Five-year-old students perform “Egle, the Queen of Serpents”
- Category: Новости
- Date: July 15, 2013
For the Lithuanian tales we study at Leaping Toads, we consider the characters, think how we can handle the situations, empathise with the actors and discuss how to avoid possible problems. Children do not just listen to these tales but also have the possibility to act them out with authenticity, understanding and enthusiasm.
Last summer, our history teacher Erika did not choose the conventional historical event. Instead she chose a folktale “Egle, the Queen of Serpents.” The act of parents telling fairytales to their children is becoming increasingly less common (and Lithuanian folktales, even more so). With this project we wanted to encourage parents to remember the times when they themselves used to curl up on their parents’ laps and listen with curiosity and in awe to such stories. Erika felt it would be great to re-enliven this tradition so it can be a renewed and enjoyed by families once more.
We have no doubt that fairytales of great interest to children. When creating our video project “Egle, the Queen of Serpents” we were keen to assess the children’s enthusiasm when they were choosing their character roles. No child seemed disinterested or sad – everyone wanted to play and participate in the selection process.
Last week, the established daily newspaper Lietuvos Zinios (“News of Lithuania) commented upon our school and its folktale.
“Although quite a joyless tale, the children played cheerily and gave it purity and sincerity, which is not characteristic of today’s world “.
This and other educational projects have significantly matured this group. Another was a poetry performance for children “The Lazy Bug Students” created by Prof. Dr Liutauras Degesys and his children’s book “The Grass Menagerie.”
Children learned to listen to each other and demonstrate interest and patience. They grew stronger in their self-motivation, responsibility and confidence and no child was shy to express their opinion.
We are very pleased that now they our pupils have since become six-year-olds who have grown to be funny and certainly very clever. The children remain very interested in ethno-cultural projects as well as being very keen to learn about and appreciate the many cultures and traditions around the world.
We invite you to take a look at some of our work from the previous year:
When learning about the weather, children travelled back in time to historic times when Lithuanians prayed to the Baltic gods.
When we talked about home and family with our teacher Erika, our five-year-old pupils created a traditional dwelling and while presenting it to parents to remind them of childhood holidays spent in the countryside and fun stories about the time their grandparents spent in their youth.
What did young people do in the olden days times after work and at the weekend? Did they gather together all into a barn? Let’s stop reading and go dancing together
