Tadpoles. Fairytale twists series by various authors
Crabtree Publishing
The Pied Piper and the Wrong Song. ISBN 9780778719601
Snow White sees the Light. ISBN 9780778719571
The Elves and the Trendy Shoes. ISBN 9780778719571
(Age: K-2) These are just three in a series of traditional
fairytales that have been given a new, modern twist to turn them on
their head. In Snow White sees the Light, Snow White is tired of
being treated like a slave by the dwarves and enlists the help of
the Queen with the magic mirror; in The Elves and the Trendy Shoes
no one wants to buy the elves' old-fashioned footwear then one day
they wake up to find their shop full of trendy shoes; and in The
Pied Piper and the Wrong Song the rats don't disappear. Cinderella,
The Three Pigs, Hansel and Gretel, and The Ugly Duckling are among
sixteen tales that have been given a modern slant in this collection
suitable for newly independent readers looking for something a bit
different.
Vibrant illustrations and puzzles that encourage the reader to
sequence the story (a critical element of the organising strand of
the information literacy process) add appeal and there are also
notes to adults to help them make the reading more of a five-minute
wonder with suggestions for helping the young person predict, use
the context cues, and make connections between the text, themselves
and the world, thus supporting the strategies we encourage within
the classroom.
As well as being entertaining reads for the K-2 age group, these
stories would also be valuable teaching tools in teaching students
about the interpretation of texts and the factors that influence the
author's perspective. While the original stories were written as
didactic stories to keep young children on the straight and narrow
for fear of dire consequences, what do they look like through a more
modern lens? Perhaps older students could be challenged to make
their own take on one of the stories. Valuable additions to the
collection are those that can be read and used across a range of
ages, and this series fits that bill.
Barbara Braxton