From an early age we began to hear stories from our parents and grandparents, loaded with narratives and amazing episodes that we not only cannot forget, but also transmitted from generation to generation to our own children, students, grandchildren or siblings. However, until we reached an advanced age, we did not understand the intentionality of these writings and the true meaning of the legends .
We must differentiate the legends from the myths, and doing so means understanding that the legends are stories that have a certain level of veracity or are based on events or beliefs from the past or the folklore of a certain region in particular, as opposed to myths. In other words, although the theme of a legend was not authentic, it could be taken for granted in another era; the myth , on the other hand, is about supernatural events or gods or monsters, which used to be used to keep the population of the past in a certain order. Of course, it is true that most legends transform as time goes by, and they do so by adapting to new ways of recounting the same event over and over again and at very different times. It is here when they can acquire a certain degree of exaggeration and / or great fictional overtones, since these are key elements in the narrative and excellent to capture the attention of the listeners.
With regard to the little ones, the messages that the reading of legends provide them are clear and easy to understand, being those of the fanciful or adventurous type the ones almost always preferred by the little ones, such as “ The legend of the unicorns ”, which you can enjoy on our main Forest page. But what are legends really and what do they teach our children? Let’s look at this topic a little more in depth below.
What are legends
The legends are narratives of historical events, told in a natural way, characterized by not having precision in time or a specific author. Quite simply, they are stories that have been passed down between generations and forever, and that have served for centuries, on many occasions, to stimulate the imagination of children and establish important teachings .
Today many legends have been brought to the cinema transmitting the same message but adapted to each new generation. It is true that technological advances have had a great impact on the dissemination of these stories, especially because of that powerful addition of special effects (which has undoubtedly made it possible for the legends to be much more attractive to children), but books are still the best source for discovering this type of storytelling. That is why in the Forest of Fantasies we want to invite you to discover the best traditional legends specially adapted for children, being able to enjoy great moments of reading and learning with them.
Benefits of legends in children
Although they may seem somewhat old-fashioned, legends can provide great benefits and large doses of learning to the little ones, as they are part of the cultural wealth of humanity and often harbor great messages and values, but do you want to discover some more benefits of the legends?
- They stimulate the cognitive development of children.
- They encourage creativity and inventiveness.
- They promote the sequence and order of events.
- They activate the imagination to the point of being able to capture it well, either in handwritten form or in illustrations.
- They facilitate social interaction and transmit values of social culture.
- They contain timeless storytelling elements that are important to understanding literature.
- They provide information about different cultures (similarities and differences, importance of certain values, the history of a certain people …, etc.).
Popular and ideal legends for children
Legends will always be present throughout people’s lives in one way or another, but reading legends is a habit of reading from the first years of life, by parents to children, is something that work must be done and something that will undoubtedly facilitate the future learning process of the little ones . To achieve this, it is good to start from an early age to instill values, to stimulate thought and creativity and to foster a love for literature.
If you want to start this task with your little ones and you want to do it through the legends, some of the best known and most interesting to start with may be: the legend of King Arthur, the Pied Piper of Hamelin , Robin Hood, the rabbit engraved on the Moon …
The good thing about legends is that they are almost inexhaustible and you can have a beautiful and interesting story to tell every day , especially if you go to the legends of each region, as it happens precisely with the ” Legend of the rabbit engraved on the Moon ” , which is an Aztec legend and has been versioned on the Forest page, maintaining, yes, the most important cultural elements reflected by that society.
