As one of the Four Great Classical Novels in China, Journey to the West has been read and appreciated by literary enthusiasts since ancient times. It is a classic good versus evil story, which marks the peak of ancient romantic novels. Behind the characters who are both good and evil, it is a true portrayal of contemporary people’s social life. In order to guide students to read “classic literature” happily and be attracted by the essence of traditional Chinese culture, the G6 Native Chinese Group launched a series of activities with the theme of “A Chinese Odyssey—Let’s Transit Together with Monks.” The aim was to encourage students to read, understand, and peruse the contents of Journey to the West, and help them perceive the deep theme and spiritual connotation conveyed by such a classic work.

In order to help grade six students better understand the relevant contents of Journey to the West, a series of little tasks were designed to enable students to be inspired in the process of completing each task and finally “obtain the true scriptures.” In the first stage of the activity, we invited students to design and make their own Westward Journey magazines. Students were asked to read the text of Journey to the West and choose some contents that they were interested in (a chapter that they were interested in, or a character that they appreciate most) to design the magazine. Finally, the students gave full play to their imagination and creativity to design various “unique” Westward Journey magazines after carefully reading and understanding the stories. Teachers were so surprised to see these creative works and the students also experienced endless fun in such a creative process! This was undoubtedly a good start to the unit and laid a foundation for the follow-up activities.

In the second stage of the activity, students were tasked with giving speeches and debates around the theme of “Journey to the West.” They can freely choose their favorite characters in the book and perform “brainstorming” within the group with this theme, which aims to help students find the imperceptible details behind the story and further understand the significance of each character being created. The significance of such a design in this link was to encourage students to think actively and be good at expressing themselves. On the other hand, it also gives children who take online classes at home more opportunities to interact. Judging by the children’s performance and effectiveness in the activity, it was very successful. Many parents highly praised this activity, and the children also had their language skills and critical thinking skills enhanced in speeches and debates.

Then we came to the third stage of the activity: the happy reading and skillful reading of the long literary piece of Journey to the West. In order to help students immerse themselves in reading and pay great attention to the details that are easily ignored in the book, teachers guided students to further appreciate the wonderful paragraphs by means of text guidance, intensive paragraph reading, and knowledge contests. The aim was to help them understand the delicate characterization, exquisite plot design, and unique environment descriptiveness of the novel. Congruently, the children learned clearly all stories being told by Journey to the West, and how these stories were created. In this process, students came to enjoy reading classics and master the relevant methods of them, which greatly enhances their reading ability.

The fourth stage of the activity was designed to let the students recreate such a classic of Journey to the West based on the exploration of its text. In this process, we asked students to deconstruct the article from the perspective of monsters, and the H Level students even rewrote the script. Everyone hoped to have the opportunity to perform the script on the stage with their classmates after COVID-19 is defeated. This part of the activity aimed to enable students to form their individual understanding of the text by adding their unique and imaginative input. Facts have proved that the results of the activities in the later stage were quite gratifying. Many students added unexpected ingenuity in rewriting and script creation, and also added new colors to the original work. More importantly, the children’s writing level has been significantly improved.

Finally, we came to the end of the activity series, and a wonderful lecture drew a successful conclusion. We invited Zhang Yiwei, associate professor in the Department of Chinese Language and Literature at Fudan University and author of “Borderline of Love in ‘Journey to the West,’” to give the students a lecture on the theme of “A Chinese Odyssey.” She chose to take the cartoon images of Journey to the West that the children were familiar with as an entry point and show them more interesting stories—What kind of person is Xuanzang? What is the source of the image of the Monkey King? What is the mystery about Monk Pig? Furthermore, she answered the questions raised by the students one by one. This theme lecture enabled students to understand the relevant history of Journey to the West, and further perceive the capability of international communication and the influence of this book.

The “A Chinese Odyssey” activities series has come to an end, but we will never stop our efforts on the road of studying the original Chinese classics. We hope that our students can discover and gain more from reading texts and classics.

Written by｜Zhao Shuyi, Chen Fan

Pictures by｜G6 Native Chinese Group

Edited by｜Huang Shiyuan, Kristjan Butler