Stories are powerful toolsChildren’s imaginations need nurturing [Archives:2005/824/Culture]

By Salem al-Majidi
Yemen Times Staff
Taiz Bureau
Imaginary stories are highly appreciated by children. These tales have their own influences on their behavior and day-to-day activities, helping them to enrich their knowledge, perception and mental abilities and implant the desire to be helpful to others.

But not all the imaginary tales and fables presented to children via films and caricatures can help develop their abilities, particularly those leading to violence and hatred among children.

How one protects the child and modifies his behavior after being exposed to such tales and fables and various scenes were printed in his/her mind is important. In the view of some, it becomes impossible to modify the child's behavior after he/she starts to imitate what has been viewed in the screen.

Is it possible for parents to provide their children with some useful tales and fables other than what they watch in the TV? How can we protect our children from deviation and make them capable of proper thoughts?

To discuss events behind the phenomenon, we probed into the views of some educators and psychologists.

Fatihia Lugman commented that imaginary tales contribute much in developing children's creative abilities through their feeling toward responsibility and modifying their behavior by themselves.

Some useful tales include those related to truth and honesty that are viewed in caricatures; they make the child accustomed to think enough before taking decisions in critical times.

“We do forget that the limited imagination often yields positive outcomes and in the contrary, the limitless imagination leads to negative influences on the child's behavior such as roughness and aggressiveness and other violent conducts.

Double-edged sword

“As far as I am concerned, imaginary tales are useful for children if they are employed properly, otherwise, the imaginary tales are a double-edged weapon,” said Nawar al-Maqtary, a teacher at Jeel al-Ghad School.

“Such tales may help modify the child' behavior to be socially admired. Some other times they make children aggressive and a source of trouble in the society; the useful imaginary tales and fables can be exploited in developing the mental abilities of children and implanting in them curiosity via reading special stories.

The frightening tales should be avoided since they have their negative influences on the personality of the child”.

She added: “children experience horrifying dreams during their sleep after reading or listening to tales colored with aggression and violence. Childhood-related fables attract the attention of children more than others, particularly those narrated by mothers before their children during days of childhood. Tales related to other children and animals seem to be next in importance to the first kind.

“The more the child's experiences increase in the sense of reading and listening to tales, the more his/her mental domain expands. Tales exposing familiar things help develop the child's horizon of thought; they help take the child from his limited environment to the outer world.”

Mohammad Murshid Sultan holds the view that any fiction has its effect on the recipient, specifically if it forms exciting scenes on the mind of the recipient. Fictions to some extent develop the mental ability of children while there are many others that have their negative effects on the behavior of the child.

Mohammad commented that the scientific imagination in fictions contributes effectively to developing the analytical abilities and talents of the child either at home or at school. This enables him to be more creative in his scientific and practical life.

With respect to the subject Waheeb al-Shaibani, a teacher at Jeel al-Ghad said: “The child as psychologists say is a blank slate and the nature implants in him either love, hatred, curiosity or violence. When adults narrate fictions and fables before children, the mental abilities of the latter will develop leading him or her to the phase of creativity.”

Mohammad al-Qubati holds the view that imagination is of two types, either broad imagination or narrow imagination.

We can profit from the second type in developing the mental abilities of children because such a type of imagination fit their mental abilities and help them develop, but the first type usually scatters the mental concentration of the child and draws his attention to things out of place, he said.

A true story

Abdulsalam al-Omaisi said that the stories of children have an integral role in raising awareness among them and implant in them some good qualities like discretion and honesty. However, tales heavenly colored with imagination have their negative influences upon the behavior of the child making him aggressive and accustomed to telling lies. The majority of tales are not more than being a waste of time and have no specific purpose to be reflected in the child's day-to-day life.

On this subject, Dr. Rifgi Eisa, Professor of Psychology at Faculty of Education Taiz University said: “One of the outstanding characteristics of younger children is their enthusiastic desire for imagination and creativity, and this in turn leads to the conflict between reality and imagination. Children mostly desire to be driven by their imagination while adult people want them to avoid this due to its negative influences. By this we resort to bring a compromise solution to combine between reality and imagination and to make a distinction between them while maintaining the latter (imagination) under our control.

We have to take for granted the tale of “Aglat Al-Usb'u” which tells the younger child that whatever seems difficult and intricate, he/she has to face because when he/she grows up and goes out of his/her home he/she is bound to face risks in the outer world.

Dr. Eisa added: “What I mean is that we have to teach the child how to differentiate between reality and imagination as this helps children overcome difficulties facing them later.

Growing through imagination

Does the child need a particular style of imagination to develop his creative abilities? Dr. Eisa answered that using the style of imagination and its role in preventing children from perceiving reality.

Most of the advanced experiences are not favored to be offered to children at earlier stages, and imagination is recommended as the favored mean to provide children with experiences that fit their level and age.

With respect to this, Dr. Eisa noted: “Some of the imaginary tales are considered to be an effective means in the social upbringing. The imaginary personalities also have a crucial role in cultivating the child's behavior and they can be visualized in the form of ghosts and Jennies.”

On this subject, Mohammad al-Sawi, a teacher of psychology at the Teachers Institute mentioned that it is the psychological features which distinguish the artistic works of children in their earlier stages.

He added: “Younger children show a great desire for the tales that expresses the idea of loss and restoring, and this idea is existent on the psychological analysis. While in cradle, the infant experiences that his/her mother left him/her once and returned, and the mother is the physical and spiritual protection of the child. The child becomes happy when he/she realizes that his/her mother comes back.”

How we should write tales

Regarding this, al-Sawi emphasized an important point associating with the style the writer has to follow for the sake of conveying his ideas. The tale should deal with a specific idea or a single topic that is related to the day-to-day experiences of the child.

The tales should proceed on one direction without any shifts and the succession of events has to be perceived as it took place in a specific area such as a forest, a school or a castle. The time setting should be as limited as possible and the number of characters is preferred to be small so that they can be distinguished and convincing.
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