Notes about the locations of the folktales:

The stories for this lesson are African folktales. “The Collared Crow,” “Selekana and the River God” and “The Ostrich Egg Wife” are from South Africa. “The Cruel Creditor and the Judge’s Wise Daughter” is from Morocco and has Jewish roots. “Gratitude: The Hunter and the Antelope” is from the Nupe people of Nigeria.

On a map, locate South Africa, Morocco, and Nigeria and give their absolute locations (longitude and latitude). Give their relative locations (general descriptors of where the places are located). Further research may include physical characteristics and human characteristics.

Move young people into five groups and assign each group one of the folktales. The group reads their assigned story and discusses the following questions:

• What is the lesson of this folktale?
• How does the title of the folktale fit the story?
• What is revealed about the generosity of spirit of the characters? What can serve as models for others to follow?
• What character traits seem to be valued in the story and culture? (caring, courage, civic virtue and citizenship, giving, honesty, justice and fairness, perseverance, respect, responsibility, trustworthiness)
• What is revealed about the country’s culture through the folktale? 
• What lesson is taught about listening to the words of others? 
• What choices did the characters face? What actions could have produced an entirely different effect? How likely was it that the character might have acted differently? 

Have each team share with the whole group a verbal summary of their story and key findings from their discussions.

Here are some guiding notes and questions specific to each story to go with the whole group discussions, if needed. 

• In the story “The Cruel Creditor and the Judge’s Wise Daughter,” the merchant’s son is reckless with his inherited wealth and makes a bad business agreement when he becomes penniless. Some people would say that it is his own fault that he has come to ruin. He should not be saved from his fate because he agreed to it. What argument would a person with a generous spirit use?
• In the story “The Ostrich-Egg Wife,” a man loses everything because he breaks a promise. Was his punishment just or would a more generous wife have forgiven him?
• In the story “The Collared Crow,” the farmer and his wife were asked to be generous even though they had little to share. In what ways can those who have little be generous?
• In the story “Selekana and the River God,” Selekana is kind but also trusting of others. How does a generous person know when the need is genuine or when others are taking advantage? Should this be a consideration when deciding whether or not to be generous?
• In the story “Gratitude: The Hunter and the Antelope,” a trusting man helps a crocodile out of his difficulty but then is placed in danger of losing his life to the crocodile. There are really five stories of gratitude/ingratitude in the story. Could the author have kept out the colored oval woven mat known as the Asubi, the old torn and worn dress, and the old mare from the story and still have had the same effect? Often we are not aware of the effect others have had on our lives until years later when we have lost contact with them. Is there a way gratitude can be shown in circumstances when there is little or no chance of contacting the person again?