Part 1: Record the Fairytale Elements

Use the fairytale selected by your teacher. Support every interpretation with precise evidence from the text, such as a short quotation, a specific action or a clearly described moment. Explain how your evidence supports your idea.

Record the title and version of the fairytale. Then write a concise interpretation of what the story suggests about power, goodness, danger, change or justice.

Title and source or version: _________________________________________________

Initial interpretation:

Describe the most significant setting in the story. Select two precise details from the text and explain how each detail creates an atmosphere or shapes the audience's expectations.

Overall setting analysis: Explain how the setting influences a character's choices, changes the balance of power or prepares the reader for a later event.

Analyse the protagonist's goals, qualities and agency. Does the protagonist change, refuse to change or reveal qualities that were present from the beginning? Use precise evidence and explain what it reveals.

Analyse the antagonist, opposing force or source of danger. Avoid simply calling the character “evil”. Explain how the storyteller positions the audience to feel fear, sympathy, distrust or frustration.

Identify the protagonist's most important internal or external conflict. Trace three pivotal events and explain how each develops tension, changes the protagonist's situation or prepares the resolution.

Tick the conventions that appear in the story. For two selected conventions, use precise evidence to explain their purpose. Decide whether each convention reinforces a familiar expectation or challenges it.

magic or the supernatural    a repeated pattern, phrase or event

transformation or disguise    clearly opposed good and evil

a quest, test or forbidden action    a helper or magical object

an apparently just ending    a moral or social lesson

Convention 1, evidence and effect:

Convention 2, evidence and effect:

Does the resolution provide justice, escape, restoration or transformation? Explain how the ending shapes the audience's final judgement of the characters and the world of the story.

What value, warning or belief does the fairytale communicate? Evaluate whether its message is convincing to a modern audience. Refer to at least two moments from the story.

Part 2: Compare with Cinderella

Compare your chosen fairytale with Cinderella. Move beyond listing similarities and differences: compare the storyteller's choices, the effects of conventions and the expectations created for the audience.

Tick the conventions used in both stories. Then compare one shared convention and one convention that is used differently. Support your ideas with evidence from both texts.

magic or the supernatural    a helper or magical object

a central conflict    transformation or disguise

a test, quest or forbidden action    a social or moral lesson

an apparently just ending    repetition or a pattern of three

Shared convention: ________________________________________________

Convention used differently: _______________________________________

Compare the protagonists' circumstances, qualities and ability to shape their futures. Explain how antagonists, social expectations or other obstacles create sympathy, fear or frustration. Include one significant similarity and one significant difference, supported by evidence from both stories.

Both stories may follow a pattern of hardship, intervention and change. Analyse how this pattern operates in each story. Then compare the endings: which is more predictable, which creates the stronger audience response, and how does that choice affect each story's message?

Choose one fairytale convention from the checklist and propose a deliberate “fracture”: a moment in which the story refuses, reverses or changes the expected convention. You may alter the ending, the role of magic, the behaviour of a helper, the protagonist's transformation or the apparent division between good and evil.

Describe your proposed change, then justify how it would alter the reader's expectations, their judgement of the characters or the story's central message. Finally, explain whether your revised choice would make the story more effective than the original.

Convention fractured and proposed change:

Effect on expectations, meaning and audience response:

Final judgement: Which version uses the convention more effectively, and why?