The Sloth in the Tree: Week 2 Story
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Have you ever wondered where sloths come from.........
Have you ever wondered where sloths come from.........
Ring! Ring! Ring! The bells of Woodland Hills Elementary sounded! All the teachers are aligned in the hallways waiting to meet their new students. I happen to be one of those teachers. I go by Mrs.Pointer. This year I am teaching 4th grade. I hope this year goes a little more smooth than last year. The kids were very unruly. They simply did not listen. I opened the door to the classroom and the kids took their seats. It is always funny to see them trying to sit next to their friends. The class suddenly became really loud and I tried to quite them down but it was not working. In my mind I thought to myself, can I have a peaceful year of work? Then suddenly the little wiseman appeared. He said,"I hear your wish. Would you like me to grant your request? How about a landscaper? Plants are not unruly." I was excited to become a professional landscaper. Plants do not disrespect you.
I found peace in planting flowers. As a kid I always loved to garden with my grandmother. Every season we would have a new set of flowers to plant. I began to start on a new landscape project and I became very thirsty. I looked in the truck for water and there was none. I figured I could tough it out and wait until I was finished with the project. While I was planting, I thought to myself, I never had this problem as a teacher. Can I be a fish and live in water? I will never go thirsty then. The little wiseman appeared on a flower pedal. He said, " I hear you wish to be a fish in the sea. A fish, you will be!
Instantly, I became a fish. I looked behind me and there was the biggest shark I had ever seen behind me. I did not think about fish being a sharks best meal. I began to swim as fast as I could and I screamed, "Wiseman! Wiseman! Where are you? I want to live in peace and no fear! Please save me" The wiseman said, "What might you want to be?" "Anything! I can be sloth! It doesn't matter!" I replied.
Where did my scales go? I have fur! Wait, I have fur? Woooaahh, I am a Slooottthhhhh. This is not bad at all. This is peaceful and my home is a tree. I can hang here with no cares in the world. However, this is a little boring. I thought to myself, I need some excitement in my life. Can I be ..... No! No! No! The little Wiseman interrupted my thought and said, "I don't want to hear it!" You wished to be many things and you will remain a sloth in a tree!
Author's note: This story is remade from Origin Stories: The Moon. The man in the moon story specifically. I thought this story was greatly written. I kept the plot the same. I changed the character's and had the teacher turn into a sloth. In the original story he started out as a blacksmith and then turned into the moon. The wiseman granted all of his request. Similar to the way the wiseman granted the requests of the teacher in my story. The teacher ultimately turned into sloth.
"The Man in the Moon" from Laos Folk-Lore by Katherine Neville Fleeson. Origin Stories: The Moon
I really enjoyed reading your take on the story we read this past week. This is a retelling that I would never even have thought about but it works really well and hits a lot closer to home than the original because it tells us a story of people, jobs and creatures that we are very familiar with. I'm looking forward to reading more of your stories this semester!
ReplyDelete- Anna Margret
Hello Taylor, I really enjoyed reading your story that you created. I actually also used the Man in the Man to make a story for my blog so it was nice to see different spins off the same story. I really enjoyed your more modern approach on the story and was better to understand than the original. Also i enjoyed the Finding Nemo picture you put in the blog. Keep up the good work!
ReplyDeleteHey Taylor! I loved the way you told yours story! It was fun reading about how each animal transformed. I also loved all of the pictures that you added, it made the story that more fun! This was an easy and fun read. I also liked how it was a little similar to the original story and then I enjoyed how you were able to see the similarities and differences between the two. Nice job on retelling the story!
ReplyDeleteHey Taylor! The manor in which you kept the story clear and concise was one of my favorite parts. More often than not, when people try to adapt a fairy tail into another story they find it hard to trim the fat so that the story is still told just as smooth as the original. You did a great job with this, making the moral of the story strong and the characters organized. I wonder if it would have worked out as well if you went backwards with the story, rather than degrading the teacher to a sloth, she worked her way up from a sloth or some other organism. However, I am not sure how the moral would stay relevant. Perhaps if you were to give the teacher more of a backstory then you could manipulate the direction of the story to differ more from the original story! Overall, great job.
ReplyDeletehello Taylor! You did a really good job with the story and keeping my interest by keeping the subjects of the story relevant to things that I already know. the story kept a good flow when the character kept changing what they were doing. Now I wonder if could have gave the story more happy ending at the end. The story itself did not seem to be very sad until the end where the wise man just says you are now staying a sloth. You could change the ending from the origin story and make it to where they are stuck for a while and learn to appreciate what they have and the wise man change them back giving it a happy ending rather than a sad ending. I am not saying the ending is tragic because they do live but it is sad that they stay a sloth the rest of their days. it would be a plot change but sometimes those can be great when rewriting a story.
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