Risk and resilience: A perspective from traditional tales and nursery rhymes

Abstract

The risk and resilience framework (Stanley, 2003) views developmental outcomes as the consequences of young people’s responses to the risk and protective factors that are operating in
their social settings.

Students in the School of Education at The University of Waikato at Tauranga can have the opportunity to apply the framework to models and situations of their own choice.

The present paper describes the first author’s work, a risk and resilience analysis of traditional English fairy tales.

The point is made that fairy tales are themselves a protective factor and they are typically communicated to children in circumstances that are conducive to the development of resilience.