Before students begin to read, review what the class already knows about archetypes. The students probably haven't read Carl Jung's Man and His Symbols or Joseph Campbell's The Hero With a Thousand Faces , but high school students easily understand the concept and probably have already been introduced to archetypes. Employ student journals with this teaching approach. Journals in the secondary English class offer a personal and informal opportunity for students to respond to the ideas they see in the African stories. The journal is an idea exercise.
Students can write whatever they believe to be appropriate to their interpretation of the story.
For this lesson, students were asked to read silently the West African folktale, The Cow-Tail Switch . This story can be found in Topics for the Restless , Book One, Second Editon, 1989,Edward Spargo, Editor, Jamestown Publisher, Providence, Rhode Island. Read the folktale, The Cow-Tail Switch . Discuss the archetypes with your teacher so you are sure you have an understanding of what each one means. As you read, identify some of the archetypes that are listed on your worksheet.