For the activity that we designed we were all dressed-up as characters from Aladdin’s film. And the plot of our activity begins by the time the Genie comes back from his trip around the world. Then in the activity the Genie appears with loads of presents that he took for Aladdin and Jasmine. During the activity children have to classify all the presents that the Genie bring for them depending on the country that the presents came from and by the time they finish it they have to define the route that the Genie follow during his holidays around the world.

It was a really fun and interesting project in which all of us learnt and had a great time, although it would be hard to say who enjoyed it more; the children or us.

Secondly I´m going to talk about the THEATRE activity that we did this week, which personally I think that it has loads of possibilities.

As I’ve just said, during this week we used the theatre as a tool for bringing English to students in a motivational way. Now I’m going to explain some of them.

For the first activity there need to be at least two pairs of people. The members of each pair have to be sitting in a single line and the one that is behind has to pretend that his arms are his partner´s arms. So once the two pairs are prepared, they will have to play a role such as pretending to be in a job interview, while the audience (the rest of the class) asks them questions.

In addition, in the next activity the students will form groups of four to six people. Then, two of them will be playing a role in which they are friends and for example, they are talking about the last holidays of one of them. While they are speaking the rest of the group members have to perform what the others are saying.

In conclusion, I think that these two activities can easily be done with primary students and also, they can be used as a cross-curricular activity, in order to review and learn almost every topic that they study at class in any other subject.

This is my fourth post, and I would like to explore a little bit the emotional outcomes of reading and writing fairytales and other stories in the classroom.

Fairytales are usually seen as something innocent, created for children by adults, with the only aim of being amusing. Sometimes, we try and go deeper into the stories, and the result is that we get to the conclusion that they also transmit values and pieces of advice. But my question is: Is it everything fairytales have to offer? My answer is a big round NO.

When the writer creates a story, and when it is a good one, all of a sudden the characters are brought to life. They have something to say, they are somebody, and the reader or the listener will connect with their emotions, feel sorry when they are sad, compassionate when they suffer, full of joy when they succeed. And all of this wouldn’t be possible without empathy.

I am sure that all of you understand this term perfectly, but just in case, let me introduce you a definition by the Merriam-Webster Dictionary , according to which, Empathy is

the feeling that you understand and share another person’s experiences and emotions : the ability to share someone else’s feelings.

Why is it important?, and how is it related to health? It is important because when we are teaching literature, or English, or whichever subject you prefer, we are also transmitting values, helping our pupils develop to their full potential, and it includes allowing them to be themselves, to build self-confidence and to be able to understand others’ needs, which is a proof of mental health.

What does it have to do with Fairytales? In fact, a lot. In order to be told or read, a tale needs to be created. And it is at that point of creation, where the pupils have to imagine their characters, and to provide them with a personality to make them deeper and catchy for the reader. Focusing on the character’s aims, dreams and hopes, fears and faults, the pupils will use  the language they know, the literary figures we have taught them, but also their own experience about life.

For example, a kid who is happy, will more likely create happy characters, and it is possible that only good things happen to them. On the other hand, if another child is going through something, it is possible that this process of creation can help him/her to externalize needs, fears, or experiences, just like they were the character’s and not theirs.

This is one reason that makes children prefer stories whose characters have something in common with them. If they go on an adventure, so are the readers. If they become friends with a vampire, suddenly it turns from a horrifying creature, to the best of companies. If they are mice who can cook, they will want to be super chefs.

And what about you? can you see any other reason to consider fairytales good for health? I am looking forward to read them!

But maybe, to create a character is not as easy as it seems, we should follow some steps to have clear the idea and to produce a complete character with more than one face and multidimensional instead of creating a simple one.

But, how do we bring a character to life?

1. Pick a gender and give it a name. It can be male or female. You can give it a common or an unusual name but remember that the fact that the name isn’t original doesn’t mean it’s boring.

2. Choose what your character is going to be. You can find many fantasy creatures in fairytales from ogres to speakers’ objects. Now it’s time for you to pick yours from the different categories: elder, hero, true love, villain, helper, friend, messenger, the girl.

3. Select a period of time. The character can be a time traveler or it can live in the Middle Ages, in the future, in other planet, with the Ancient Egypt, in the Roman Empire, at present or in any other time of the history. Watch out! The followings steps have to be connected with the period of time you have chosen.

4. Choose a personality. Describe it just with 3 adjectives, the most important ones and after that develop and elaborate the personality more. Remember that you also have to define the age of your character or at least if it is a child, a teenager, an adult or an elder. Normally, the characters that we like the most are those who are not perfect and in consequence those who have a weak spot or a dark side. You can think about its origins and explain why it is like that or why it has a particular nature. It is also important to describe and to explain how it interacts with other characters of the story.

5. Give it an appearance. If not the character will be almost nonexistence. You have to describe it physically, the color of the eyes, the hair, the height, the weight, the clothes and any strange or shocking physical characteristic.

6. Likes and dislikes. Think about the hobbies and activities of your character, things that it likes to do or not. It can be anything, from physical activities to cultural and intellectual activities. The possibilities are endless.

7. Character evolution. Usually every character changes along the story according to the adventures and situations that it has to live. Your character has a determined personality at the beginning of the story but you have to think where and how your character is going to end and what its objective is. Is it a good guy who turns to the bad side or the opposite? Has it a hidden power or trauma that is going to come to light? Is it going to achieve its goal? Many things can happen while you are writing but I recommend you to think how your character is going to end.

Your character can be inspired on you or in other person, can be your antagonist or it can be completely imaginary. Now your character is ready to play in the story and to interact with others!

Thank you very much for reading me and I hope these seven tips can help you in the creations of your own fairytale character.

This post is related with the class in which we were talking about tales and how they were changing during time depending on the author it belonged to.

The first impressions I had when I discovered the three versions of the Cinderella story were astonishment and surprising. I supposed that Walt Disney had to create Cinderella by taking the story from other different origin but I never imagined how much cruelty there could be in this kindly and romantic tale as in the Grimm’s version.

Because of that, my curiosity made me looking for other well known instances and their mysterious origins and finally, as a result, I found the name of Karlheinz Bartel and his research about the real case of Maria Sophia Margaretha Catharina von Erthal.

Karlheinz Bartel was a german historian of the last century who had in mind to find out where Walt Diney’s stories come from.  Because of that, he took a look in Brothers Grimm’s tales because both artists shared some of the stories.

Finally, he moved around the german history, in where he found the noble name of Maria Sophia Margaretha Catharina von Erthal.

Does she rings you a bell?

 Maria Sophia Margaretha Catharina von Erthal

Snow White (Disney’s character)

To begin with, this woman was born on 15th of June of 1729 in a german city called Lohr. She was the unique daughter of one noble couple in Germany.  When she was 12 her father married again with Claudia Elisabeth Maria von Venningen, two years after of the death of Maria Sophia’s mother.

Maria Sophia really didn’t get on well with her stepmother but that relationship was not so horrible. It was believed that the stepmother felt jealous of Maria Sophia because of her behaviour who was known in the town due to her goodness with people and her charity to the needy.

Appart from that, the stepmother had in her power a “magic mirror” that was given to her by her husband in her wedding. That kind of mirror was fashioned in that time because was able to repeat what you said. That’s because of its reverberation skill. One curiosity is that on the mirror left side you can read: “Amour propre” (self- love).

The “magic” mirror

A present gifted to Maria Sophia’s stepmother.

The mirror that appears in Snow White movie.

Besides, Lohr, the city is located in a mining zone, in where there were children working at mines to find some silver and copper. It was said that Maria Sophia used to join them to feed them and play.

And now… Is this familiar for you? Of course!. Brothers Grimm, who lived a few time after inspired by her to create the original tale of Snow white and also Walt Disney fall in love with her story. That’s why today we can watch her beauty on an amazing film, but also the chaterbox mirror and the 7 great friendly dwarfs.

If you are interested on reading the Grimm’s version of Snow White I let you to take a look on the link below and if some time you travel to Germany you can visit the Spessart museum, in the old castle of Lohr. In there you can inmerse into the most lovely tale ever.

• http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/grimm053.html (Grimm’s version of Snow White)