Fairy Tale Fantasy involved fifth- and sixth-grade students in Sioux City, Iowa and Ashtabula, Ohio. The students participated in the following activities during their month long unit:

• Reading various traditional fairy tales and folktales with a particular concentration on multicultural "Cinderella" stories
• Reading modern day adaptations of traditional folktales
• Working in Literature Circles to read folktales
• Completing a story matrix, illustrating key literary elements of folktales
• Sharing favorite stories via e-mail letters
• Completing Venn Diagrams to compare and contrast various folktale versions
• Choral reading of a folktale
• Spelling lists with words from folktales
• Brainstorming adjectives to describe Cinderella, completing a LINKS graphic organizer
• Writing meaningful sentences using "Cinderella" words
• Distinguishing between meaningful sentences and those with no meaning
• Participating in pre-writing strategies in preparation for developing their own folktale adaptations
• Peer conferencing personal folktale adaptations, editing and proofreading each others' writing
• Designing a picture book adaptation of either a "Cinderella" story or another familiar folktale complete with illustrations
• Self-evaluating their folktale adaptations with a teacher prepared rubric
• Sharing their folktale adaptations via the Internet

Now that Fairy Tale Fantasy has drawn to a close, there is still one more activity that the students at Riverview and Sts. John and Paul are awaiting: the sharing of their folktale adaptations via hard-copy. In the near future, each school will send their books to the other through the regular postal service so they can enjoy their handiwork.