Often history is written from the point of view of the victor. We see everything in our lives from a certain perspective. It colors everything, and I try to get my students to see that. I have found one class activity that I think does this very well.
It begins with fairy tales. I begin with having the class read The Real Story of the Three Little Pigs by A. Wolf written by Lane Smith. Each student reads a page aloud. I ask them to do it with feeling and a good voice. The story garners some laughs, and it breaks up the monotony of English Composition.
And then we talk about perspective and whose points of view should a paper be written from. We talk about the differences between what the wolf wrote and how the story was originally written. Who does the original favor? We also talk about in a light hearted way how everyone who goes to prison is innocent.
We then move on to the class activity. Here I ask my students to get into groups of three or four and to write their own take on a fairy tale. I say, “Choose a character in that fairy tale and write the story as you imagine that character would have.” I then allow them about 15 to 20 minutes to write their version of the fairy tale.
It’s an enjoyable experience where students are given the opportunity to be creative in a English composition class. It also requires them to review a familiar story more critically and pick up details that they may have passed over when they were children. Often, my students give modern twists on the story, and I am often impressed with how creative they are really with their stories.
At the end, I bring them back to what I want to emphasize. When they get to the end of the semester and have to write their argument/persuasion paper, I want them to be able to consider the other side as well as the side that they take. I want them to step into someone else’s shoes and see if they can understand why how the other side sees the issue.
