Week Thirteen: Storytelling

One day Henny Penny was minding her own business out in her yard gardening. Now, Henny Penny wasn't the brightest young hen in the village, but she had a good heart. While she was clucking to herself and planting new flowers for spring she felt something smack her in the head. She looked up towards the sky in amazement. Oh, no! She thought. The sky must be falling! Alarmed she immediately ran to go tell the King.

She ran so quickly she ran right into Cocky-locky. "Oh I'm sorry, Cocky-locky! I was just running to tell the King that the sky is falling," Henny Penny said. Cocky-locky became alarmed. "May I come with you?" he asked, "Of course!" Henny Penny replied. So the two of them set off to warn the King.

Not long after they set off they ran into Ducky-daddles. "Where are you doing so fast?" Ducky-daddles asked. "We are going to warn the King that the sky is falling!" replied Cocky-locky. "Oh, is it okay if I come with you as well? I would like to help," Ducky-daddles said. Cocky-locky and Henny Penny nodded and so Ducky-daddles followed them.

As they went along they ran into Turkey-lurkey. "Where are all of you going?" Turkey-lurkey asked. He was curious and bored. "We are going to tell the King that the sky is falling! Would you like to come with?" Ducky-daddles asked. "Why yes, I would love to!" Turkey-lurkey replied.

They went along and came upon Goosey-poosey. Goose-poosey asked them where they were going and asked to join. So together, Henny Penny, Cocky-locky, Ducky-daddles, Turkey-lurkey and Goosey-poosey set off to find the King.

Eventually they came upon Foxy-woxy. "Where is everyone going?" Foxy-loxy asked. "Well, we are going to find the King to tell him that the sky is falling," Henny Penny replied. Seeing his chance, Foxy-loxy created a plan to trick them all.

"But this is the wrong way to the King!" Foxy-loxy exclaimed, "Here, let me show you a shortcut." Foxy-loxy started in the direction of his cave. It was dark and narrow, with only room for one animal at a time to enter. "I will go first and then you can follow one by one," Foxy-loxy said.
Henny Penny
Feeling suspicious, Turkey-lurkey thought for a moment. I hope this isn't a trap… Foxy-loxy is known to be a trickster. Then he had an idea. Using a rope he died his ankle to Ducky-daddles' then to Goose-poosey's then to Cocky-locky's and finally to Henny Penny's.

"This way," he whispered, "If Foxy-loxy tries to pull anything I can pull my ankle and you can pull me out. We are all in this together." Everyone else nodded as Turkey-lurkey ventured into the cave.

Just as they suspected, when Turkey-lurkey had gotten safely inside, Foxy-loxy tried to take a bite of him. Turkey-lurkey goobled loudly and the rest took his cue. Using their combined strength they pulled Turkey-lurkey out of the cave safely and ran away before Foxy-loxy could figure out what happened.

(Source by John D. Batten)

Author's Note. I kept most of this story the same as the original, except for the ending. In the original ending Foxy-loxy gets to eat all of the animals except Henny Penny. I didn't like that ending very much, so I thought I would have the animals be more resourceful and clever. The fox has tricked almost all the animals in the stories I read so I thought it would be better if the animals could get back at him.

Bibliography. Henny Penny in English Fairytales Unit by Joseph Jacobs (1890).

Week Thirteen: Essay

Tricksters and Fools

I noticed in this unit that many of the fools are foxes. Foxes are known for being sly, clever and tricksters. I think this is really apparent in this series of stories. For example in Johnny-Cake, a cake rolls (not sure how…) and outruns a series of characters. As he comes upon each character he brags about how he has outrun a father, mother, son, two well diggers, two ditch diggers and a bear. When Johnny Cake comes upon a fox he yells out his same taunt, saying he's outrun all these other people and the fox replies that he couldn't hear Johnny Cake properly. As Johnny Cake gets closer and closer, repeating his phrase, the fox finally eats him up.

(Source by John D. Batten)

In Henny-Penny, the hen, goose, duck, rooster and turkey are all tricked by the fox. They are all trying to see the king to warn him that the sky is falling. When the fox hears of their mission he promises to lead them to the king. He says that he has a shortcut through his cave. Each animal is tricked by the fox and killed, with only the hen surviving. I think both of these stories really tell a lot about how foxes are seen in many cultures. Known for being cunning and sly, in many stories I've read they trick and fool other characters.

In general, the tricksters use their tricks to eat other characters. The other characters, or the "fools" are easily convinced and gullible. They follow the fox's instruction and influence quickly, making it almost too easy for the fox to trick them. You'd think that after all these stories the animals might learn from their mistakes!

Bibliography. English Fairytales Unit by Joseph Jacobs with illustrations by John D. Batten (1890).

Week Thirteen: Reading Diary

Part A: I read English Fairytale Units (1) this week. I enjoyed it and found the stories interesting. One in Part A that was particularly interesting was Mouse and Mouser. In the story, a cat and a mouse share a dialogue about how the mouse finds a silver sixpence and uses it to go to the market and buy a pudding (which is actually meat). In the story the mouse leaves the pudding in the window to cool and in the end the cat pounces on the mouse to eat him. I thought it was really interesting because of the writing style it was written in. It's a lot like a rhyme they chant back and force, reusing the term "good body, good body." It really gave a different style and overall feel to the story.

Part B: I really enjoyed reading Henny Penny in this section. The story is about a bunch of animals (with goofy names) that all go to tell the king that the sky is falling. A hen, rooster, turkey, goose and duck all fall trap to the fox, who convinces them that there is a shortcut to the king through his cave. When the rooster, turkey, goose and duck enter he quickly kills them. The hen escapes only because the rooster calls out after only being injured but not killed. I vaguely remember reading this story as a child.

Week Twelve: Storytelling

Tom had always lived in his brother's shadow. Being the second born cat to a king and queen cat, Tom was always compared to his brother Tim. Tim was the older, bigger cat. He was in line to become king soon and everyone loved him. First in school, athletic and popular, Tim was the perfect child. Their parents fawned over Tim, destined to take the cat crown and carry on their father's legacy.

Tommy on the other hand was the opposite. Not a bad cat, but not as perfectly rounded as Tim. Tom loved his brother, obviously, but was secretly very jealous of all his status and position. When their father died, Tim became King of all the Cats. And Tom was still nothing. Bitter and jealous, Tom ran away a week later. He found a nice home in the woods and a older couple to take care of him. He caught mice in their barn and napped on their rug by the fire. At his nice home he was no longer "Tim's kid brother," here he was a beloved part of the family.

He spent many years with the older couple. During this time he never went back to his home or checked on his family members. Sometimes he'd hear some news: Tim got married, visited a neighboring cat society, blah blah. Tom never told any cats he met that he was Tim's brother. He didn't want to be in Tim's shadow any more.

One day, as Tom was falling asleep on the warm rug after having a delicious can of Fancy Feast and a dish of milk, his owner barged in. He was sweaty like he had just gone for a run and was frantically yelling Tom's name. Why is he calling for me? Tommy wondered. He doesn't know my real name.

The older woman calmed her husband and asked him what in the world was going on. As Tommy's master retold the story, Tommy was in shock. Apparently, his master was at a graveyard and had witnessed a traditional cat death processional. Nine black cats with white spots on their chests, like Tommy, were carrying a cat coffin to a new grave. They came and stared at the old man and then one stepped forward and told him to tell Tommy that Tim is dead.

By the time his master had gotten through the story, Tommy knew what it meant. He kept meowing as he got more and more excited. Tim had gotten married but he had never had kittens. That meant that Tommy was now the King of the Cats! He could barely believe it! He meowed loudly and then rushed out the door, never looking back.

Author's Note. This story is based off of The King o' The Cats. I kept most of the original plot line and the same story theme. The only thing I changed was the point of view. The original was told from a third person point of view, focusing on the human couple. The husband walks in and retells the story and when he finishes their cat, Tommy, runs away saying he will be king. I took that idea but told the story from the cat's point of view. I thought it would make an interesting twist.

Bibliography. The King o' The Cats by John D. Batten (1894) English Fairytales Unit (2). Picture Source.

Week Twelve: Essay

First Memories of Writing

I remember when I started first grade and started to learn cursive, we always used "inventive spelling." This meant that if we didn't know how to spell something we had to write it the way we thought it should be spelled first. It taught us to sound out the word and piece together words based on our previous knowledge. Of course, I didn't always get it right. What I found most frustrating at the time was that fact that I didn't get an eraser on the end of my pencil. We had creative writing portion of school and we always had to use our "inventive spelling" without any erasers. I remember being frustrated by this and that I couldn't change what I wrote down after I wrote it. They wanted us to mark it out but still be able to draw on our changes if we wanted. I understand the idea, but when I was in second grade I didn't like the way it looked on my paper. I couldn't understand why I couldn't just erase my mistakes and re write them.

Even before that, I remember we used to retell what we learned and other stories to a teacher who would write down our ideas for us. We got to do the drawings, but the writing was physically done by someone else. That was when I was really small, maybe in kindergarden. As I moved up, we wrote down our own stories. I've read some of them and it's pretty funny to see the way I wrote and the way I spelled when I was younger.

When we learned cursive we had an outline to follow that showed us where all the letters were supposed to go, like the image below. For a long time I just had to write in cursive and even today many of my letters are still connected and curly like cursive is. I actually enjoyed cursive once I got the hang of it. It was a little difficult, but I liked it when I learned. These are my first memories of writing.

(Source)

Week Twelve

Part A: I read the More English Fairytales unit. I really enjoyed the stories, they were sometimes silly and sometimes serious, but had interesting plot lines. I didn't really recognize any of them from my childhood either. I vaguely know of Pied Piper, but I didn't remember what exactly happened. In the  unit story The Pied Piper, a town is filled with rats and a man with a pipe comes and says if he gets paid he will get rid of all of the rats. For fifty pounds, he plays his pipe and leads all the rats into the ocean where they drown. The mayor then refuses to pay and he plays his pipe again, this time enticing the children. From my understanding, I think the children followed the Pied Piper into the woods and they were never seen again. A pretty sad ending. In the first part, I also thought The Three Wishes was interesting. A man goes into the forest to cut down a tree and a fairy pleads that he spare the tree. Because he listened, she granted him three wishes. In the end he wishes for black pudding, his wife wishes the pudding was on his nose (not sure why) and then he finally wishes for the pudding to get off his nose. In the end, they stayed just as they were with the exception of some nice pudding.

Part B: I really enjoyed reading The King o' the Cats. The story was about a man who comes home to his cat and his wife and tells the strange events he encountered that evening. He said he witnessed a cat death processional. He said that the cats spoke to him and told him to find his cat and tell him that Tim Toldrum had died. His cat, apparently Tom Toldrum, said he was the King of the Cats and scurried off.

Week Eleven: Storytelling

Amanda was 17 and bored. It was the summer after her junior year in high school and while all her friends were camp counselors or snow cone operators she had no job and no plans. Her parents spent their days at work and she sat by the pool in the backyard imagining her day away. All she wanted was some excitement and adventure. She wanted something different and new.

One day, after hours by herself, she thought she was half dreaming when she thought she saw a cat scamper across her yard. Now this was no ordinary cat. He looked like he was wearing a long yellow coat, complete with gold buttons and a red collar. He was hurrying through the yard, his tail moving high above grass. Squinting and looking closely at him, Amanda swore that she saw him check a pocket watch from his coat. But in a flash he disappeared through a hole in the ground and he was gone.

Curious, Amanda stood up and inspected where the cat had disappeared. She bent over and stuck her head near the hole in the ground, peering into the darkness. Then she fell over, tumbling into the hole and into a large tunnel that seemed to never end. It was dark and long and Amanda fell further and further. She wondered where in the world she was going and how she got there. There is a tunnel beneath my backyard? Maybe it's sewage? Oh that would be gross… She thought to herself as the tunnel kept going.

Finally she fell with a heavy thump on the ground of a dark room. Around her were several doors of all shapes, sizes and colors. She stood up, brushed herself off and tried all the doors. To her disappointment they were all locked. Even more confused, she looked again to the center of the room only to see a glass table (which she was sure hadn't been there before). She carefully walked to the table and found a large golden key. She excitedly tried the key on every door in the room but found it didn't fit any of the key holes. Hmmm… She thought. How interesting. Then she noticed a curtain near one of the doors and beneath it another door, much smaller than the rest.

The door was blue and about a foot and a half high. Bending over she found that the key fit into the door perfectly. She slowly opened the door and inside it, to her delight, was a beautiful garden. Full of flowers, mushrooms, green grass and clear blue sky, she tried desperately to get through the door. But it was too small. She couldn't fit herself no matter how hard she tried.

She turned again to the room and this time noticed a small bottle on the glass table (that was definitely not there before). After drinking the contents she felt herself shrink impossibly small. She looked up to see the now giant glass table above her and realized that the golden key to the small door was still sitting on the table while she sat on the ground.

(Disney Alice in Wonderland Clipart page 1 - Disney Clipart Galore (clipped to polyvore.com))

She began to cry, but after she started again she noticed a small box with a piece of cake inside. With a sign that read, "eat me," she ate the cake and found herself grow taller and taller with every moment. Soon she was nearly nine feet tall and she towered above the glass table. This time she picked up the golden key and returned to the small door, determined to get through this time.

However, now that she was tall she still couldn't get through the door. Sitting down she began to cry again. Her tears, now giant because of her size, filled the room and pooled like a pond in the room. As it filled the water carried her, and her sadness, through the tiny door and into the beautiful garden.

Author's Note. This is based off of Down the Rabbit-Hole from the Alice in Wonderland unit. I changed the characters to a more modern setting, but kept the original plot almost exactly the same. I thought it might be more realistic for her to see a cat in her backyard and liked the idea of it being some high schooler that is bored during the summer (because I know I used to be). The tunnel, the rooms and everything else that happens follows pretty much the original story.

Bibliography. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland unit by Lewis Carroll (1865).