Literary scholar Clare Bradford gives voice to a pervasive anxiety that arises when a child audience meets unsettling ecological narratives. She remarks: "to explain to young children that pygmy hippos are under serious threat or that elephants are still being killed for their tusks or that wilderness areas are disappearing is to construct a…

This article argues that the denial of development can be a productive space and a liberating time for children in the current outcomes-driven times. The author offers an alternative reading of childhood, considering children's development differently through various philosophical theorizations of events, which emerge through utilizing philosophy…

Tolerance of ambiguity has been referred to as "the indispensable component of symbolic competence" (Kramsch, 2006, p. 251) and the recommendation was later made for college-level language instructors interested in emphasizing symbolic competence in their classrooms to "bring up every opportunity to show complexity and…

Fairy tales to female writers are major resource for their abundant writings, but for the feminist poets since 1960s, they become essential subject matter to often deal with in their literary production. With the motivation to address the conventional tradition of patriarchal society, and re-address the stereotype females inhabiting these tales,…

Fairy tales--indeed all tales--are told for a purpose. They are a form of social education, a form that some scholars argue is older than civilization itself. They imagine dilemmas and offer a range of permissible solutions, labeling socially acceptable and unacceptable behavior, demarcating good and evil, exploring existential questions, binding…

Ubiquitous music is a relatively new research area which seeks ways to involve novices in music learning, playing and improvisation. Despite the ambitious goals, ubiquitous music is still unknown territory in schools. In this study, we have tried to identify whether ubiquitous music environments can enable novice music students to participate in…

"Pregnant Rapunzel Emergency" is part of a series of online free games aimed at young girls (forhergames.com or babygirlgames.com), where dozens of characters from fairy tales, children's toys and media feature in recovery settings, such as "Barbie flu". The range of games available to choose from includes not only dressing,…

This dissertation explores the relationship between the teaching of literary genre and the facilitation of empathy. It analyzes whether poetry, fairy tales, readers-theater, biography and/or novel can contribute to a fourth-grade student's understanding and development of empathy. After leading my students in guided readings, I concentrated on…

In this article, we discuss a media discussion group for female students with disabilities, which we created and facilitated using fairy tales to discuss and critique gender norms. Disability was not the primary focus for our media sessions; however, participants occasionally extended dialogue to include intersections between disability and…

This article discusses the movie "Frozen," which is the Disney version of a fairy tale. While some parents report that their young children love "Frozen," know the words to the songs, and beg to watch it again and again, "Frozen" is still a fairy tale, with some dark subject matter. Parents might tell themselves that…

Disney's animated films have long been a significant source of entertainment for children across the world, and the global reach of Disney has only increased since the company's extremely lucrative acquisition of Pixar, a merger that has produced some of the highest-grossing films of all time. However, while animated Disney films are renowned for…

Courses: Public Speaking, Storytelling, Performance Ethnography, Oral Interpretation, Language and Communication. Objectives: The aims of this class exercise are: (1) To engage in a collaborative creative process of developing a story/topic from a simple idea to deepening the relationship with the audience through vivid and evocative language; (2)…

Grounded in critical literacy theory, this teacher research in a Middle Eastern EFL classroom addresses the traditional female positioning in literature, media, and pop culture. Adolescent students are encouraged to challenge the traditional Cinderella fairy tale through various critical literacy engagements. A content analysis of sample written…

This article argues that postfeminist influences on the multiple and interconnected narratives of fairy tales, both real and imagined, provide fertile ground from which to consider ideologies related to race, class, gender, and sexuality. It reports on a research the purpose of which was to engage students in a critical exploration of ideologies…

This qualitative study examined a class of 20 five-year-old Korean children's literary sessions that were composed of whole-group read-alouds of fairy/folk tales and their parodies, including discussion and follow-up activities based on critical literacy practices. Over a 15-week period, multiple sources of data including observations, open-ended…