GOAL: By using a familiar fairy tale Cinderella, students discuss authority and justice and understand use of some fairy tale devices.

OBJECTIVES: Students will determine which parts of the story could happen, who has legitimate authority in the story and what the extent of that authority is.

ACTIVITY: Introduce the story of Cinderella. Discuss the terms stepsister, stepmother, and fairy godmother and the way they are used in stories. Read the story to the class.

Suggested questions for follow-up discussion:

• What are the stepsisters' and stepmother's parts in the story?
• What is the fairy godmother's part in the story?
• What does the prince do?
• Who has authority?
• How does he/she get it?
• How do the people who have authority use it?
• Is it fair when Cinderella can't go to the ball?
• Is it fair when she gets to go?
• Is it fair for the stepsisters to go?
• Who decides who can go?
• Is it fair for Cinderella to marry the prince?
• If the stepsisters go to live in the palace, is that fair?
• Does everything always turn out so that it is fair?

FOLLOW-UP ACTIVITY: Let students act out the story. At the conclusion let students review who had authority and how it was used. Guide them to summarize how actions showed what was fair and not fair.

Through the answers to the discussion questions and in listening to the summary of the dramatization of the story, the teacher can determine what understanding the students have of the concepts of authority and fairness.

MATERIALS: Copy of the story of Cinderella.

RESOURCE: Perrault, Charles, Cinderella, Mahwah, New Jersey: Troll Associates, 1979.