes and challenges may accompany, but the main thing is not to give up or give into the temptation of doing wrong deeds. In the end, patience always pays ( Veraksa, 2011) .
It is believed that the original versions of fairy tales were gruesome and not appropriate for young children. However, authors like Andersen rewrote these books to make them educative for children. For the better part of the early lives of children, these stories are just for entertainment purposes. As they continue to grow and become aware of the world, they take into account the moral teachings. For this reason, parents and teachers should be encouraged to always read a tale to children and discuss its morals. In conclusion, it would be correct to say that the tales of Andersen are appropriate for children, given the morals, they bring out.
References
Andersen, H. C. (2011). The complete fairy tales and stories . Anchor.
Veraksa, N. E. (2011). Development of cognitive capacities in preschool age. International Journal of Early Years Education , 19 (1), 79-87.
