8 Reasons Why Fairy Tales Are Essential to Childhood
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Not everyone believes in the importance of fairy tales for kids. In fact, 25% of parents recently surveyed said they wouldn’t read fairy tales to a child under five years old because they didn’t teach a good lesson or were too scary. Many of you shared your opinion about this on Facebook and please comment here, too – I want to hear your thoughts!
The fairy tale survey, quoted in this UK’s Telegraph article shared the top ten fairy tales parents don’t read and why. Reading through the list of reasons, I can only conclude that these parents have lost their reasoning skills –completely. For example the reason not to read Goldilocks is that sends a message to steal. Hardly. If anything, the message is don’t break into houses because a family of bears might live there.
I want to look at why fairy tales are important for kids; why they’re essential stories for childhood.
8 Reasons Why Fairy Tales Are Essential to Childhood
“If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales.”
― Albert Einstein
1. Fairy Tales Show Kids How to Handle Problems
We learn from the characters in stories, even as adults. They help us because we connect to our own lives, dreams, anxieties, and consider what we would do in their shoes. Fairy tales help children learn how to navigate life. (Bettelheim, B. Uses of Enchantment: The Meaning and Importance of Fairy Tales.)
“Fairy tales do not tell children the dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children the dragons can be killed.”
― G.K. Chesterton
2. Fairy Tales Build Emotional Resiliency
Fairy tales show real life issues in a fantastical scenario where most often the hero triumphs. (Except in Grimm originals.) Children need to discover in a safe environment that bad things happen to everyone. Because guess what? No one in life is immune from challenges — so we need to build capacity in our children. Do we build emotional muscles so our children can hang on during tough times or do we shelter our kids, protecting them, leaving them so weak they can’t handle anything requiring strength?
3. Fairy Tales Give Us a Common Language (Cultural Literacy & Canon)
Neil Gaiman writes, “We encounter fairytales as kids, in retellings or panto. We breathe them. We know how they go.”
4. Fairy Tales Cross Cultural Boundaries
Many cultures share common fairy tales like Cinderella, with their own cultural flavor. We read the versions and know we all share something important, the need to make sense of life with story, and the hope for good to triumph over evil.
5. Fairy Tales Teach Story
Fairy tales are understanding the basics of a story — setting, characters, and plot (rising action, climax, and resolution) as well as the difference between fiction and non-fiction. Once a child understands story structure, it supports his ability to make predictions and comprehend other stories he’s reading.
6. Fairy Tales Develop a Child’s Imagination
“When I examine myself and my methods of thought, I come to the conclusion that the gift of fantasy has meant more to me than any talent for abstract, positive thinking.”
― Albert Einstein
7. Fairy Tales Give Parents Opportunities to Teach Critical Thinking Skills
I absolutely hate Disney’s The Little Mermaid. A girl abandoning her life for a boy is rubbish and no kind of role model for my daughters. Even the original version shows a weak woman who dies for the man — I don’t like it. (But at least she suffers the consequences!)
But.
It doesn’t mean I won’t let my kids read the mermaid story. Sheltering doesn’t give my kids critical thinking skills. Exposure and guided conversation do! (Maybe with a few groans from the peanut gallery.)
8. Fairy Tales Teach Lessons
Use fairy tales to teach morals and lessons. What can you learn from Goldilocks? How about Cinderella or Jack and the Beanstalk?
So, are fairy tales too scary for kids?
Sometimes.
You need to consider a child’s age and developmental stage. We don’t read a two-year-old the original Rapunzel where the prince is blinded and bloodied because the child won’t understand it anyway. Use your judgment as a parent. Let your children use their judgment, too — they’ll be able to say if they think the story is too scary or not.
You need to consider time of day to read the fairy tales. Perhaps some fairy tales aren’t meant to be bedtime stories. So, read them at lunch!
Just don’t ban fairy tales from your child’s life forever just because some are scary or politically incorrect. You can easily find modified versions if that works better for your child and your family.
What are your thoughts about fairy tales?
What are your favorites?
“Though now we think of fairy tales as stories intended for very young children, this is a relatively modern idea. In the oral tradition, magical stories were enjoyed by listeners young and old alike, while literary fairy tales (including most of the tales that are best known today) were published primarily for adult readers until the 19th century.(complete:http://www.endicott-studio.com/gal/galWi…)”
― Terri Windling
KEEP READING
Huge List of Fairy Tale Books for Children
I don’t think I could have made it through the toughest of times without remembering what fairy tales had taught me. Keep going on, don’t give up, you always have a choice, there’s always light at the end of the tunnel. I’m thrity, if I am having a hard time coping with the issues life throws me, the first thing I do is curl up in bed and watch grimms fairy tales on netflix. Then I travel into deep dreams and learn how to fix my problems.
such a great point — thanks.
I disagree with the 7 statement I think the little mermaid is a wonderful story because it is encouraging children to go out on adventures and to find true love but to still visit there parents every once in a wile. It also makes kids use there imagination like when my family went to see some beautiful caves my daughter said “I wonder if this cave once was under water if it was it could have ben carved by mermaids and the finishing touches were done by fairies” and she is 12 and she still believes in mermaids and fairies and elfs because she read and watched so many fairy tails! and now she is working fairy tails for work at school lucky she has red and watched lots of fairy tail stories or she will have been completely lost! (I believe in fairies I do I do!)
No hate about the 7th reason
Don’t you think that some of these stories over simplify life? I have recently thought about Little Red Riding Hood. Conspicuously, this story aims to convey that there are people in life that will use manipulations and schemes (and very elaborate ones) to deceive you. In the story (the movie at least), the narrator makes sure to mention that the wolf ate grandma, in every step of the way. Sadly in life, you don’t get to understand that the wolf ate grandma until you’ve been eaten – or unless you make a hard judgment call based on the information available to you – that will rarely be easy or straightforward. That sends the message that making the distinction between grandma and the wolf is a clear and obvious one – while it really isn’t. I think it would send the (hidden) message that you should never make a call based on the signs you witness – unless you are 100% sure you are right about it, which again, never happens in life.
It is worth to mention that usually even grown ups are not able to make the distinction, and even our leaders often have no clue what’s right and wrong about questions that a 6 year old can ask.
Furthermore, it is worth mentioning that like in every other field, humanity has most probably advanced culturally. The set of values that society holds today are completely different than the ones believed even as little as one hundred years ago. The fairy tales however originated a very long time ago (certainly over 100 years ago). There is a chance that this fact makes them obsolete just like various scientific beliefs that have been discarded along the advancement of humankind. The problem with social progress is that it is ill defined, and I highly doubt that it can ever be well defined, which makes it impossible to determine whether the direction in which we are going is really the right one. However, if you believe (like me), that our belief set today is much better than the one society held centuries ago, then I think it is very important to consider the importance of fairy tales from the perspective of the present (and not stress the tradition of the custom too much).
The following is a short paragraph from Bruno Bettelheim’s The Uses of Enchantment. I highly recommend reading the entire book.
“The figures in fairy tales are not ambivalent—not good and bad at the same time, as we all are in reality. But since polarization dominates the child’s mind it also dominates fairy tales. A person is either good or bad, nothing in between. One brother is stupid, the other is clever. One sister is virtuous and industrious, the others are vile and lazy. One is beautiful the others are ugly. One parent is good, the other is evil. The juxtaposition of opposite characters is not for the purpose of stressing right behavior, as would be true for cautionary tales. (There are some amoral fairy tales where goodness or badness, beauty or ugliness play no role at all.) Presenting the polarities of character permits the child to comprehend easily the difference between the two, which he could not do as readily were the figures drawn more true to life, with all the complexities that characterize real people. Ambiguities must wait until a firm personality has been established on the basis of positive identifications. Then the child has a basis for understanding that there are great differences between people, and that therefore one has to make choices about who one wants to be. This basic decision, on which all later personality development will build, is facilitated by the polarizations of the fairy tale.”
Yes, children’s stories are simplified. They are for children. however I feel there is still a depth to them which makes them enjoyable for adults and children alike.
In regards to fairy tales being outdated, I would argue that while the way we define our values has changed the values themselves are still and will always be relevant. I believe society still values courage, kindness, respect, self sacrifice, intelligence and truth. These things are eternal. Our definition of how to be kind or respectful may be different. We may not have many opportunities to offer bread to a hungry old woman (though I would argue there is still plenty opportunity for that) but there are regular news stories of people being praised for picking up someone’s tab, or that elderly woman who simply smiled and waved at the students walking past her home on their way to school. A congregation of muslims offering refreshments to a woman picketing against Sharia law outside their mosque.
These are the values fairy tales teach and I pray they will ALWAYS be an integral part of our society.
fairy tales are bad for kids they teach them that only pretty girls get princes
Dear Morgan,
You have not read enough fairytales; that is not what they teach.
I was just reading in Mem Fox’s book “Reading Magic”. She talks about using fairy tales. She even says there were some programs that dealt with juvenile delinquents and they found that very few of them knew any fairy tales. They actually used the stories to teach the idea of consequences. Also, in her book she explains (much like you suggested too) that fairy tales enable kids to deal with scary situations and project them onto someone else. For me, it’s WAY less scary to think about a sweet little pig getting eaten up by the big bad wolf than it is to think of ME getting eaten up by a big bad wolf! We’ve definitely introduced fairy tales– at developmentally appropriate times… oh, I and I love your comment about considering time of day too.
thanks, Jackie. It’s been years since I read Reading Magic – I need to reread it again it sounds like. What a interesting way to help juvenile delinquents!