Japanese Folktales

Notes Before Starting

• This activity is NOT meant for their first time practicing this type of SVOO. This activity is meant to be a challenge for the students, so be careful about when/if you use it.
  
• These stories should be very familiar to the students and JTEs. I grew up with a Japanese folktale book, so I wrote most of these from memory. The first story is from Aesop's fables, but other than that, they're all Japanese folktales. The last one, The Stone-cutter, is the only one that I couldn't find a Japanese version / title for. So I'm not sure if the last one is a real folktale or not.
• The goal of this activity is to have the students read folktales and write what the moral ("lesson of the story" is what I said in the class) is. But the moral is almost always "don't be greedy" or "don't be jealous." So, instead, we want them to write "interesting" morals. I'll explain what I mean below in step two.
• I purposely did not put the titles of the stories in the box with the text. This is so that the students can try and figure out what the folktale is based on the English text.
  

Materials

• Stories - preferably one copy of each of the stories you use per student, but up to you
• Worksheet - one copy per student (you will have to mess around with the copier's settings to make the pictures at the bottom visible)
• Pencils
• Dictionaries - both English to Japanese and Japanese to English

How it Works

1. Before doing the activity, review the grammar. As I said above, this activity is meant to be a challenge, so reviewing the target SVOO + that grammar will help.
   
2. Next, give them an example using a folktale not here. I used The Tortoise and the Hare. Ask the students if they know it and what is the moral of the story. We often say "Slow and steady wins the race." But that moral is too boring. What we want is something like "breaks are bad." So I wrote "This story teaches us that taking a break/rest is bad" on the blackboard. But we don't stop there, we want them to write more. So I continued with "So I will never rest and I will only work. If I am always working, I will never lose." Hopefully this puts the students in the right mindset for how to think about the activity.
3. Split the class into groups of four (or however you normally split them) and give each group one of the stories, the worksheet, and dictionaries.
   
4. Have them work together to read the story and understand it, then write what they learned from it. If they want to, they can write the normal moral of the story. But if they feel creative, they can write a weird lesson instead. Help them with their reading and writing if they need it.
   
5. After giving them time to write a few sentences (I usually said four minimum), have them read their story to the class and present their lessons. At this point I also give a copy of the story to the other groups so they can follow along with the reading. Ask them if they know the name of the folktale and check for basic understanding with the other groups.
   

Final Notes

• I obviously wrote the stories in a way that uses very simple English. I also used Japanese folktales because that should help the students understand the stories faster. Have your JTE read over the stories and confirm that the contents are okay/easy enough for the students. I had to change the contents / events of some of the stories to make them shorter and easier.
• If you only need a few of the folktales, I recommend 3, 7, and 8. I think those are the easiest. I put numbers at the end of each story and the Japanese titles (sorry, I don't know the English names / if they have English names) at the end of the stories.
• If you want your students to write "interesting" morals, you have to put them in the right mindset. The example you give them and the explanation are very important to how they will approach the activity.
  

Files:

Small files

Folktales.docx (719 KB)