Thirty-Three Multicultural Tales to Tell

by Pleasant DeSpain

Book Overview

When a story shares a universal message, it finds its way into that pantheon of tales that is shared with many diverse cultures.People just can't live together without telling stories. We tell stories that are funny, ironic, insightful, or just simply pleasing to the tongue and ear. Stories just seem to happen. When a story happens with the force of universality, it finds its way into that pantheon of tales that is the common denominator of cultural exchange. Here are thirty-three such tales, collected from Brazil, China, Korea, Russia, Tibet, Africa, from America's native peoples, and other lands, and chosen for the universality of their message. Each story is presented in concise "retellable" form, suitable for all ages.Kirkus Review wrote, "Presented in easy-to-learn versions enlivened with unforced humor and clear, fluent language; most would take ten minutes or less to tell. Their readers will bring away a stronger impression of human culture's unity than its diversity."

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0874832667
• ISBN13: 9780874832662
• Release Date: December 2005
• Publisher: August House Publishers
• Length: 126 Pages
• Weight: 0.90 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 8.4" x 11.1"
• Age Range: 7 to 10 years
• Grade Range: Grades 2 to 5

Customer Reviews

Multicultural tales

My dad bought this as a gift for me. My teacher likes to tell tales from around the world so I've been interested in stories from other countries for a while. I loved this book! I read it in two days and I go back to it and reread certain parts. I want to show it to my teacher. He would love it too!

Multicultural Tales

My mom and dad bought this book as a gift for me. My teacher likes to tell tales from other countries and I find that interesting. I love this book! I read it in less than two days because it was so good. My teacher would love this book. There are good illustrations too!

MULTICULTURAL TALES FOR EVERYONE

I have been using this great collection of stories in My San Francisco classroom for 5 years now. My classes are always composed of children from a wide variety of different cultures. It is so powerful to have one book that so many students can relate to. With stories from Japan, Africa, Guatemala, Russia and many others, children can usually find a story that represents their personal culture. These stories are excellent tools for opening the door to group discussions. These discussions present opportune times to discuss morals, cultural differences/similarities and human nature. It is obvious that Pleasant DeSpain is a master storyteller and writer because the stories are so easy to read aloud. I could not recommend these tales to tell more.

Thirty-Three Multicultural Tales to Tell

This is a supurb collection of multicultural tales! It's a delight to read and the stories have many classroom uses. DeSpain knows how to make each story come alive and he keeps them short and to the point. Boys especially like to read this collection. I recommend it to everyone.

Excellent for the classroom!

I am a music educator and am constantly looking for books that contain multicultural stories that I can incorporate into my music lessons. Many different countries are represented in this book and the illustrations are useful. They are black and white, and I have even allowed some of them to serve as coloring pages in my class. Each of the stories are relatively short so that they work into lessons extremely well.