Ethnic Folklore

The Folk Book is a series of fifteen 20-minute videos on ethnic folklore is designed to promote interracial, intercultural and interethnic understanding among students in the primary grades using dance, drama, storytelling, puppets, animation and a variety of other art forms to present folk tales from around the world. Each 20-minute video contains 2 or more stories organized around a theme or motif universally found in folklore.
$40 per video; $500 for entire set of 15 videos. Accompanied by a comprehensive teacher guide.

Hodgepodge A potpourri of the oral tradition (children's games, riddles, jokes and Ote, a Puerto Rican folk tale).

Stories of Stories Stories of how stories came to be (How Anansi the Spider Stole the Sky God's Stories, Ghana and Feather Toes, Seneca)

In the Beginning Stories explaining how the world began (Pan Ku, China; In the Beginning, Australia; Serpent of eternity, West Africa)

How and Why Stories that explain the occurrence of natural phenomena (The Sun Man, Kalahari Desert; The Sun and Moon, Netsilik Eskimo; The First Zebra, Malawi; Why Men Have to Work, Afro-American; Whirlwind is a Ghost Dancing, Native American)

How and Why-II (How the Snake Lost His Voice, Japan; The Bear Dance, Mountain Ute)

Trickster Tales Representatives of the ubiquitous trickster hero (Senor Coyote and the Tricked Trickster; Mexico; Brer Rabbit and the Tar Baby, Black Southern U.S.; The Trial of the Stone, Burma)

Learning to Be Stories that teach morals (The Monkey and the Crocodile, India; It Couldn't Be Worse, Jewish; Deep Down in the Jungle, urban Philadelphia)

Learning to Be in East Africa East African stories that teach morals (Arap Sang and the Cranes, Lake Nyanza; Digging for Water, East Africa; The Fire on the Mountain, Ethiopia)

Monsters and Magic (Baba Yaga, Russia; Wicked John and the Devil, Appalachia)

Just for Fun (Juan Bobo and the Caldron, Puerto Rico; Two of Everything, China; The Silver Bell, Japan)

Just for Fun-II (The King with the Horse's Ears, Ireland; The Clever Wife, China; Mark Twain and Huckleberry Finn, United States)

Wonderful Womenfolk Stories about clever women (Scheherazade, Middle East; Three Strong Women, Japan)

Who Is the Real Cinderella? Variants of the Cinderella story (Turkey Girl, Southwest Native American; Nitokris and the Gilded Sandals, Egypt; Kari Woodencoat, Norway)

At the Back of Beyond Stories of ways different cultures deal with death (Death of Kigtak, Eskimo; The Descent of lshtar, Sumerian; Barrington Bunny, United States)

Reflections (Two Highwaymen, Japan; Princess of the Full Moon, Upper Volta; The Tiger's Whisker, Korea)