Sparkle up your homeschool literature with fairy tales. Here are movies based on fairy tales to enrich literature unit study.
Movies Based on Fairy Tales to Enrich Literature Unit Study
Is your homeschool middle schooler or high schooler getting a little tired of books?
While reading real books is an important part of all Language Arts studies, there are MANY kinds of reading material that can be added to sparkle up the literature credits:
- Poetry
- Current events reading
- How-to magazines
- Folk tales
- Fairy tales
In particular, fairy tales make great unit studies so you can do a fun but slightly deep dive into each tale for meaningful educational experiences. When you decide to do a fairy tale unit study, here are some components you may want to choose for your homeschool:
- Country of origin of the fairy tale
- Time period where the story originated (this is sometimes hard to pinpoint, because fairy tales evolve over time)
- Always a good excuse for a map study of that country
- Life of the author of the fairy (if that is known)
- Discuss the stories main components
- Setting
- Main good characters (protagonists)
- Main bad characters (antagonists)
- Plot line of the story (for a simple study: happy opening, problem, climax, happy ending)
- Watch a movie
- Creative project (illustration, act out a scene, sew a princess dress)
- Write your own fairy tale. 7Sisters’ Middle School Short Story Writing Guide: Fairy Tale is a simple way to write a first fairy tale.
Here is a list of some of our favorite movies based on fairy tales that are appropriate for the entire family:
- Snow White (1937)
- Beauty and the Beast (1997 and 2016)
- Cinderella (1950) and/or Ever After (1998) for contrast
- The Little Mermaid (1989)
- Sleeping Beauty (1959)
- Aladdin (1992)
- Peter Pan (1953) and/or Hook (1991) for contrast
- Princess Bride (1987) takes the fairy tale format and invents a new tale
- Shrek (2001) creates a new fairy tale
- Hoodwinked (2005) is a fun spoof mashup of fairy tales
There’s not ONE right way to do a unit study, so pick your own components. Let us know what YOU do for a fairy tale unit study. What would you add to the movie list?
Don’t forget to download Middle School Short Story Writing Guide: Fairy Tales.
For more fun unit studies based on a movie, check out this freebie: Unit Studies Based on Popular Movies.
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