When do we actually start reading fairy tales?

[slaraine]

My eldest is nearly four definitely enjoys sitting to read.  I hadn’t pulled out classic fairy tales on my own because I planned to wait till we could read The Blue Fairy Book or other original stories.  However, the children’s show my son watches referenced Little Red Riding Hood and my son was fascinated. Unfortunately, the cartoon did it wrong, so I felt we needed the real story. I bought the Scott Gustafson version for the illustrations.

The illustrations, of course, are gorgeous. I’m a little annoyed that Little Red Riding Hood’s mother doesn’t give her an interdiction to “stay on the path” or even the weaker “don’t talk to strangers,” since a theme of the story is that parents have rules that keep children safe.  I have several miniature complaints about several other stories.  I’ve also had the added problem of my son’s tendency to obsess over frightening things; for example, he is so obsessed with the Beast existing that he cannot absorb that the Beast turns (back) into a human at the end of Beauty and the Beast.  My husband made a “no looking at the scary pictures unless we are reading the story” rule.

Really, I think I should just wait till we can read Perrault (and Grimm and Andersen, etc.), but when is that?  7? 10? 5? When do I get to pull these out? Should I just read them now? I would love to hear what others do with fairy tales!

[Gil]

Get a version without illustrations to read to your child.
Or hunt around online to find free versions that you like.
Or use the book you have but freely insert/omit any details you want your child to hear (or not hear) when you read aloud.
Or skip them all together.

Personally, I'm not big on fairy tales so I don't think I really read any to The Boys when the were young, but once they could read, they were free to read them themselves.

[Rosie_0801]

I'm not sure wrongness in a fairy tale is a useful concept. Fairy tales are an inheritance, well out of copyright, and we can do what we like with them. 

Read a kiddie version for now, because you have an easily frightened three year old.

When he is older, and either isn't frightened or wants the adrenaline rush, you can read a less sanitised version. You'll figure out the timing when you get there.

Like Gil said, if you want to underline the point that one oughtn't talk to strangers, you can interrupt the story to say so, or to ask your son if Red Riding Hood is making safe choices and invite his opinion on what better choice could be made. You can make a joke out of it, like roll your eyes "Is she making good choices?" in "that" voice so he can gleefully yell "NO!" But probably not now, because he's only three and "good choices" is a burdensome concept for three year olds who usually aren't convinced about the goodness involved in choosing tooth brushing and broccoli eating.

I gave up on fairy tales. I was still bored of them when I had kids because I'd read them so much as a child myself, and Andrew Lang's versions made me rage. "No! The princess is not a good person, no matter how blond she is. Good people don't murder peasants!!!"

[HomeAgain]

This is about the age to focus on two styles of stories:

1. Animal based.  Just So Stories, Peter Rabbit, etc, where a personified animal is the main character.  The child has a good idea that these things don't happen in real life because none of the animals he has met can talk.  There are many folk tales that fit this category.

2. Three-peat stories.  You'll often find in conjunction with folk tales there is an element that is retold 3 times.  This edges into fairy tales as well.  You can ease into them over the next few years by keeping this element constant.  It helps them predict what is going to happen and be able to retell it back with puppets or acting it out.

 

My youngest really loved most of the traditional fairy tales around age 6, but wasn't ready for them before that.

[Xahm]

I think it's fun with little kids to check out multiple versions of traditional little-kid stories at the library and read them all with kids from about 3 to 8. Our library usually has a couple of very traditionally told ones with nice pictures, a few from different cultures, and a couple told from different character perspectives. Since teaching my children how to hold multiple perspectives in their head at the same time is one of my primary educational goals, this last is very helpful.

[Maria327]

Here is an article from the Waldorf perspective: "Choosing Fairy Tales for Different Ages" by Joan Almon.

[Momof4sweetkids]

Paul Galdone has good picture book versions of fairy tales for little kids that aren't scary. Jan Brett is a favorite of ours that has many picture books that are twists on the classics (i.e., Goldilocks but set in the Arctic called The Three Snow Bears).

[Masers]

I love fairy tales, and we are doing the Fairy Tale Summer (read aloud revival) right now with 4 kids ages 12 down to 3. She uses the Scott Gustafson version. I just read Little Red Riding Hood, and I felt like the mom DID say don’t stray from the path? “Stray” was one of the vocabulary words for the unit, in fact. 

We also have always enjoyed reading all sorts of different versions…different authors, different cultures. Just doing naptime with my 3 year old now, and she requested the Arthur fairy tale book for her story, haha. 
 

[Penderwink]

I was never into fairy tales as a child, so am not too excited to read them with my kid. He does know some of them from a very simple Usborne fairy tale book we have, or from the wordless picture books that come with the fairy tale based Smart Games (Three Little Pigs, Red Riding Hood etc). I think he did more in an extracurricular class this semester. At some point we will read more, along with Aesop’s Fables, key folk tales and stories from other cultures because it is important background knowledge. I’d like that he understands the references in Shrek as he gets older- but otherwise they are dated and often reference ideas that don’t fit well with us (ugly = bad, disfigured  = scary).