It was written by an anonymous person working for the Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China. Tye May and the Magic Brush seems like it's a traditional Chinese folktale, but it is more a story that uses the folktale syle and structure to teach specific values. On the whole I thought this book was perfect for the topic of Chinese New Year and although I used it with nursery aged children, it could easily be developed and looked into more deeply with older Key Stage 1 children.Tye May and the Magic Brush First published in 1981. Julia Donaldson has made a video about this book, promoting its use in the classroom as a whole group drama session, which would be better for Key stage 1 classes. The children learnt loads about Chinese culture through these activities and the story, but they were also able to notice similarities to their culture as well. We also used ‘magic paintbrushes’ on the playground outside, using gross motor skills to paint our ideas, and obviously lots of Chinese New Year activities like making paper lanterns, eating noodles, using chopsticks and rice to develop fine motor skills and making Chinese tea light holders using clay. Other activities linked to this book have included using props from the story in the role play corner- I had a Chinese restaurant anyway so it fitted in nicely. What would we paint if we could paint anything and it would become real? Would we paint something that could be shared? Or would we choose something selfish just for us? (Just a side note but I was observed by an Ofsted inspector using this book, and he was thoroughly impressed with the discussion and imaginative thinking that was inspired in such young children). Later in the week we returned to the book and put ourselves in Shen’s shoes. I had children drawing pictures of doors, keys, holes and tools that they would paint to help Shen out of her problematic situation. This also fed really well into some emergent writing and mark making as the children were keen to get down their ideas and also begin to use their newly acquired knowledge of the phonetic sounds. This activity is similar to what I did when using the book ‘Bear Hunt’, as the children suddenly have ownership of the story and can use their imaginations to decide what happens next. During this part of the story the children were excitedly thinking of things that they could paint with the magic paintbrush so that Shen could escape from the mean Emperor. Shen is captured by the rich Emperor and locked in a prison cell, she is told that she must paint a tree full of money and then she shall be set free. The children loved the rhyme in the story and became involved in guessing the different things that Shen would paint for the poor people who needed help, but most of the discussion and paired talk occurred when the main character is faced with a problem. When the evil emperor commands Shen to paint gold for him, she is determined to keep her promise to paint only for the poor.” The blurb states: “With her magic paintbrush, Shen can paint steaming pots full of fish and oysters to feed the hungry people in her village. As always, this book is entertaining, full of rhyme and of underlying morals but this book is also based on a traditional Chinese folk tale. Julia Donaldson is obviously a hugely well known children’s author and I’m sure most of you with kids have at least a couple of hers on the bookshelf, but I thought this book may be less well known to you. As it was Multi-Cultural Book Day last week and it was Chinese New Year on Friday, I thought I would share a book that fits into both of these areas.
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