From Many Lands
A curriculum for middle elementary grades, or mixed-age groups, by Dan Harper
Copyright (c) 2026 Dan Harper
The Blue Jackal
Once upon a time there lived a jackal named Fierce-Howl. This jackal lived in a cave not far from a city. Now this jackal felt throat pinched with hunger, and one night he went hunting in the city. But the dogs that lived there snapped at him with sharp teeth, and terrified him with their barking. He ran this way and that in order to escape, and blundered through the door of a house where there lived a man who made his living dying cloth. A huge vat of indigo dye was just inside the door, and in his haste the jackal tripped and fell into it.
By the time the jackal had managed to crawl out of the vat, all the dogs had gone. So he slunk back into the forest. Once he was in the forest, some of the other animals who lived there stared at with astonishment at this strange blue-colored beast. They cried out, “What is this creature whose coat is richly colored with the remarkable color?”
Then they fled in terror, and quickly spread the news through the forest: “Some strange beast has come into our forest! No one knows from whence he came, or what he might be like.” And the animals began to say to each other, “We must flee from the forest!” for they knew the old animal proverb: “Where you do not know who someone is, it is wise not to trust them.”
Fierce-Howl saw how frightened they all were, and had an idea. He called out to the animals, “Why do you flee in terror from me? The god Indra saw that the animals of the forest have no king, and he has appointed me as your king. My name is Fierce-Howl. You may rest in safety in my strong paws.”
When they heard this speech, the lions, tigers, leopards, monkeys, rabbits, gazelles, jackals, and all the other animals bowed humbly to Fierce-Howl, saying, “Your Majesty, please tell us what our duties are.”
Fierce-Howl made appointed the lion to be prime minister, the tiger to be lord of the king’s bedchamber, the leopard to be the keeper of the king’s food and drink, the elephant to be the royal doorkeeper, and the monkey he appointed the bearer of the royal parasol, to keep the hot sun off the king’s head. But fearing the other jackals might recognize who he really was, he cuffed them and drove them away.
And so the jackal lived in royal state. The lions and tigers killed food animals for their king, and laid them before him. And King Fierce-Howl divided the food, and distributed it among his subjects according to their need and their service to the king, just as all kings do.
One day when King Fierce-Howl was sitting in his royal court, he heard a pack of jackals begin to howl. This brought back old memories of the days before he became king. A tear came to his eyes, and without thinking he stood up and began to howl back. The lions and tigers, upon hearing this, realized that their king was nothing but a jackal. The jackal saw that he had made a horrible mistake, and stood there ashamed and downcast.
Lions and tigers do not care for jackals, since jackals may try to steal their food. The lions and tigers looked at each other and said, “We have been deceived by a jackal. He deserves to die.” And that was the end of the jackal.
SESSION 8: “The Blue Jackal”
Top-level educational goals:
(1) Have fun and build community;
(2) Increase religious literacy;
(3) Build skills associated with liberal religion, e.g., interpersonal skills, introspection, basic leadership, being in front of a group of people, etc.
Educational objectives for this session:
(1) Get to know other people in the class;
(2) Hear a story from this religious tradition;
(3) Be able to talk about one or more incidents or themes from the story, e.g., if parents ask what happened in Sunday school today.
Preparation:
None.
I/ Opening
Take attendance.
Light chalice with these words and the associated hand motions: “We light this chalice to celebrate Unitarian Universalism: the church of the open mind, the helping hands, and the loving heart.”
Check-in: Go around circle. Each child and adult says their name, and then may say one good thing and one bad thing that has happened in the past week (anyone may pass).
II/ Read the story “The Blue Jackal”
See above.
III/ Acting out the story
As you’ve done before, we’ll help the children internalize the story by acting it out. Remember: some of the children may be familiar with how to act out a story, but others won’t be. But this is a simple story to act out.
Ask: “Who are the characters in this story?” In this story, the main character is Fierce-Howl. Then there is a pack of dogs in the city who sanp at Fierce-Howl. Once Fierce-Howl turns blue, there are miscellaneous animals over whom he becomes king; and there is also a pack of jackals who live nearby. So there is a role for everyone!
Determine where the stage area will be. If there are any children who really don’t want to act, they can be part of the audience with the lead teacher; you will sit facing the stage.
The lead teacher reads the story, prompting actors as needed to act out their parts. Actors do not have to repeat dialogue, although some of them may want to do so.
Since this is such a simple story, you may want to act it out twice, with different person playing the part of Fierce-Howl each time.
Fill the bulletin board in your classroom! It would be great to take photos, print them out later, and post them on the bulletin board in your classroom.
IV/ Conversation about the story
Sit back down in a group. Now ask some general questions: “What was the best part of the story? Who was your favorite character? Who was your least favorite character?” — or questions you come up with on your own.
One of the key elements in the story is that the animals can talk with each other. Ask the children if they think animals can talk with one another (one answer might be that perhaps they can, but they don’t use the kind of human language that’s in the story!).
Then you can ask the usual question for this curriculum — is this story true, or not? Ask the children: “Is this story really true, or is it more like a fairy tale?” Most of them will say this story is more like a fairy tale. “If this story is more like a fairy tale, does it have a moral?” The children should figure out pretty quickly that the moral of the story is something like — Don’t try to be something that you’re not.
This could lead to an interesting conversation. What does it mean, Don’t try to be something that you’re not? Obviously a jackal should not try to pretend that it is some kind of mystery beast or animal. But the children may also pick up on an undercurrent in the story — that each person should stick to the social level into which they are born; in other words, jackals are not respectable members of society, and they can never hope to be a king. Notice that this contradicts the American dream that “anyone can grow up to be president.” You can ask the children — Do you agree, can anyone grow up to be president (or can any animal grow up to be king of the animals)? Adult leaders take not: there is no one correct answer to this question!
V/ Drawing, coloring, and/or free play
With the time that remains, you can have the children draw pictures to illustrate the story. How did the jackal look after it fell into the blue dye? How did the other animals react when they realized that strnage blue creature was actually just a jackal? — or anything else they may choose to draw.
For younger groups, here’s a PDF of a jackal coloring page.
Or have some free play time. Free play can help the class meet the first educational goal, having fun and building community. Ideas for free play: free drawing; “Duck, Duck, Goose”; play with Legos; etc.
VI/ Closing circle
Before leaving, have the children stand in a circle.
When the children are in a circle, ask them what they did today, and prompt them with questions and answers, e.g.: “What did we do today? We heard a story, right? Anyone remember what the story was about? It was about Guru Nanak, right?” You’re not trying to put any one child on the spot, but rather drawing on the wisdom of the group as a whole. If any parents have come to pick up their children, invite them to join the circle (so they can know what it is their children learned about this week).
Say the closing words together — either these words, or others you choose:
Then tell the children how you enjoyed seeing them (if that’s true), and that you look forward to seeing them again next week.
LEADER RESOURCES AND BACKGROUND
Source: Arthur W. Ryder, The Panchatantra of Vishnu Sharma: English Translation (Univ. of Chicago, 1925), pp. 122-124 (available on Archive.org).
The Panchatantra is a collection of wisdom tales. Variants of these tales can be found in throughout India and into Europe.