How necessary are retellings and can you DIY?

[EMS83]

That about sums it up. I get SWB's reasoning behind the gradual introduction; DH disagrees and would present the entire work whenever the maturity was there. However, he's ok with me retelling the stories, and in any case wouldn't forbid me to follow SWB's suggestions; he just disagrees with them. So I was curious if tales like Beowulf and The Inferno could wait until Logic, or if it's just imperative that I touch on them (how?) in Grammar. And is there a Storytelling for Dummies website? I am the polar opposite of a storyteller. :(

[Harriet Vane]

Former English major and editor here. I also teach group lit classes to teens.

 

I am with your dh on this one. My approach has been to wait until the child is ready for the real thing, and then go for it. This has worked for both my dd, who is very strong with anything related to language arts, and for ds, who is more of a math/science kinda guy. I have found it's been fine in the group classes I teach. For the group classes, I strictly forbid the use of study aids like Cliff Notes and require the kids to actually immerse in the literature. It's worked really, really well.

 

Interestingly, I have found in teaching the group classes that it's often the parents who are scared of the more advanced literature, rather than the kids. I have had a few kids who felt intimidated by what I expected, but who got over it within the first several weeks of class with me. I do prepare the kids thoroughly for what they are about to read, so that helps too.

 

There have been exceptions to my rule. For example, when we were traveling in England and planning to stop at Stratford-upon-Avon (Shakespeare's home town), I did teach my kids about Shakespeare's life and read some stories derived from his plays. I wanted them to have a sense of who it was we were getting to know at Stratford-upon-Avon.

[Harriet Vane]

Some further thoughts . . .

 

I did ask SWB the very same question at a conference. In response, she described her experience as a college professor dealing with students who are quite fearful of reading more advanced works. Those experiences are totally legitimate, and her advice on this subject makes sense in light of this specific experience.

 

It is quite possible that my kids do not fear advanced literature because:

 

--They have not been taught to fear it. Kids in a traditional school setting are more likely to hear horror stories about how hard certain works are.

 

--They HAVE been given the skills to read advanced literature. When I know something is going to be more of a challenge for them, I have a couple tricks that seem to help.

 

One is that I will read aloud with lots of expression to help them fall into the rhythm of that language. When dd and I read Oliver Twist (she was 10yo), I read a chapter aloud and then she read the next one. This worked best when the next chapter had a lot of action.

 

Along the same lines, live performances of some things really helps as well. Dd has been going to see live Shakespeare performances since she was quite young, and this has helped her learn Shakespeare's English and read it comfortably.

 

Another trick is to require them to read a LARGE chunk rather than trying to interpret tiny bits laboriously--reading a lot, without obsessing about getting ever tiny detail, helps the mind "fall" into that language. CS Lewis writes in Surprised By Joy how effective this larger immersion was in helping him learn multiple languages. If I want to analyze the piece more thoroughly, we go back and read it a second time--it goes so much quicker because the child has learned the language, learned the "culture" of the book, and knows the story (isn't distracted by not knowing what will happen next).

 

--When something is genuinely too hard for them, too big a leap in my expectations as a teacher, I put it aside and come back to it later when they are ready. While I do expect my kids to meet challenges, they know they can trust me to back off of something that they are not ready for. I don't force them to tortuously slog through something that they have not yet developed the literary muscles to read.

[Lori D.]

A Literature and Cinema major here, and we did it both ways -- some retellings early on in elementary grades, and some works we waited and did without previous exposure. Mostly, we did tons and tons of read alouds through all the years -- me doing read alouds above their reading level of older works with the vocabulary and complex sentence structure -- and together reading popcorn-style "you read a page I read a page" all the way through, even through high school. (I have great memories of all of us as a family taking parts and reading Hamlet aloud together in high school. :) ) No fear of "hard works" here was the result. And no "harm" done through enjoying a few retellings of some classics early on.

 

Sure you can DIY, which would be a fun thing. But why not also enjoy some of the wonderful picture books out there, often done in the art style of the culture/times or with many historical/culture details drawn into the illustrations -- for example, Ludmilla Zeman's Gilgamesh trilogy; Rosemary Sutcliffe's Black Ships Before Troy (The Iliad) and Wanderings of Odysseus (The Odyssey); Penelope Lively's In Search of a Homeland (The Aeneid) -- or even Gulliver in Lilliput (Hodges) or A Christmas Carol (French), which retain a lot of the original phrases -- just abridged and retold into a "one-sitting" format that can allow very young children to enjoy some of these wonderful, timeless works.

 

One last thought -- we did not do much in the way of Great Classics Illustrated type of retellings (that's where I personally draw the line, since there are SO many well-written age-appropriate children's Literature for our children to enjoy). BUT, when one DS was *just* getting confidence in reading, we did do the Robinson Crusoe Reader, which was a very simplified retelling -- it was perfect, because to keep that DS reading was crucial (he was a late bloomer in reading and on the edge of giving up), and the shipwreck/survival story absolutely fascinated him and kept him going in a way that many of the "stepped reader" books did not. But that was a rather specialized exception.

 

We did Black Ships Before Troy when DSs were 6yo and 8yo; the 8yo especially was on the edge of his seat and LOVED it. By the time we did the full translation of The Iliad when DSs were 15yo and 16yo it was an all new and different experience -- we had some fabulous discussions together and they loved the rich language, images, and themes. I don't think they really remembered much from reading the retelling 8 years earlier (i.e., so it didn't "spoil" them for the later reading), but I also can't imagine now having missed that opportunity when they were young to give them a chance to hear this amazing epic, and getting to see older DS's tremendous enjoyment and excitement over it...

 

 

I think the key here is moderation in all things -- going to an extreme of NO retellings or AS MANY as possible each have problems. But doing a few retellings here and there that also allow you to enjoy the art, times and culture at a level that can be absorbed and appreciated by young children... I just see that as all good exposure to the Humanities in general. :) At least, our DSs took no harm from it. ;) And obviously, some works are better suited for early exposure than others -- Beowulf, maybe yes especially if you have a child who gets really into monster/hero tales, or into the Lord of the Rings (by Tolkien, who was a Beowulf scholar and obviously influenced by it). On the other hand, Inferno I would wait -- it is a very cerebral work.

 

 

BEST of luck in charting your own course through Literature and homeschooling! :) Warmest regards, Lori D.

Edited July 4, 2012 by Lori D.

[Farrar]

Not all retellings are created equal. Black Ships Before Troy is a classic in its own right. But many others are not so good. We use them when there are good options available and don't worry about it when there aren't.

[EMS83]

I admit that I am afraid they would be bored or "not get it" if I read something like Much Ado About Nothing in 6th grade or even earlier! Although I read Romeo and Juliet in 7th grade. DH's issue is censorship more than literary readiness. Basically, if the parent is uncomfortable with the subject material or the child is not mature enough for it, then it should wait until both parent and child are ready (rather than omitting facts and changing wording). My own issues with originals are both literary readiness and the subjects that may come up in various works. However, I am very picky about tellings and retellings. I've gone through many, many Greek mythology books trying to find "the right one." Sutcliff and Zeman are on my list for this year, but not every work happens to have great children's versions. But then if you nix too many literary topics for that reason, there are huge gaps in your literature list for each year, at least in the Grammar stage.

 

I completely agree that traditional school cages the expectations of children. I can see that played out in my own schooling, and I think our cultural expectations of what children can handle and enjoy are ridiculously low. It's hard to break out of that thought-box, though. Anyway, perhaps I'll just have to fill my gaps with works that diverge from the cycle--not wait until grade 4 to read the Narnia series, etc. Especially in this first year--there are several weeks where there's just nothing because there is not much I can do to correspond with Phonecians, Hittites, and Assyrians in the way of literature, unless I read Henty and Speare the like to my first grader. ETA: That may work for some and I'd love for it to work for us, but I seriously doubt it would.

Edited July 5, 2012 by CES2005

[smgwynn]

I think it depends on the story and the child. We use TOG, which incorporates many retellings. My children have loved most of the selections offered. What little boy wouldn't love the Homer stories, beowulf, gilgamesh, etc..? He has read them at the grammar, and dialectic levels and looks forward to the real thing. Retellings of the dickens novels, les miserable, Robert Louis stevenson have all been big hits. These retellings have helped to get my children looking forward to reading the real things when they're older.

 

I wouldn't feel pressured to make sure your children read them all, but why not offer them as options?

[Cosmos]

Former English major and editor here. I also teach group lit classes to teens.

 

I am with your dh on this one. My approach has been to wait until the child is ready for the real thing, and then go for it.

 

So do you not do any retellings at all? No fairy tales, Greek myths, King Arthur, etc.? What is "the real thing" for Robin Hood, for example?

 

Personally, I am very comfortable using retellings for stories that are based primarily on oral tradiion and also ones that are the MOST foundational to western tradition. So Greek myths, Homer, Bible, and myths and legends from around the world.

 

I also use Shakespeare retellings to introduce a work before we see a production.

 

Where I depart from WTM philosophy is in retellings of novels. We don't do adaptations of Mark Twain or H.G. Wells or Hemingway.

[Alice]

Like others, we use the retellings that are excellent in their own right (Sutcliffe, Zeman ,Geraldine McCaughrean). There was also a version of Beowulf that we read and really liked, although I can’t remember which one it was now. Black Ships Before Troy was one of my son’s favorite read-alouds in his first grade year. Just this summer he asked if he could read The Odyssey for summer reading and we got out the Sutcliffe version from the library. I love that he loves the stories and is familiar with them. We’ve also found some very good children’s versions of Shakespeare that use the original language but that are shorter and more accessible. We are part of a co-op that does a Shakespeare production every year and reading the plays has made seeing the performances very enjoyable.

 

I’ve always been opposed to the more watered down kind of retellings. The Great Illustrated Classic kind of books. In general we stay away from them but there have been a few times that my son has found one at the library and wanted to read it. He just read the Robin Hood Great Illustrated Classic. I’m don’t keep him from those but I also don’t give them to him as assigned reading.

 

On a larger note, I woudn’t worry too much about having everything you read correspond to the cycle. I tried to do that more our first year and found that we burnt out a little. When we were on a topic that we loved (Egyptians) or where there was an excellent book (Black Ships Before Troy). Otherwise we enjoyed a lot of other literature that didn’t correspond to the history cycle.

[Harriet Vane]

So do you not do any retellings at all? No fairy tales, Greek myths, King Arthur, etc.? What is "the real thing" for Robin Hood, for example?

 

Personally, I am very comfortable using retellings for stories that are based primarily on oral tradiion and also ones that are the MOST foundational to western tradition. So Greek myths, Homer, Bible, and myths and legends from around the world.

 

I also use Shakespeare retellings to introduce a work before we see a production.

 

Where I depart from WTM philosophy is in retellings of novels. We don't do adaptations of Mark Twain or H.G. Wells or Hemingway.

 

We do some retellings, pretty selectively. My kids have read myths and fables from numerous cultures as well as fairy tales. (I didn't think of those as adaptations when I wrote my posts). My kids don't read shortened adaptations for long classics, though. It's not like I Strictly Forbid it--we simply focus on lots and lots of whatever is developmentally appropriate (by this I mean what matches the child's abilities and emotional/spiritual maturity) and well written.

[Laura Corin]

We used retellings for books that were strongly in the culture separate from the original format: the Bible, Homer, King Arthur, Robin Hood, Arabian Nights.....

 

Other books we waited until an age-appropriate time and read the originals.

 

Laura

[Laura Corin]

We used retellings for books that were strongly in the culture separate from the original format: the Bible, Homer, King Arthur, Robin Hood, Arabian Nights.....

 

Other books we waited until an age-appropriate time and read the originals.

 

Laura