• Each answer should be 1-2 paragraphs. Paragraphs are typically 4-6 sentences long. A little more is OK. Less is not OK.
• Be sure to read each question carefully and answer every part of the question!
• Use at least one quote or example from the readings to support your answers.
• Properly format your submission like the template provided in the “General Information” section of Moodle.
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1. What do you see as the main lesson of Edgeworth’s didactic story “A Purple Jar”? Is this lesson still relevant to today’s children? Why or why not?
2. “The Purple Jar” is often considered a didactic story, meaning that it is more invested in teaching a lesson than telling an entertaining story. However, literary scholar Mitzi Myers pushes back on this characterization, claiming that the story is aiming to relate with young readers’ own experiences, not just lecture to them. According to Myers:
Youngsters can’t learn from stories if they can’t relate to them and don’t enjoy them. To teach, to be morally and emotionally helpful to children, stories must please. And they do so best by offering juvenile readers a recognizable child protagonist to identify with, a real character with a language, thought process, problems, and circumstantially depicted daily life of his or her own (54).
Myers believes that Rosamond is one of those relatable child protagonists. What do you think—can Rosamond as a character and “The Purple Jar” as a story still be entertaining and relatable for young readers in the modern day?
• If so, how is it still able to both “please” and “teach” children?
• If not, how do you think the story could be changed to engage a young reader?
3. Consider a book, story, poem, or movie that you enjoyed as a child…or even one that you enjoyed sharing with a child. Now, take some time to examine it in two paragraphs.
• In the first paragraph, provide the title and a brief summary of the story. You don’t have to remember every detail, but try your best to introduce this text as if you were convincing another adult to share it with their children.
• In the second paragraph, explain how you think it successfully teaches one lesson. Do you think the story is didactic or that it allows children to think critically about that lesson? Be specific in describing one example from the story to explain why you think so.
4. What would you say is one major appeal of The Little Prince for young readers? Think in terms of its ability to entertain, please, or capture their attention. In describing this appeal, be sure to quote and analyze at least one quotation from the text.
5. Unlike “The Purple Jar,” the lesson or lessons of The Little Prince are not spelled out so clearly. Do you think the book has a lesson at all?
• If so, state one lesson and explain how the text communicates by analyzing at least one quotation.
• If not, explain why you think the book is valuable despite lacking that lesson.
6. Let’s practice analysis of literary techniques! Choose one specific feature of The Little Prince: the narrator’s point of view, his tone, the word choice/sentence structure, a character, the setting, an example of imagery, or a symbol. In the first sentence of your paragraph, state why you think this literary technique is effective in the story. Then analyze two examples from the text to back you up.