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    April 2, 2002
1.  How many of you are familiar with the story of Cinderella? Folklore often mirrors the culture it comes from. Where did the story Cinderella originate? 

(hint) What body part is most admired in this story? Which culture admires this body part? 
http://cte.jhu.edu/techacademy/fellows/cheek/webquest/pcindex.html

2. You are going on a Cinderella Webquest where you will first read the "USA" version of Cinderella and then read one from another country. Work in groups of two. Fill out a Story Analyzer for the USA and the foreign country.

3. Work with a neighboring group to compare your foreign country with that from the other group. Fill out a VENN diagram (http://www.teach-nology.com/cgi-bin/venn.cgi) to compare similarities and differences. 

4. Each group gives an overview of the similarities and differences of these stories and identifies the customs and values that emerge to the class. 

5. In another Cinderella Webquest, A New Twist on an Old Tale, after students read three versions of Cinderella, they examine Ancient Greek Culture from one of four perspectives: Societal Expert, Marriage and Family Counselor, Gender Investigator and Stage Setter. Students synthesize the information they've collected to collaboratively create the story. 
http://www.richmond.edu/academics/a&s/education/projects/webquests/cidnerella/Cinderella.htm

6. Quickly look over the American version of Cinderella again. What evidence of gender bias to you see in Cinderella? How are women's roles defined?  Do you think the story would be the same had Cinderella been a male? (Jerry Lewis made a movie called CinderFella in the 1960's)

7. To learn more about Gender Issues in Children's Literature, read this article from KidSource http://www.kidsource.com/education/gender.issues.L.A.html

8. Examine some popular Fairy tales for gender bias.  These can be found at Kidsdomain, an excellent source for sample programs and software reviews.  http://www.kidsdomain.com. I have copied some on CD-ROM for you so you can use these.

9. Some other children's literature resources can be found at: http://www.uvm.edu/~jmorris/childlit.html

10. Examine some sites: Criteria for examining sites for multicultural sensitivity, have been identified by Paul Gorski of The Curry School of Education. This article can be found at http://curry.edschool.Virginia.EDU/curry/centers/multicultural/resources/webeval.html
Some good sources of online stories are:

  • Whootie Owl-review a story, http://raspberry.forest.net/FMPro?-db=whootie.fp5&-lay=weblay&-format=/whootie/choose.htm&-SortField=b_pizzazz&-view
  •  Korean Stories, http://story.lg.co.kr:3000
  •  Aseopís Tales http://www.umass.edu/aesop/contents.html
    • 11. How has technology helped us learn about multicultural childrenís literature?