To be frank about this folktale, its quiet an interesting piece to
read. As I’m fond of reading stories, I could engage well with the story line. The
main issues discovered in this folktale are the Chinese belief of supernatural
power and the ultimate love. Both these issues are linked closely with each
other. If we look at the ancient history of Chinese, their life aspects and
culture are intensely influenced by the supernatural power. This folktale talks
about the turtle spirit who transforms into human, purely to win the maiden’s
heart. The love between them becomes intense that the maiden at last bears a
child. This brings curiosity to the maiden’s parents. At some circumstances, the truth has been
discovered and the turtle has been brutally abused to death. However, the
maiden who couldn’t disobey her parents and at the same time who couldn’t forbid
her true love manages to collect the turtle’s bones and keep it secretly with
her. Soon her son grows to the age of eight. He eventually gets to know about the
challenge and the reward for the burial. After seeking his mother’s advice he
leads to the unusual river which has a heap of mud shaped like a dragon. As
soon as he arrives he remembers his mother’s words and places his father’s
bones in the dragon’s mouth and the rich man’s grandfather’s on the horns. Accordance
with the Chinese belief the dragon brings fortune, prosperity and wealth as
well. So, fortune flourishes the young boy’s life. Just at the age of ten, he
becomes an emperor and the son of the rich man becomes his minister. In
conclusion, the supernatural power of the dragon and the ultimate love has
brought to the success of the boy.
Ways to use folktales as a
useful teaching material.
According to my personal view, to make
a lesson effective, we must engage the students’ attention. Folktale will be an
essential teaching material to inculcate, integrate and to conduct the lesson. Folktales
could be used as a listening text. Students listen to the text and answer
questions prepared for them or match the sentence parts. In order to make the
students to be more independent and confident, can let them to predict or guess
the outcome. Besides that, as they listen they can even imagine the characters
and draw it. Besides making use of it as listening text it could be used as a
reading text too. Perhaps it will be useful to improve their vocabulary too. Students
should also be encouraged to make use of the folktales to do a role-play. As
the role play is conducted, students will be engaged to the imaginative world
and they can express their creativity. In short, folktales could be used in
many ways to make a lesson more interesting and effective as well.
FOLKTALES
THAT HAVE SIMILAR STORY-LINE IN VARIOUS CULTURES
- SKUNK ORIGIN MYTH IN GREEK
- “TOKOYO” -THE GIRL WHO RECLAIMED THE HONOUR OF HER SAMURAI FATHER IN JAPANESE
- “KINTARO”- SUPERHUMAN GOLDEN BOY IN JAPANESE
