The Benefits of Reading Fairy Tales to Your Child

Recently there has been a lot of discussion about whether fairy tales are appropriate for children to be reading or listening to anymore. Especially older fairy tales like those from Perrault or even the Grimm Brothers. This largely comes from some studies that had been done on the effects of fiction and children’s books on child development. We discovered that the stories a child is exposed to young can often influence their view of the world later in life.

As with reading fairy tales to children, this brings up a few issues. The first of which is that many of the older tales incorporated rather dark themes devoted to death, suffering and children being murdered. But then there is also a second incorporation that has to do with later Disney movies of these fairy tales and them being too happy and can result in parents thinking their child will be deluded with ideas that the world will just work for them and things will be good.
Benefits of Reading
With that said there are still initial benefits for reading to your child when they are young. It will improve their vocabulary, enhance verbal communication and understanding and if you do it regularly you’ll even find your kids can interact and say what they want to more often. You also enhance the child’s imagination and creative process, which is a huge benefit to any child. There is also the added benefit of making the reading enjoyable since the stories are often fantastical ones that the child wants to hear which means they will probably grow to want to read on their own. And this is all not even considering the bonding potential of spending every night to read with your child. But there still remains the issue of picking the right stories that will express the views you want your child to encounter.
Choosing Your Tales
The real benefits to reading fairy tales come with the personalization of what stories you choose to read to your child, or have them read. When selecting your stories, the first thing you need to always do is read the stories on your own first. If you go into it blind, you may start reading the story then realize this is not something you want to read to your child at all. It may take a little extra time, but it will also provide a means of bonding with your child since you’ll have taken the time to read the story and not just read it out loud to them and not absorb the information. This also allows you to pick fairy tales that you think will be productive for your child, whether you focus on things they love to do or talk about; or just finding morals and ideas that are shown in the story that you want your child to carry on.
The decisions you make will end up affecting your child, so they are always important, even when you aren’t thinking about it. So if you are okay with showing your child some of the darker fairy tales, or letting them watch Disney movies that present girls unable to do anything for themselves until a man comes along then be ready for the adult you create from that. But in turn, picking stories that promote the empowerment of your child, or their dreams can be even more beautiful in the end. And this rests with all stories, fiction or not.
So remember, a fairy tale will affect your child, but you also get a choice as to what story and what affect will occur; so choose your stories carefully!