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The EUMOF Consortium / November 2011/ Nicosia, Cyprus
EUROPEAN MOBILITY FOLKTALES
EU
MO
F
TE
AC
HE
R’S
GU
IDE
3 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Table of Contents
Introduction............................................................................. 4 EUMOF philosophy and educational approach
Criteria and process of collection
The EUMOF folktales
Useful EUMOF products and outcomes
Learning about
Culture.................................................................................... 7 Getting started
Educational objectives
Suggested activities
Learning about
Difference.............................................................................. 13 Getting started
Educational objectives
Suggested activities
Learning about
Language(s).......................................................................... 20
Getting started
Educational objectives
Suggested activities
Lesson
Descriptions........................................................................... 26
Summaries of EUMOF
Stories……........................................................................... 30
APPENDIX:
TABLES OF STORIES AND SUGGESTED ACTIVITIES
4 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
5 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Introduction
EUMOF philosophy and educational approach
Welcome to the EUMOF project! EUMOF (European Mobility Folktales;
www.eumof.unic.ac.cy) is an EU funded Comenius Multilateral Project, which compiles
versions of folktales that pertain to travelling to “foreign” lands and encountering “different”
peoples and cultures. Travelling is a fundamental human activity that has been taking place
for thousands of years and for a multitude of reasons. It has always inevitably led to
encounters with “other” people and cultures. The EUMOF project collects European folk
stories about different aspects of travelling. These “European mobility folktales” are grouped
together, placed in different categories, and brought into dialogue with each other.
EUMOF’s general objective is to address the challenge of multiculturalism through the use
of European mobility folktales. The project's central activity is the adaptation, development,
testing, implementation and dissemination of new teaching methodologies and pedagogical
strategies for use in intercultural and language education. EUMOF provides teachers of
children between the ages 9-12 with educational strategies and material that enables them to
promote amongst their students an awareness of the importance of cultural and linguistic
diversity within Europe and of the need to combat racism, prejudice and xenophobia. The
project also focuses on the improvement of early second language learning, as well as the
teaching and learning of basic reading and writing skills. Through EUMOF, stories about
travelling travel, connecting teachers and students around Europe and reinforcing a sense of
a democratic European citizenship that encourages tolerance and respect for European
peoples, languages and cultures.
Criteria and process of collection
Representatives of the partner institutions involved in the project (listed on page 2 of this
document) first agreed on three basic criteria to be followed while building the collection:
(i) The story has to be a traditional folktale or legend from the partner’s country.
(ii) The plot must include some kind of travelling and encounters with “other” people
or creatures, cultures, and places.
(iii) When narrated orally, the story’s narration should not take more than ten minutes.
Based on these criteria, each partner collected three such stories from their country. The
stories were then translated in English and in all partner languages (German, Greek, Polish,
6 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Romanian). Multilingual versions of all EUMOF stories are published both in print form
(The EUMOF Booklet) and in electronic form (on the project’s website:
www.eumof.unic.ac.cy ). Narrations of stories in their original language were also recorded
and published on-line and on an audio-CD (attached to The EUMOF Booklet).
The EUMOF folktales
The collection includes twenty four stories from five different EU member states: Austria;
Cyprus; Greece; Poland; Portugal.
Characters in these stories travel for all kinds of reasons: to go to war, to play their music
and make their living, to learn a trade, to make a fortune, to do business or do some
sightseeing, to find a husband or wife, to help others, to learn something, or even to meet
God. And during their journeys they meet all kinds of people, animals and magic creatures,
and visit all kinds of countries, kingdoms, cities, villages, forests, mountains and prairies.
Taking into account the similar characters, plots, or patterns in some of the stories, we have
grouped them under several themes. All stories are accessible in several languages on the
EUMOF website and browsed either by Theme or Country of origin.
Useful EUMOF products and outcomes
Through its website and other dissemination actions, the project makes readily available to
you and all other European educators the following series of products and outcomes:
• EUMOF Stories Booklet and Audio CD
• EUMOF Educational Objectives
• EUMOF Educational Activities
• EUMOF Teachers’ Guide
• EUMOF Teacher Training Courses
• Piloting and Implementation Reports
• EUMOF International Conference
• EUMOF Website (http://www.eumof.unic.ac.cy)
The present document, EUMOF Teacher’s Guide, is designed to help you, as educators of
children aged between 9 -12, incorporate the European Mobility Folktales collection and
educational material in your teaching. The following section, “Learning about Culture,”
introduces you to a comparative, intercultural use of the collection. The section after that,
entitled “Learning about Difference,” helps you to explore with your students issues of
7 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
mobility and diversity in the stories. The section “Learning about Language(s)” guides you
through the use of the collection for the teaching and learning of languages within cultures
and language/literacy teaching in general. Towards the end of the document you may find a
couple of lesson descriptions, as well as a chapter entitled “Summaries of EUMOF Stories,”
which gives you a brief overview of all the folktales in the collection, so you can easily
choose the ones to incorporate in your teaching. Finally, in the Appendix, you can find useful
tables that link all EUMOF activities to targeted objectives and appropriate EUMOF stories.
8 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Learning about Culture
Getting started
Each EUMOF folktale reflects the culture that has produced it, as it is bound to be
related to culture-specific customs, traditions, legends, events, places etc., or include culture-
specific elements, such as clothing, art, music, food, language, architecture, everyday living,
heritage, etc. All these elements within the stories have the potential to bring to your students
a taste of diverse European cultures. As some of your students may share the same cultural
background with a EUMOF story, it is important to utilize their “expertise” and acknowledge
them as “representatives” of that culture.
As these folk stories were first told a long-long time ago and do not necessarily reflect
the modern culture and values and the contemporary way of living in the countries they
come from. While traditions and cultural heritage are important, we definitely wouldn’t
want children to come to believe that people in other countries are “backward” and continue
to dress, live and behave the same way people lived hundreds of years ago.
In the same spirit, we would like to point out that some of the collected folktales may
contain ideas that offend contemporary sensitivities and political correctness. They
come from periods in the distant past, when slavery was legal and women were
underprivileged or even oppressed. Inevitably, then, they include some elements or ideas that
by contemporary standards would be considered racist or sexist. We decided not to censor
these elements, but instead utilize them as opportunities for critical thinking, discussion, and
comparison. We encourage you to help your students identify ideas that are not in agreement
with contemporary ideology and human rights agreements and have them respond critically
and even creatively to them (e.g. by retelling the story in a contemporary setting).
Keeping the above points in mind, a sense of European citizenship, as well as tolerance
and respect for the peoples and cultures in these stories is expected to be promoted. In
addition, intercultural dialogue is central in EUMOF. The diverse stories within the
collection are quite appropriate for comparative approaches, which identify similarities and
differences, and appreciate the value of diversity. In order to achieve this, you need to
utilize stories from diverse settings. DO NOT limit yourself and your students only to
stories from your own country.
9 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
THREE SIMPLE STEPS TO GET STARTED
1. DECIDE ON YOUR FOCUS
Decide what educational areas you wish to target and set your
objectives. You can select some of the Culture EUMOF Objectives
listed further down and/or design your own objectives.
2. CHOOSE THE FOLKTALES YOU WILL USE
Browse the collection on-line and select the mobility folktales that
best fit your objectives. Familiarize yourself with the stories you are
going to use and the countries/cultures they come from. DO NOT
limit yourself and your students to stories from your own country.
3. DESIGN YOUR ACTIVITIES
From the “Culture” pool of activities on the website, choose the
suggested activities that best fit your objectives and selected stories.
Adjust them and/or design your own activities, in order to address the
specific needs and abilities of your own students.
10 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Educational objectives
These are the “Culture” educational objectives that have been developed for the purposes of
EUMOF. You may need to revise them or add your own objectives, to best fit your own
educational settings.
Children will be able to:
1. Form communities within which they interact freely, sharing their cultures and their
knowledge of other cultures with each other.
2. Discover connections between texts and their cultural contexts (e.g. art, music,
architecture, school, family, professions, customs, etc.).
3. Find out more about the history and traditions of the cultures that produced the
stories.
4. Explore the connections between actual people and places and those depicted in the
story; extend this knowledge through research.
5. Engage in self-reflection regarding their cultural identities and discover how they are
different or similar to each other.
6. Ponder on similarities and differences between European cultures and begin to form a
European citizenship which recognises the similarities within cultures and celebrates
the differences.
11 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Sample activities
In this section, you can find some sample EUMOF activities that highlight the potential
comparative, intercultural use of the collection. Longer descriptions of these and many more
activities can be found on the project’s website, under “Educational Activities”> “Culture.”
Title: New Destination
1. After reading and discussing a EUMOF story, students work in pairs identifying the
places visited by the hero and how these places and the people/creatures s/he met
there helped her/him in the story.
2. Teacher explains that the story comes from a European country and asks students if
they have visited any other European countries recently.
3. Students then get into groups, choose a European country and read more about it,
listing any information they may find interesting.
4. Teacher asks them to imagine what would happen if the hero of the story travelled to
this modern country instead of the place s/he travels in the original story. How would
he get there? What would he see and who would he meet? What would he eat? How
would this place help her/him find the solution to her/his problem?
Title: Do you know these animals? Where do they live?
1. In many folk tales there are animals that speak, understand the human speech and
help the protagonists. Read the following stories, find the animals, and write each of
them on a separate sheet of paper. Describe them and list their characteristics.
2. After having together discovered the animals in the stories, the teacher distributes the
tasks. Each child (or a group of children) has/have to do research on the Internet
about one animal.
3. Kinder report what they know or have learned about these animals?
4. Are the animals acting the same way in real life and in the folk tales?
5. Do these animals live in the countries, where the story comes from?
6. There is one animal that doesn’t live in the European countries, the Lion. Still, lions
are often found in European folk tales. Why?
12 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Title: Markets in the world
1. After the narration of the fairy tale the teacher divides the children into groups and
asks the members of each group to imagine and describe the King’s of Cyprus visit to
Venice’s market. In order to help them, he could give the groups some questions like:
“How do the shops look like?”, “What do they sell?”, “What do the traders’ and
customers’ clothes look like?”, “How are the products advertized?”
2. Each group presents to the whole class the thoughts they have made about Venice’s
market in past times and then a discussion follows.
3. The teacher asks the groups to think about the basic similarities and differences
between the market of the fairy tale’s age and the market of our age.
4. Then, a whole class discussion follows during which the groups state their point of
view.
5. Next, the students talk about the markets (open air) both in their country and also in
other ones, which they have visited.
6. The teacher assigns each group the task to find information (texts and images) about
markets (open air) in a different place of the world: markets in Europe, Africa,
Middle East, Central Asia, North America and elsewhere. The students can look for
real pictures of the markets, and also illustrations of scenes in markets in different
places of the world.
Title: Writing a Song
1. After reading a EUMOF story, the whole class collaborates to write a summary of the
story on the board.
2. Students listen to traditional songs on a CD (either songs from their home country or
from the story’s country).
3. Students are then asked to work in groups and draft appropriate lyrics that narrate the
story and fit to the music of one of the songs. Epic songs might be the most easy to
adopt.
4. Groups then share their drafts and use the best ideas in order to create the final
version of the lyrics.
5. They then sing the lyrics while they listen to the music on the CD.
13 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Title: Put these characters on the map!
1. Teacher tells students that they will have to cut out the beginnings of stories and stick
them to their countries of origin. The countries of origin may be chosen amongst the
following: Portugal, Cyprus, Greece, Austria, Poland, Greece and Spain. One of these
countries is the origin of 2 stories and one country doesn’t apply.
2. Teacher gives correct matching after students have completed task. 1.AU; 2.CY;
3.PT; 4.PL; 5.CY; 6.GR.
3. Next, students are invited to find the title for each story. Solutions: 1. A Treasure in
the Fireplace; 2.Sierolotta; 3.The Tower of Babylon; 4. The Legend of the Bugle of
Cracow; 5. The Prince of Venice; 6. The Black Man.
4. The last activity on the handout is to see if students remember the countries of origin
of the stories. As a follow-up, students are invited to choose a country and/or a story
to read from the excerpts presented.
Title: Religions in the world
1. After narrating the story, the teacher asks the students to spot elements concerning
religion.
2. The class discusses which religion the elements they found refer to.
3. Then, the students brainstorm the religions they know and the results are written on
the board.
4. A whole class discussion is conducted about the basic facts the students know about
the religions mentioned. Students who come from families that have as their religion
another than the master one, could function as catalysts in the above discussion.
5. Students form groups. Each group chooses a religion from the list that was formed by
the brainstorming, do research on its basic characteristics and presents them in class,
some other day.
6. After all the groups have presented the religions in class, the students find any
similarities or differences among them, based on their notes.
7. The students and their teacher/families could visit different religions’ places of
worship that exist in their area.
8. The teacher and the students could invite in class persons that belong in different
religion groups to talk about their religion. The visitors could also come from the
students’ family or social background.
14 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Learning about Difference
Getting started
All EUMOF folktales focus on characters that travel. One of the three criteria we
followed to collect the tales was the following:
(ii) the plot must include some kind of travelling and encounters with “other” people
or creatures, cultures, and places.
So, all EUMOF stories reflect issues that pertain to travelling and the mobility of people,
ideas, cultures, etc. These lead, of course, to issues that pertain to the acceptance and
celebration of diversity. These two areas (Mobility and Diversity) are grouped here under the
same general category Difference.
Encouraging your students to reflect on and explore the reasons that have prompted
humans to travel since the beginning of time is central for a better understanding of
Mobility and Diversity. And while not all reasons for travelling are based on good intentions
(e.g. military invasions) in most cases mobility can bring about several positive effects, for
intercultural understanding, the personal and professional growth of people, and a
community’s culture, science, and economy. European integration and progress depends
heavily on these positive effects of mobility.
As mentioned in the “Culture” section, these folk stories were first told a long-long time
ago and do not necessarily reflect modern cultures and norms. This means that some
stories may imply negative stances towards difference. In fact, by contemporary standards,
some elements or ideas in the folktales may be considered racist or sexist. We encourage you
to help your students identify ideas that are not in agreement with contemporary ideology
and human rights agreements and have them respond critically and even creatively to them
(e.g. by telling the story from the oppressed person’s point of view).
Activities listed under the area of “Difference,” enable you to promote amongst your
students an awareness of the importance of cultural and linguistic diversity within
Europe and of the need to combat racism, prejudice and xenophobia. Comparative
approaches are again most appropriate; for instance, students could compare EUMOF
stories, explore why their heroes travel, and identify diverse attitudes towards difference.
15 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
THREE SIMPLE STEPS TO GET STARTED
1. DECIDE ON YOUR FOCUS
Decide what educational areas you wish to target and set your
objectives. You can select some of the Difference EUMOF Objectives
listed further down and/or design your own objectives.
2. CHOOSE THE FOLKTALES YOU WILL USE
Browse the collection on-line and select the mobility folktales that
best fit your objectives. Familiarize yourself with the stories you are
going to use and the countries/cultures they come from. DO NOT
limit yourself and your students to stories from your own country.
3. DESIGN YOUR ACTIVITIES
From the “Difference” pool of activities on the website, choose the
suggested activities that best fit your objectives and selected stories.
Adjust them and/or design your own activities, in order to address the
specific needs and abilities of your own students.
16 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Educational objectives
These are the “Difference” educational objectives that have been developed for the purposes
of EUMOF. As explained in the previous pages, we have listed under “Difference” two more
specific areas: “Mobility” and “Diversity.” You may need to revise them or add your own
objectives, to best fit your own educational settings.
Children will be able to:
Mobility
7. Identify and analyze an imaginary or real person’s motives for travelling.
8. Demonstrate positive stances towards meeting and interacting with “other” people, places, and
cultures.
9. Demonstrate a critical attitude towards mobility (crossing various kinds of boundaries for
diverse reasons) evaluating it from different points of view.
Diversity
10. Identify and critique attitudes towards “difference” within a story and within real-life
contexts.
11. Take action as promoters of civic equity and intercultural understanding.
12. Appreciate cultural diversity and view it as a positive characteristic of European societies.
13. Identify historical change in the views about or attitudes towards “other” people(s).
14. Learn to see through other people's eyes by developing respect and tolerance, and promoting
intercultural relationships as the key to conflict resolution.
17 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Sample activities
In this section, you can find some sample EUMOF activities that highlight the potential use
of the collection to educate students about mobility and diversity. Longer descriptions of
these and many more activities can be found on the project’s website, under “Educational
Activities”> “Difference.”
MOBILITY
Title: Interviewing Migrants
1. One or two of the stories are read or told to the children (or two different stories to
two groups).
2. The teacher asks children WHY the protagonist has to leave his home and family.
3. Personalizing the reasons of migration: Are there people in your family who had to
leave their home and family and go to another country?
4. Children with migrant background share stories of migration with the rest of the
class.
5. The teacher collects different reasons for migration on the board.
6. Children interview migrants (in their families or other people). The migrants are
asked why they could not or did not want to stay at the place where they had been
born.
7. The children present their findings in class, e.g. show photos of migrants and tell
their stories.
8. The ways of migration are visualized on a map in class.
Title: How people in Europe travelled in the old times and why
1. Identify on the map each of the countries participating in the EUMOF project.
2. Give suggestions how the people from each of these countries could travel in the old
times.
3. Read a story from each country and check whether your suggestions were correct.
4. Look in the stories and compare what the travelling people usually had in their bags
for the long way? (In the Greek stories they had besides bread and water also olives,
why?).
18 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
5. Compare the three folk tales and see the different motives of travelling. (To try there
luck, to meat new people, to learn something new from them, to become rich…)
6. How do you think, what has happened to the different protagonists while they were
travelling? (Possible answers: They met new people, visited new countries, learned a
lot.; they had the opportunity to try their ability to communicate with the others, they
have gone through many difficulties and have become more mature, they have
proven their abilities in unknown milieus, but some have also come to conquer a
land, or to cheat the others, i.e. they crossed moral borders, etc.)
Title: To Travel on not to Travel?
1. Teacher narrates the story up to a point where the hero decides to leave his country.
2. Teacher asks two students to express their opinion about the decision of the
protagonist. Will his life improve by leaving his home or is this a wrong decision?
One of them is supposed to agree and the other to disagree. They have a debate,
trying to convince their audience (classmates) that their opinion is the right one.
3. Teacher asks the other students to vote for one of these two opinions and to write
down at least one reason for choosing this opinion.
4. After voting, the teacher asks children to step into the hero’s shoes and to imagine
what they would do. Would they leave on a journey, or not?
5. A brief whole-class discussion follows, examining why the hero decided to leave and
what were the factors that urged him to do this. Why do people travel?
6. Teacher continues and concludes the narration of the story.
7. Children re-examine the hero’s decisions based on the ending/consequences.
DIVERSITY
Title: Identity Card
1. Teacher shows her/his identity card, discussing the various elements that compose it.
2. Children suggest other information that could go on someone’s identity card (e.g.
favorite color, food, place, ice cream flavor/ important personality trades/ profession/
habits etc.)
3. Teacher narrates a EUMOF story.
19 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
4. Then the whole class collaborates to fill in an identity card for the protagonist.
5. Children get into groups and each group gets a different story.
6. Each group fills in a new protagonists’ identity card according to their group’s
folktale.
7. At the end each group presents its identity card and students find differences and
similarities among the protagonists. How are the children similar to or different from
these characters? How are these characters treated in the story? Which elements of
their identity cards are important in the story? Why? Establish connections to real-life
people and attitudes towards identity.
Title: The Opposite Story (for the stories “Black Man” and/or “Mavris”)
1. As soon as the story has been narrated, the teacher asks the students to narrate the
opposite story, that is, a story in which all the heroes (King, Queen, Princess) are
black and Blackman is a white man.
2. A student plays the role of Blackman (the hero of the original story) and the other
students become journalists who ask him a number of questions (how he felt when
the King ordered to kill him, when he was saved, when he married the princess, etc.).
This step can be repeated having other students to play the part of “Blackman”, as
well.
3. A student acts the part of the “Whiteman” (the hero of the opposite story) and the
students repeat the same as in step 2. This step can also be repeated by having other
students play the part of “Whiteman” as well.
4. There is a whole-class discussion about one’s feelings when he is different from the
master group.
Title: Kindness to Strangers
1. Teacher writes on the board: ‘Would you like a foreigner to live with you at home?
Why? Why not?
2. Teacher discusses with students good things and bad things that might happen:
E.g. S/he might not like the food. S/he may not know enough language to
communicate. S/he may not understand our implicit rules, such as when to stand up
20 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
and go to sleep, how to use the fork and the knife. What you want to tell the visitor
and what s/he would like to hear may be different, etc….
3. Teacher shows four details of one page from Shaun Tan’s Tales from Outer Suburbia
(handout) and elicits what kind of questions are being asked by the secret foreign
visitor.
4. In groups, students are invited to create storyboards (a series of illustrations) based on
excerpts from three selected folktales that include “kindness to strangers” (handout).
21 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Learning about Language(s)
Getting started
All EUMOF activities contribute to the development of students’ effective use of their
native oral and written language. EUMOF also focuses on the improvement of second
language learning, as well as the teaching and learning of basic reading and writing
skills. As all stories are available in English, German, Greek, Polish, and Portuguese,
teachers can capitalize on the multilingual aspect of the collection, by introducing their
students to foreign languages, and inspiring them to adopt a positive stance towards second
language learning.
There is a multitude of linguistic elements you could work on with your students, even
if you are not a fluent speaker of a foreign language:
Character recognition
E.g. Ask students to compare the characters in the alphabet of their native language with the
alphabet of a foreign language.
Word recognition
E.g. Ask students to look for words that are similar with other words in a language they
speak or discuss the origin of some words.
Speculate about meaning
E.g. Discuss capitalization: if the first letter is capital then it is a name.
The sound of words
E.g. Combine written (read the book) and spoken form (read the story and listen to its audio
narration on the EUMOF CD or website) and reach conclusions about the pronunciation of
words.
Language skills
E.g. Have students use resources (dictionary’s/thesaurus) to find the meaning of unknown –
foreign words or ask them to arrange foreign words and punctuation marks in the correct
order to form sentences.
In any case, comparative and playful approaches are the most appropriate.
22 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
THREE SIMPLE STEPS TO GET STARTED
1. DECIDE ON YOUR FOCUS
Decide what educational areas you wish to target and set your
objectives. You can select some of the Language EUMOF Objectives
listed further down and/or design your own objectives.
2. CHOOSE THE FOLKTALES YOU WILL USE
Browse the collection on-line and select the mobility folktales that
best fit your objectives. Familiarize yourself with the stories you are
going to use and the languages they are presented in. DO NOT limit
yourself and your students to stories from your own country.
3. DESIGN YOUR ACTIVITIES
From the “Language” pool of activities on the website, choose the
suggested activities that best fit your objectives and selected stories.
Adjust them and/or design your own activities, in order to address the
specific needs and abilities of your own students.
23 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Educational objectives
These are the “Language(s)” educational objectives that have been developed for the
purposes of EUMOF. They are divided into “Languages within cultures” objectives (in
relation to second or foreign language learning) and in “Language & Literacy” (general skills
that pertain to language and literature). You may need to revise them or add your own
objectives, to best fit your own educational settings.
Children will be able to:
Languages within cultures
15. Demonstrate positive stances towards learning foreign languages.
16. Identify and read commonly used words, phrases, and structures in stories written in
another European language.
17. Appreciate Europe’s linguistic diversity as linguistic richness.
18. Identify some of the European languages when they hear them.
19. Identify some of the European languages when they see them in written form.
Language & Literacy
20. Demonstrate positive stances towards listening, reading and narrating folktales and
other narrative texts, viewing the act of storytelling as an imaginative journey, but
also as a way of interpreting real life.
21. Apply reading and listening strategies to comprehend, analyse, and criticize a
narrative text.
22. Apply speaking strategies to present, in an attracting and convincing way, ideas and
arguments, which pertain to the stories.
23. Compare folktales and identify similarities and differences, in terms of the way in
which they are structured and written.
24 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Sample activities
In this section, you can find some sample EUMOF activities that highlight the potential of
the collection for language(s) learning. Longer descriptions of these and many more
activities can be found on the project’s website, under “Educational Activities”>
“Language.”
Title: Exploring Numbers (Numerals) in Different Languages
1. A EUMOF story dealing with three sisters/brothers/animals etc. is read or told to the
children.
2. Question: Do you know other stories or folk tales in which the number THREE is
important?
3. Children narrate their stories.
4. Question: Can you tell the number THREE (and/or other numbers) in other
languages?
5. Children try to fill in a grid in a relevant handout.
6. Children ask their parents, relatives, neighbours, and friends to help them and
collaborate in groups to fill in the grid. They should try to get into contact with
people from different linguistic backgrounds.
7. The findings are copied to a poster.
8. Possibly a little prize could be awarded to those children who could find out numbers
in most languages.
Title: The “Drakish” Language
1. After narrating the story of the Little Goldenmoon (from Greece), students form
groups in order to create the “Drakish” language, that is, the language spoken by the
dragons in the fairy tale.
2. Each group decides on some common characteristics of the “Drakish” and based on
them, they make some words or phrases (eg. “good morning”, “how are you”, “we
are dragons”, “who are you”, etc.). The “Drakish” vocabulary could contain original
words found in different languages, words created by the students combining words
from different languages or completely imaginary words that children usually make.
3. Each group presents a short dialogue in “Drakish” to the other groups. The groups
who watch try to understand the dialogue’s content.
25 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
4. A whole class discussion follows during which the students talk about differences
and similarities in the “Drakish” language each group created. They discuss if the
“Drakish”of one group reminded them and in which points of an existing language.
Also, whose “Drakish” seemed easier or more difficult than the one of the rest
groups, etc.
5. After the discussion, students can role play the fairy tale, having the heroes/dragons
speak some version of the “Drakish” language they have created.
Title: Familiar words
1. Teacher divides the class into pairs.
2. Teacher asks the students to look for familiar words in the text of a foreign story.
3. Students speculate about the meaning of the words in a foreign language.
4. Students create groups of chosen words.
5. Students create their own poems, using the familiar foreign words found by all the
pairs.
6. Students present and compare their poems.
Title: Place Names
1. The “Wars and Sawa” story (from Poland) is read or told to the children.
2. Question: Can you explain the place name of your town or village?
3. If yes, children report to the class. Otherwise the teacher should prepare a few
examples.
4. Children are divided in two groups.
5. Group A tries to discover similarities in the naming of towns/villages of the
respective own region, like (in German/English/Italian/Slavic languages) elements
like Burg/castle, chester/castello/grad, Stadt/town/villa/mesto, miasto ,
Dorf/borgo/ves, …
6. Group B tries to identify similar place names all over Europe. Possibly they need a
bit of help in order to know that e.g. Neumarkt in Austria corresponds to Nowy Targ.
7. The findings are copied to the posters.
A small prize is awarded to those children who could find out most place names.
26 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Title: Placing Human Punctuation Marks
1. Teacher chooses several students to stand at the front of the classroom holding the
sentence strips for one sentence.
2. Teacher makes another student choose a card for one of the punctuation marks and
stand next to the students with the sentence strips. They are to line up in the order
that the sentence would be written on paper.
3. Teacher continues making students choose and place the cards needed for
punctuation until the sentence has been completed.
4. Teacher asks the class, if they agree or disagree with the placements.
5. Teacher repeats the process with a variety of sentences, taken from the chosen folk
tale.
Title: Exploring Greeting Words
1. The story “Roman Ghosts” (from Austria) is read or told to the children.
2. Question: Can you greet in a language other than your native language(s)?
3. Greeting words in as many different languages as possible are collected in the class.
4. Children try to fill in the grid on a handout.
5. Children (in groups of two or three) are sent out to ask their parents, relatives,
neighbours, and friends to help them fill in the grid. They should try to get into
contact with people from different linguistic background.
6. The greeting words can be grouped: formal/informal (i.e. within the family),
according to the time of the day (morning, midday, afternoon, evening, night),
meeting/departing.
7. The findings are copied to a poster.
27 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Lesson Descriptions
Storyteller at Secondary School St. Stefan/Stainz, Austria
Activities with “Little Goldenmoon”
This day I went to the public library of St. Stefan/Stainz, which is located close to the secondary
school. The children only had to walk for 3 minutes and they already knew the library from other
visits. The teacher was very excited and curios about the stories from other countries. In the end of
the lesson, I also handed the EUMOF material to her. When the children came, we gathered and I
explained what we will do. I choose the activity ‘The little Goldenmoon’. First we talked about tales
in general and I got to know, that the children already knew a lot about how tales are structured.
Then I read the story to them and stopped at a certain point. We talked a little bit about the story and
found out, that there are similarities to one from Austria. Then I separated the class into groups and
told them to find some place, where they can prepare their little role play. I also told them, to write it
down first.
I did not know what to expect from the children, because I did not know how familiar they are with
acting. Despite my doubts all children were really into creating an alternative end and were
motivated. After half an hour the children were ready to present their results. We gathered again and
one group after the other presented their outcomes. Two groups where a little bit shy, so they only
read (in the different roles) to the audience. The other groups acted their alternative ends and had a
lot of fun. Also the children who watched did like to see the others acting.
Altogether I was really surprised with how well the children did. They really understood how to bring
the tale to an end, and which elements are important to tell the stories. Except a few children, they
really liked to act in front of the others and also were proud to present their work. After all the
presentations I read the original tale to them.
During the second part of the lesson we did the activity ‘Hidden treasure’. In advance I choose one
story from Austria, which is written in old-fashioned German. I wanted to see if the children are able
to understand the words and also if they can find the racist part of the story. I chose the story ‘The
Fireplace,’ printed it and cut it into five pieces. Before the children arrived in the library, I hid the
pieces of paper in books and noted down were they are. First I read the first part of the story to the
children and then asked them what will happen next. They had really creative ideas, also funny ones,
and really did like to fantasise about the ongoing of the story. Then a few children were allowed to
search for the next piece of the story. I gave them a hint, in which book it was hidden. We did so until
we finished the whole story. All children had problems to understand the old-fashioned German and
did not know for example the old word for Italian, which is ‘welsch’. This word also is kind of
degrading.
They really liked to search for the tale-pieces and to guess what will happen next. They also
understood that the foreigner was the bad character, who wanted to profit from the honest Austrian.
28 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
They also were able to find the connection to nowadays. The children liked both activities. Also the
teacher was excited, but I don’t know if she used the other material.
Teacher at Primary School in Larnaca, Cyprus
Activities with “Sierolotta” [Iron Pig]
This morning I had scheduled to differentiate my lesson. I am a teacher in a primary school in
Larnaka area and I teach in a fifth grade of the school. I was feeling weird because I didn’t know if
children would like the story that was ready to teach them. I was hesitated about this lesson because
children sometimes laughed at the tradition and the stories of their country.
When the lesson started the children were actually confused. They couldn’t understand what was the
really meaning of the story. I choose to teach the story of “sierolotta” which was talking about a
weird creature. It was looking like a pig but this creature was wild and fearsome. The children had to
recognize different cultural elements that show the civilization, the tradition and the perceptions of
Cypriot people.
After reading the story the children were excited because this creature was really weird. Instead of
being scared they had fun while they were listening to this story. They tried to imagine this creature. I
understood that they had unique ideas and I asked them to paint the creature on a piece of paper. The
children created beautiful paintings and pictures. They liked the way that we had this lesson.
Then I asked them to find and tell me different things and parts of the story that they impressed them.
I listened to a lot of interesting things. One of my students told me that he wanted to be the monk who
fight and won sierolotta. One child told me that if he was one of the people living in this village he
would leave the village and live in another village. Finally the children wanted to play the roles of
the monk and of sierolotta. I was impressed by the way they played the roles and they expressed their
fear or their happiness.
I really liked the way we did our lesson and I am sure that the children did so. I will choose another
story and I will repeat this lesson.
Teacher at Platon Primary School, Greece
Activities with “The Three Brothers”
In the context of the EUMOF project, I chose to use the activity “The Three Lands” and I
implemented it by exploiting the fairy tale “The Three Brothers”. The objectives of this activity were
to familiarize the students with the “Difference”, to learn to respect the particular cultural
characteristics of each place and to identify and appreciate the importance of diversity about the
evolution of human civilization.
Regarding the implementation of this activity in the classroom, the following procedure was
followed. The students were divided into three groups. I gave to each student a copy of the fairy tale.
Initially I read it once and then some of the students read it as well. I asked the students some reading
29 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
comprehension questions about the special way that each people were behaving. The children were
asked to find the elements that seemed strange to them in every country of the fairy tale and think
about why this behaviour arose. Through the exchange of opinions the children understood that the
inhabitants in the lands of the fairy tale were not crazy. They realized that the knowledge and
perceptions of the people from each country were simply different and that the meeting between
people can help in the development and finding of new ideas.
Then I asked the children to tell me if they knew any particular habits or phrases used in only some
areas of our country. I enriched their knowledge with some more cases that had not been reported by
the children. In this way, we realized that even all of us who live in our country we are not absolutely
the same.
Then I asked everyone who was wearing jeans to stand up. Later to stand up those who had brown
hair. In this way we observed that even in our classroom all of us are not absolutely the same.
After that, I announced to the children that we would play a game. I gave to each group of students a
card that had as a title: “THE CULTURAL NORMS OF OUR COUNTRY”. I explained to children
that each group is a separate country in our game. They should have read silently and learn the
norms, in order to be prepared to implement them later. Prerequisite of the game was that each
group – country should not be aware of the other team norms.
The cultural norms of each group were conflicting. The norms of the first group were the following:
when we meet someone from another country, we must join our hands and surround him, not to talk
to him and smile constantly. The norms of the second group were the following: when we meet
someone from another country we must hold his hand if we want to talk to him and at the time we talk
to him we should be hitting our feet on the floor. According to the norms of the third group: when we
meet someone from another country we must not touch him or he must not touch us, it is forbidden to
look at him/her in his/her eyes and we are allowed to talk to him/her only if we are men.
After the teams worked out the norms, two of the teams got up, went into the middle of the class and
did a reconstruction of the meeting of the two countries. The third group noted down the reactions of
the students who made the reconstruction. The procedure was repeated two more times in order to
make all possible matches between the three countries.
After finishing this process, everyone sat down to discuss the results. The first observation was that
they failed to have an understanding between the countries. When I asked them to tell me what went
wrong and failed to agree, the children said that there was no one to blame but the problem arose
because of the special norms that each country /team had. The second observation was that there
were different reactions among students during the meeting of the countries. Some were shocked,
some laughed, some were hesitant and cautious at first, but later they had a lot of fun.
So we came to the following conclusion: that the situation we saw in class, comes very close to
reality. We often meet people from other places, people who have different habits, different language
30 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
and different rules of behaviour. This can complicate our discussion with them; it could cause
laughter to some, or surprise, or even ridicule and resentment. We, however, understood that there is
nothing wrong with the people, neither one is worse or better than another There are simply some
cultural differences, which when they are respected and when there is an interest for understanding
and communication, these differences can inspire new ideas and develop the culture of every people.
The activity was completed with the dramatization of the fairy tale by the students of my class.
31 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
Summaries of EUMOF Stories
STORIES FROM AUSTRIA
PILFERING
Once upon a time there was a poor peasant, who had three sons. The peasant asked their sons
to learn a handicraft. Then the sons left the house to learn a handicraft. The oldest brothers
left together but the younger one left alone. This boy met an old man who told him to follow
him. After a while they reached a cave and went in. The boy was puzzled when he noticed a
group of ferocious looking men who amused themselves by playing cards and dice. They
were robbers and the boy had to go with them every time they had a robbery. After a long
time the three brothers returned home. When the younger boy told to his father about
pilfering, the father went to the magistrate. This magistrate asked the young boy a difficult
job. Over there in the fields, there was his farmhand with a pair of oxen. If he managed to
steal one ox from the plough, he would earn another fifty ducats and they would give him a
job at the municipality. The young boy did it and got fifty ducats in addition to his own fifty
and was employed as a warden, because he knew very well how to deal with thieves.
THE FIREPLACE
Once upon a time there was a stranger, a distinguished gentleman from Italy, who stopped to
get some rest at a peasant’s house in Northern Styria. In his kitchen, the peasant had an
exceptionally large, old style stone fireplace to which the stranger turned his attention.
Behind this kitchen there were a lot of pots of gold and the stranger knew it. He tried to trick
the peasant so he sent him to Italy to find a new kitchen and replace the old one with that.
But the peasant realized what was going on and he asked his wife by sending her a letter to
find and hide the pots. So it happened. When the Italian and the peasant returned to the
village, the Italian demolished the old kitchen and put a new one. But he didn’t find the
treasure. The peasant laughed up his sleeve because he tricked the Italian who had wanted to
take his great-grandfather’s treasure.
ROMAN GHOSTS
Once upon a time there was a strong young man with a tanned face and a walking stick in his
hand. He had left his dear mother and his faithful sister in order to go to war against the
Turkish army. He had wanted to gain victories for his emperor and make a small fortune for
himself. He was tired from the long journey, so he sat down on a small mound under a
shade-giving tree and fell asleep. Suddenly, someone tapped him lightly on his back. An old
man waved to him, and the lad followed him willingly. So they wandered across a few grave
mounds and entered one of them, into the earth. They went into to a high vault where many
strange men gathered around a long table, they all had the same outfit as their chief. They
welcomed the surprised young man, filled his pouches and pockets with pieces of gold and
one of them even served him a goblet of wine. More and more bodies crowded around the
lad, toasted and cheered. Again and again he bravely exclaimed “Vivat!” It was the only
Latin word he knew. All of a sudden the lad shook. He started up and still found himself
lying on the mould. He thought that it was only a dream. But when he put his hand in his
pocket, he found it was full of ancient gold coins. He understood that what he had seen was
not a dream. He had become rich.
THE FROG FIANCÉE
A poor widow wanted to leave her possessions to one of her three sons as they were too few
to split into three. Yet she loved all three of them, and in order not to have to choose one, she
gave each of them a bundle of flax and asked them to bring them back the most beautifully
spun yarn. The youngest one met a frog near a lake. The frog took the flax, jumped into the
32 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
lake and soon came out with the yarn spun. The young man thanked the frog and was about
to go back home when the frog told him he should come to the lake again later. He would
find a golden cane by the lake. He was to pick it up, strike the frog three times and after that
strike the water three times. After that the youngest son went back to his mother’s house with
the beautiful yarn. But then he went quickly back to the lake and found the golden cane
there. When he picked it up, the frog appeared in front of him. The young man struck the
frog three times and at that very moment it changed into a beautiful girl dressed in a silver
dress and then he struck the lake’s surface three times and all of a sudden it turned into a
castle with blossoming meadows around it. Finally the youngest son married the girl.
THE GOLDEN SHOES
Once upon a time there was an old musician. He travelled around the world and played his
fiddle. This was how he earned his living. One day he stopped in front of a chapel and, being
in a good mood, he entered the chapel and started playing and singing as well as he could to
the glory of God. All of a sudden a golden shoe fell from the altar of Virgin Mary just in
front of him. The old musician tried to sell this golden shoe to many people he met but
nobody wanted to buy it. The last man thought that the musician was a thief and he called the
police. The musician was trying to prove that he was innocent and he asked them to take him
to the chapel. There he started playing and singing as before. He played even better than
before because now he asked the Lord, his only witness, for help. When he finished his song
the wonder happened again. The guards saw another golden shoe fall down in front of the
old musician. The happy musician went back to the goldsmith who bought from him the
golden shoes and gave him so much money for them that he didn’t have to beg by playing on
his fiddle any more till the end of his days.
THE LION, THE STORK, AND THE ANT
A poor widow lived with her son Hans in a forest. But the son wanted to see the world. His
mother couldn’t stop him and he left the house. While he was walking the young boy met a
lion, a stork and an ant. They asked him to solve their problem. When the young man did so,
the lion made him very strong, the stork made him able to fly high and the ant made him able
to become very small. After that he saw a town. All the houses were covered in black and the
inhabitants wore black clothes because the king’s daughter was kidnapped. Hans asked
where the castle was and went that way to save the princess. He used the powers that the
three animals gave him, he saved the princess and he destroyed the castle of the dragon. The
beautiful girl married her rescuer and they lived happily ever after.
____________________
STORIES FROM CYPRUS
MY POOR CHILD VASILIS
Once upon a time there was a farmer, named Vasilis. He was living in a small cottage with
his wife and their little daughter. One day, while his wife was combing her daughter’s hair,
she noticed the tall grape grapevine that hang over the well. She thought it was very
dangerous and started crying with sobs. She thought that if her daughter had a son, he would
climb over the grapevine and fall into the well. The farmer was very mad about that and he
left the house. He would return back home if he could find someone who would be stranger
than his wife. One day, he arrived at a village. There, he saw a lot of people running up and
down, asking for help. In the middle of the village square a young boy was standing. The boy
had put his hands in a large jug filled with walnuts. His hands glided easily into the jug when
they were empty. But now the young boy couldn’t pull his hands out because he didn’t want
to leave the walnuts. People thought that they had to cut little child’s hands. The farmer went
to the little boy and talked sweetly to him. The little boy left the walnuts and his hands were
33 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
came out of the jag. The village people thought this was a miracle. But the farmer decided to
return to his wife and daughter. He understood now that all people are strange, one way or
another.
KOUTSOUKOUTOU
Once upon a time, there was a little beetle called Koutsoukoutou, who decided to get
married. But her body was black and she was very sad about that. Because of her colour she
couldn’t find a husband. Koutsoukoutou met a lot of people who wanted to marry her but she
did not agree with them. Finally Koutsoukoutou gladly took the mouse for her husband. On
their wedding day, all animals, birds, and insects were gathered. They were having lots of
fun, when suddenly they ran out of water. The bride decided to go and bring some water
herself but she got tired and lied down to get some rest. She fell asleep. The mouse got
angry, and started hitting her with his tail! Koutsoukoutou woke up but was only tickled by
the mouse’s tail. She was laughing so hard that the mouse started laughing too. He was not
angry any more.
SIEROLOTTA
In Doros, a village near the city of Lemesos in Cyprus, there lived a creature that scared all
the village people. This creature was a wild and fearsome Sierolotta, which weighed more
than four tones. Her face was made of iron and her teeth were sharp as knives. Sometimes
she would appear to have a woman’s head, with live snakes instead of hair. Sierolotta was
growling, and jumping, and kicking near the village. The villagers didn’t know what to do to.
One day, a strange monk visited the village. He talked to the lords and told them that he
wanted to build a monastery near the canyon. The lords listened carefully to what he had to
say, and then they told him the story of Sierolotta. The strange monk headed for the canyon
whispering some words. Suddenly, he saw Sierolotta coming at him. They started to fight.
Sierolotta attacked the monk but he shined like a star. Then, the monk wings on his back,
flew, and grabbed Sierolotta. The ground shook and was split in two. The Monk threw
Sierolotta in the void and the creature disappeared. Next morning, a bright white light shown
on the village. The villagers found the Monk sitting on a big rock, smiling. He told them that
their troubles were over.
MAVRIS
Once upon a time in a kingdom, there lived a King and a Vizier. Their wives were pregnant
with their first child. The King and the Vizier agreed that, if the one had a daughter and the
other had a son, they would have their children marry each other. But the Vizier’s wife had a
boy with dark skin, who was given the name Mavris and the King didn’t want his daughter to
marry him. When the princess came of age, the King decided to have her marry another man.
But Mavris was sad about that and decided to leave on a long journey. He wanted to find
God and ask Him what he could do to change the colour of his skin. After some time, he
finally found God. God told him the answer to his question. Mavris did exactly what the God
told him and he left on his body a mark because this would prove his identity. After a long
way, he finally arrived at the kingdom. He went straight to the King and told him his story.
The King commanded that Mavris get married with his daughter.
34 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
THE PICKY PRINCESS
Once upon a time there was a King who had a beautiful but also very proud daughter. A lot
of princes had asked her to marry them, but she would always find a flaw in each prince.
Then another prince came by and the princess liked him, but unfortunately this prince had
long hair. The King was very mad. He asked the last prince to cut his hair and to get dressed
like a poor basket weaver. The King told his daughter that she would get married with the
poor basket weaver. So it happened. After that the princess took off her expensive clothes
and wore a simple dress. Then they left for the prince’s house. The prince took some canes
and began to weave them into baskets. But the guards of his father arrested him because it
was forbidden to make and sell baskets in the central square. The princess went to see the
prince and to ask him to leave his husband. But when she went to the prince’s house she
realized tha the prince was his husband. And they lived happily ever after.
THE PRINCE OF VENICE
Once upon a time, a King lived in Cyprus. The King had three daughters. He told them that
he would have a trip and asked them to tell him what they wanted to bring them. The oldest
daughter asked for a dress with the sky with the stars embroidered on it. The second daughter
asked for a dress with the sea and all its creatures embroidered on it. The Princess asked her
father to bring the three golden tufts of hair. The King arrived to beautiful Venice. When he
finished his business there, he went to the market to look for his daughters’ presents. But for
his youngest daughter, he didn’t know how to get the golden tufts of hair from the Prince’s
head. So, he bought her expensive dresses and jewellery and returned to his ship. But the
ship would not sail to take him away from Venice. So the King realized that he had to find a
way to get the golden tufts of hair from the Prince. He asked who the Prince’s barber was
and went to find him. Next time he cut the Prince’s hair, he was to keep three tufts of hair.
The barber did as agreed. The King took the tufts and returned to Cyprus. When he arrived at
Cyprus, his daughters welcomed him and the King gave them their presents. When night
came, the Princess opened the window of her room, she filled a bowl with rosewater and
perfumes and another one with rose petals and flowers. Then in a little vessel, she burned the
first golden tuft from the Prince’s hair. Suddenly, a golden eagle flew into the room from the
window. He washed in the bowl with the rosewater and perfumes and dried himself in the
bowl with the rose petals and flowers. He was then transformed into the Prince of Venice!
The young Princess of Cyprus and the Prince of Venice fell in love. Before the Prince left for
his home, he promised to come back the next evening. But her sisters, who saw what
happened the night before, were very jealous. They broke some bottles and they put the
broken glass into the bowl with the rosewater and perfumes. When the eagle tried to wash in
the bowl, he was cut by the glasses. He was badly hurt, and got very angry. The princess was
very upset and couldn’t stop crying. In the morning, she wore men’s clothes, took an
ointment from the old woman and left for Venice. On the fourth day, the Prince became well.
To thank the “doctor,” he gave him a golden ring. The Princess did not say who she was and
returned to Cyprus. In the night she burned the last golden tuft. The eagle came and at first
he was very angry at her. But, when he saw the golden ring on her finger, he realized that she
was the doctor that cured him. He transformed into the Prince of Venice and they fell in love
again. They got married in Venice.
ARAPIS
Once upon a time there was a King with many riches and many servants. Amongst his
servants there was also a young black man. When the Queen gave birth to a little princess,
she invited the fairies of fate. The Fates stayed at the palace for three days and three nights.
The first fairy gave the girl beauty, the second intelligence, and the third fairy asked the King
the little girl to get married with the black man. The King was thinking of ways to get rid of
the black man. One day he asked one of his servants to take him far away, to kill him and
bring his eyes as a proof. The servants did what the King said but they didn’t kill him. After
35 EUMOF TEACHER’S GUIDE
a long journey the black man met a good Lord who learned him to read and to write. One
day he met a fairy and asked her to become white. Now a rich man, he left the work of the
lord and started travelling round the world. When he got fed up of travelling, he thought of
going back to his country. When the King saw the black man he didn’t recognize him, being
all white now. He also suggested making him his son in law. So the wedding took place with
great feasting.
____________________
STORIES FROM GREECE
JOHN AND THE AXE
Once upon a time there was a woman who had a daughter. When it was time for the girl to
get married, her mother found a good young boy for her daughter and they got engaged. One
night, while they were having dinner, they ran out of wine. The girl willingly went down to
the cellar to get some wine from the barrel. As she leaned over the barrel, she noticed that the
axe was hanging over it. The girl was thinking that she will have a son and will be hurt by
this axe. So did her mother. The son in law found them crying for the unborn John and he
was very mad. The next day he took his saddle bag and left for a foreign country. He reached
a village. It was Sunday morning and he saw a lot of people outside the church of that
village. There was a wedding ceremony but the bride was very tall and she couldn’t get into
the church. The young man helped the bride and he realized that the world is full of stupid
people and he hurried back to his village to marry his fiancée.
LEILIGOUSTRA
In the old days, there was a widow who lived with her son. She worked very hard, so her son
could have everything and so he would never complain about being an orphan. As the years
passed by, the boy grew up and became a very strong and handsome lad. But even bigger
than his beauty and strength, was his kindness. One day the young boy decided to leave his
country. The next day before dawn, the boy took a backpack with some bread in it, his
father’s knife, and his mother’s blessing and left. One day, as he was walking in a meadow,
he saw something glittering. He went closer and saw it was a golden feather. He took the
golden feather, put it in his pocket and off he went again. When he reached the sea he sat
under a tree and fell asleep. In his sleep he heard a lot of noise, so he woke up. He saw
twelve wild-men chasing a wild horse. Then the man put his hand in his pocket, touched the
golden feather, and threw himself onto the wild-men. When they saw him, they were
frightened and ran away. So he rode the horse and continued his journey. After traveling a
long way, they arrived at a palace. He knocked on the door and a servant opened it. The
servants told the King about the feather and the King asked the young man to find the owner
otherwise he would take his head. The horse told to the young man that they had to bring a
Queen because she was the owner. The King fell in love with the Queen and she asked her to
marry him. The queen asked him to bring to her Leiligoustra. So it happened. The lad
brought leiligoustra. When the lad was left alone with the Queen, she opened her heart to
him and told him that she loved him. He was very happy, and they went to the Queen’s
palace to get married. He brought her mother to the kingdom, they told each other their
sufferings and then they hugged and kissed.
THE THREE BROTHERS
Once upon a time, there was a poor man who had three children. When he died, the only
property he had was a sickle, a cat, and a rooster. He left the sickle to his older son, the cat to
the second son, and the rooster to his youngest son. In the morning, they went on a journey
looking work and each followed a different path. The youngest son, who had the rooster, had
chosen a very long road and after a long time he arrived in a country where people were very
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primitive. When the night fell, he saw people fleeing. They were leaving every night because
they wanted to find the day. The youngest son pulled out of the bag the rooster and said to
them that this rooster will bring them the day. They gathered around the rooster and waited.
At dawn the rooster crowed. They were shocked and asked why it was acting this way. The
youngest son told them that it would soon bring the day and in a while it begun to dawn. The
rooster crowed again and it became day. They were crazy with joy because they were spared
the trouble of going back and forth trying to find the day! They begged the boy to let them
have the rooster and they would give him any amount of gold he wanted. He asked for three
bags of gold.
THE POOR PEASANT AND ST. PETER
Once upon a time there was a very poor peasant who didn’t have any luck. So he decided to
leave his country. After walking for a long way the peasant reached a crossroad. A man was
sitting there. He was sent by God, but the peasant did not know it. They walked together for
one day and one night but they had forgotten to introduce themselves to each other. The
peasant’s name was John and the other one was Peter. They walked for another day and
night, until they got tired and sat under an olive tree to rest. John started to take the food out
of his bag, but Peter didn’t let him. He asked him to go to a nearby farm and tell the shepherd
that it was Peter’s request to provide him with a lamb. John did as he was told and the
shepherd gave him a well fed lamb. When Peter came back with the extra wood, they baked
the whole lamb and ate it. After a while they continued their journey. On their way, they
heard a King’s messenger announcing that the Princess was very sick and the King would
make very rich whomever healed her. Peter told John they should go to the palace and try to
heal the princess. When everything was ready, Peter, John and the Princess were locked in
the house. Peter put the Princess in the oven and burned her. 39 days later Peter took the ash
of the burned Princess and molded her again. On the 40th
day, Peter blew three times at the
molded Princess and she came alive. Later that day the King went to the house and knocked
on the door three times. When he was let in by Peter he found his daughter well and alive.
The King was happy. He ordered a big feast that lasted for days. When it was time for John
and Peter to leave, the King told them to go to his Treasury and take as much gold as they
wanted. John filled up his pockets and his bag and he told Peter to take as much gold as he
could. John went back to his house and was living a comfortable life with his family.
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STORIES FROM POLAND
THE LEGEND OF THE GOLDEN DUCK
Lutek was a young shoemaker who lived near the Vistula River. Lutek was told by a man
that it was very easy to get money from a Golden Duck, living in the three hundred year old
Ostrogski palace. He went to the palace. He headed to the basement. To his amazement, a
duck was swimming there in the musty-smelling chamber. The duck swam to him and
turned into a beautiful princess. The shoemaker had never seen such a beautiful girl. She had
golden-blond hair and a radiant gold crown with precious jewels. Her long dress was made
of shiny brown velvet and white satin, and was decorated with flowers. The water suddenly
turned from muddy and dark, to clean and sparkling blue. The princess then gave him some
money in a brown velvet pouch. She told him that she had to spend all the money and that
they were only for his use. In the morning Lutek bought loads of new clothing. People did
not recognise him. He looked like a rich man. After shopping for a few hours, he had lunch
at one of Warsaw's finest taverns. Then he went to a bakery and bought some bread and
cakes. Lutek felt very good since his meal was excellent. He still had most of his ducats left,
so he hired a carriage to take him to the various places he wished to explore. Lutek was a
little afraid that he might get robbed. He gave a poor man some of his coins, forgetting what
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the Princess had said. The wind came up and a whirlwind appeared and cold spread over
Lutek's body. He then saw the Princess once again. According to the legend, the shoemaker
lived many happy years. He was successful in his shoemaking business, found a wonderful
wife, whom he loved dearly, and they had many fine children and grandchildren.
WARS AND SAWA
A long, long time ago, when Poland was still covered by forests, the Mazovian lands were
ruled by the noble Prince Ziemomysł. He had a beautiful, brick-built palace, with richly
decorated chambers and a treasure-house overflowing with gold. The Prince often invited the
local society to splendid balls. The Mazovian forest was full of game and wild birds at that
time, and one day Ziemomysł decided to go hunting with his companions. so the hunters
pushed deep into the forest, and their power was such that the very trees seemed to part
before them. The hounds were barking, and time and again they found a new trail. The
buglers blew their horns with all their might, to bring ever more superior beasts out from the
undergrowth. Then Ziemomysł himself saw a gigantic antler in a strand of trees ahead. He
thought it had fallen to him to capture this exceptional animal, and set off on his horse to get
closer. He followed it, paying no attention to his companions and being careful not to startle
his prize. The Prince moved deeper into the dark, dense forest. Before the Prince realised it,
his company was nowhere to be seen. Night had fallen, however, and no matter how hard he
tried, he could not find his way back. He put his thoughts into deeds, and moved off in
search for a safe shelter for the night. He had not gone far when a settlement appeared before
his eyes. In every house a candle was glowing, smoke rose from the hearths, and the aroma
of freshly cooked food wafted through the air. Ziemomysł knocked on the door of one of the
cottages, and was about to ask for a bed for the night, but the entrance remained barred. The
Prince walked on. As he was wandering, his steps took him to the banks of the river Vistula.
Suddenly, he saw a tiny cottage. He gently knocked on the door. It immediately opened
wide, and before Ziemomysł’s eyes there appeared a very modest interior with a tiny hearth,
a table and two beds. Behind the table, there stood a pair of humbly dressed elderly folk,
welcoming him inside with a smile. Prince Ziemomysł entered the little cottage, but his hosts
did not recognise him in the candlelight. In the morning, at first light, Ziemomysł was ready
to renew his search for his castle. Before he left, however, he sought his hosts, to thank them
warmly for their hospitality. But there was not a living soul in the cottage. On the bank he
found Wars fishing and his wife Sawa repairing the nets. The Prince was moved at the sight
of the two elderly folk working, and he offered them a riverside land, and he proclaimed that
it should be called Varsovia, so that their names would forever be in the hearts of those who
settle there.
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STORIES FROM PORTUGAL
THE TOWER OF BABYLON
There was once a fisherman who had three daughters. One day, pulling his net out of the sea
he thought it felt very heavy. He was surprised to see that it had just one enormous fish in it.
This fish was talking. The fish asked the fisherman to bring to it his daughter. . He went
home and explained the situation to his daughter. She agreed to go with her father. Over the
next two days, when he was fishing, the same fish kept appearing asking him for his other
two daughters. When the fish had possession of all three girls, he gave great riches to the
fisherman. And if he sometimes cast his net in the sea for amusement, nobody else caught
fish but him. Some time passed by, and a son was born to the fisherman who grew up to be a
man. The boy asked his father about his three sisters. The father told him what had happened
and the boy said that he would go and look for them. After traveling a long way, he came
across three boys who were squabbling. The boys were fighting because of a pair of boots, a
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blanket and a key. The boy suggested selling the objects to him. They agreed, and the
fisherman’s son gave them a lot of money, ending their dispute. The boy went to his oldest
sister. She looked very happy to see him and his husband told him that any time he will need
help he can call him. Afterwards, the boy went to the house of his youngest sister, who was
the King of Birds’ wife and the King of Birds gave him a feather from his wings. The boy,
content to have seen his sisters and the considerable riches they had given him, felt he could
return to his father’s house; but, getting lost on the way after a long walk, he noticed a huge
tower and asked what tower it was. It was the tower of Babylon. The boy went to the tower
and there he met a beautiful girl who had for company an old man. The girl told everything
to the boy and he went straightaway in search of the coffin and everything else the old man
had spoken of. He called his sisters’ husbands and they helped him find the coffin. With the
key he had bought from the three brothers he managed to open the coffin. Soon he had the
egg, which he broke on the old man’s forehead, though he roared so much it shook heaven
and earth. The old man died, the boy married the girl and took her to his father’s house. He
was reunited with his sisters and they all lived to be very rich and very happy.
THE ENCHANTED MOOR
A man was travelling, when he reached a land and asked for shelter. But no one welcomed
him. There was an empty rich house. Something had scared off the family that used to live in
it. The man stopped there and sat on a balcony relaxing, until it was night. While he was
sleeping, a gold ring was taken off his finger and another ring was put on it. When he woke,
he noticed that his ring was changed. Then he went in and lied on the bed. He felt movement
in the bed, as if a person wanted to lie next to him. It was a woman, the Moor. Only this man
could save her from the spell. The man stayed for three days and at the end of the three days,
when everything happened as the enchanted Moor had said, he found the three pouches of
money. The enchanted Moor was nowhere to be found. He bought land which he gave to the
poor. Then he continued his journey. Finally, he reached the land of the Moors. He bought a
farm there. Meanwhile the daughter of the Moor’s lord was to be married. They invited him
to the wedding. He happened to look at the bride’s finger and recognised the ring that had
been replaced in the enchanted palace. As soon as she saw it, she recognised it. She married
the man who had saved her and the other man went away.
PETER AND PETE
In another age there was a prince called Peter who had a milk brother called Pete. The two
lived as if they were real brothers and had sworn that they would stand by one another
whatever challenges they faced. Peter was about to leave for a foreign kingdom to marry a
truly beautiful Princess. Pete was supposed to accompany him, but as he preferred to travel
by land rather than by sea. Pete travelled many miles. Then it grew dark and he realised that
he had to spend the night by the road under some trees. But as he was lying down he heard
some voices from the trees that said weird things about the princess. When Pete heard this he
decided to warn the prince immediately. He decided to save the Princess, even if he was to
turn into rock. Pete went to warn Prince Peter about the calamities awaiting the Princess. As
Pete was telling what he heard on his journey, he was becoming a stone statue! Some fairies
told Peter that Pete could only become a man if Peter’s blood was poured over him. Peter cut
a finger to save his brother. But, while Pete was becoming a man, Peter was turning into a
statue. When Pete saw this, he asked a witch how to break the spell and she said that he had
to collect the blood of a dragon. Pete accomplished this task very well and the prize he won
was to marry a Princess.