Our collaborative writing project with five other classes, The Tale Trail, continues right here!
Several weeks ago, the classes voted on a topic for the story. The topic with the most votes was “An underground tunnel is found below the school. It takes you to…”
Classes have been taking turns adding to the story. So far, Mr. Salsich’s class, Mrs. Yollis’ class, and B4 have written their parts of the story.
As they were about to eat the cotton candy, they heard muffled noises that sounded close by. “Max, what was that?” Tiffany exclaimed.“I don’t know. Let’s go investigate,” Max replied. As Tiffany was about to say, “No, I don’t think we should,” Max was already walking towards the noise. When Max took his first step, the stone beneath his foot slowly began to sink into the ground. The dust and dirt around the stone began to retreat towards the newly formed hole.“Max, what did you do?” Tiffany yelled! Suddenly, the whole ground started to violently shake. The torches on the walls began to flicker as the flames danced between life and death. From the corner of her eye, Tiffany saw a rock suddenly starting to move on the wall. “Max, what is going on? I don’t like this at all. Let’s get out of here!”“We can’t leave Tiffany. Don’t you remember that the secret door closed behind us. The only way for us to get out of here is to keep moving forward. We need to go see what that is.”By this point, the rock had completely rotated out of the way, revealing a small, wooden chest. As Max inched forward towards it, Tiffany shoved him out of the way. “Fine, if this is what we have to do, let’s just get it over with.” She reached forward, lifting the cover. The insides of the chest were covered with ruby red felt. Sitting in the center of the chest was what looked like a piece of paper. She picked it up gently. “What does it say?” Max asked excitedly.
Tiffany started, “Umm…it says…
“That’s it,” Tiffany said. “The rest of it is ripped off. There’s no name. I’m not sure that I trust this at all. I don’t like this one bit.”
Max glanced over at the chest. “There are the two buttons that the note talked about. You heard what it said. We need to hit the red one.”
Tiffany responded, “I don’t like that idea. There’s no name. We have no idea who wrote this note. And look at the date. It was written on April Fools’ Day! For all we know, they could be trying to trick us! Besides, the red button is always the bad one!”
Before Max could say another word, Tiffany was pushing in the green button. The floor opened beneath her feet and Tiffany disappeared into the darkness. The floor suddenly closed back up showing no signs that there was ever a trapdoor there.
“Nooo! Tiffany, where’d you go?” Max yelled. There was no response.
Max couldn’t believe what he had just seen. His friend was suddenly gone. He had no idea where she was. While the rest of the students were probably sitting in class learning about multiplication, here he was under the school with no idea where Tiffany had gone. He wanted to find her so badly but he couldn’t take the chance of what could happen to him if he hit the green button too. He knew he had to follow the note and hit the red button. “Here goes nothing” Max thought to himself. He closed his eyes and reached out for the red button. As his hand reached it, it felt cold. He could feel it pushing in as he applied more pressure to it. As he finally pressed it in as far is it could go, he heard a noise coming from near where the floor opened and swallowed Tiffany. “Oh no,” Max thought as he prepared himself for a fall. However, his feet were still on solid ground. He opened his eyes to find that a new door had opened in the floor showing a solid stone staircase.
Max knew he had to push forward. He began to descend down the spiral staircase. Every step he took was illuminated by the torches on the walls. He suddenly came to a halt. That same muffled noise that he heard earlier with Tiffany was now audible again. For the first time, Max could feel chills running up and down his spine. The hairs on the back of his neck were standing on end. He was brave before when he had Tiffany with him. Now he was all alone. He didn’t want to continue anymore, but he had to find Tiffany.
He continued on, this time much more slowly and more cautiously. When he reached the bottom of the stairs, he encountered a door. It was old and wooden. Spiders crawled through their webs in the corners of the door. One dropped from a single thread down towards the ground. In the center of the door was a faded rectangle, with a slightly different color than the rest of the door. It looked like there had once been something there. Suddenly, Max felt something on his leg. He looked down to see a spider crawling up it. He shook his leg and the spider flew off and landed on something golden. Max noticed that whatever was laying there was the same size as the faded mark on the door. He carefully reached around the spider to pick it up. It turned out it was a nameplate. Max dusted it off and he could see the name Dr. Drakken sprawled across it. As he reached for the rusty, brass doorknob, he quietly said to himself, “let’s hope Tiffany’s in there.”
Max had to shield his eyes as he had to try to adjust to the sudden bright light of this new room. All he could smell around him was an awful concoction of must, moth balls, sulfur and gasoline. As his eyes began to adjust to the light, the room began to come into focus. He could see machinery all around him, including one giant piece of equipment in the center of the room. There were cylinders, beakers, and test tubes of liquids of almost every color imaginable scattered throughout the room. As he continued looking around, that’s when he heard it, the muffled cries that he had heard earlier. This time it was even louder though. Max moved towards the sound. He rounded the machine in the middle of the room. That’s when he saw her! Tiffany was there except she was tied up in a chair back-to-back with a man Max had never seen before. He was mostly bald with only tufts of fluffy white hair coming off the sides of his head. He wore a dirty, tattered lab coat that made him look like he had been down here for years.
Max ran over to untie Tiffany. He pulled the tape off of her mouth. “Max, I’m so glad you found me! Benjamin Franklin grabbed me and brought me in here when I fell through the floor.” He finished untying her. She stood and stretched out her legs.
“Who is that?” Max asked Tiffany.
“I have no idea. He was in here when I was brought in. Do you think we should untie him?” Tiffany replied.
“Let’s just take the tape off and see what he has to say,” Max answered.
As Max slowly peeled the tape away from the man’s mouth, he spoke. “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you! I’ve been tied up down here for so long.”
“Who are you?” Tiffany asked.
“I’m Dr. Drakken. I’ve been working down here for decades perfecting my time machine. I’ve been working with the different departments at the school. I wanted to bring back Benjamin Franklin to give a speech to a history class. I tried bringing back a prehistoric snake for a science class. I’ve tried bringing back so many different things. However, something went terribly wrong. My machine just doesn’t seem to be right as it’s changed them all in some way! Benjamin Franklin went from being the nicest man I’ve ever met and when I got him back here he was totally different. When the snake got back here it had two heads and could talk. I don’t know what I’ve done!”
“Can we help in any way?” Max asked.
“I wish you could,” Dr. Drakken replied. “I just need my special cotton candy I invented. I misplaced it and now have no idea where it is.”
Tiffany reached into her pocket and to her amazement, the small bag was still there. She pulled it out and asked, “You mean this?”
————————————————————————————————————
Dear Mr. Avery,
Thanks for telling me, I’ll probably go and retrieve my little animal over the summer. I’m also going to try to go to open house at the beginning of the year and see everyone again! Hopefully I’ll see you during the school year in 2013! Have a good summer 🙂
Sincerely,
Hannah
Dear Hannah K,
Welcome back to school! How was your summer I hope you had fun! Did you get your stuffed animal? i hope you like middle school! How was it? Well have fun!
Sincerely,
Ashley
Dear Mr. Avery,
I think the years have gone by too quick. I’m going to miss Dennett so much. I forgot to write down your address. Could you maybe tell me it? I watched the video you gave us over, and over again. I can’t stop crying ;(. Hopefully I will see you in the future!
Sincerely,
Hannah K.
(don’t forget me)
Dear Hannah,
You know that we could never forget you! It was a great year and I was extremely lucky to have been able to teach this class twice!
You’re going to have to come visit. You’ll be out of school early and with a younger brother and sister at Dennett, you’ll have plenty of chances to swing by. Also, you left behind the stuffed animal that you were having everyone sign so you’re going to have to come pick it up!
When you write me back, add your email or your parent’s email in the email section and I will send you my address.
Keep in touch and let me know how your summer is going and how everything is next year!
Sincerely,
Mr. Avery
Dear Mr. Avery,
I am so glad summer is finally here! Yesterday was a pretty emotional day. Everybody was crying! I am going to write you and Miss Girard a lot this summer so you can see what I’m doing! I am really excited for middle school. Especially because I am on team 71! Thank you for being such an awesome teacher, and I will visit you next year!
Your Student,
Emma 🙂
Dear Emma,
I hope you plan to write a lot this summer. You can send me messages on here any time to fill me in on what you’re doing.
We definitely had a great year. Friday was very emotional for all of us. It’s always tough to see a class moving on to a new school. I didn’t really experience that when I had you in 4th grade because I knew I’d see all of you the next year anyway!
Keep in touch!
Sincerely,
Mr. Avery
Dear Mr.Avery,
I knew I was missing my dog, I just couldn’t remember where I might have left it. I was also extremely lucky because I got you as a teacher twice!
Sometimes I’m sick of my siblings, but now they give me the chance to come back when they have you and Miss Girard as a teacher. My parents are also looking for a summer house in Sandwich. Don’t worry, they probably won’t get house near yours 🙂
Have a great summer!
Sincerely,
Hannah K.
Dear Hannah,
I know how it can be with siblings. I have three younger brothers so you can probably imagine that we didn’t always get along perfectly.
Hopefully you get something right near the beach! If you do, you’ll be able to head down towards the tidal pools and salt marshes again during low tide. Of course, you’ll just have to get your brother and sister to pick up all the crabs for you!
Sincerely,
Mr. Avery
Dear Mr. Avery,
It is getting very hard to read what you are writing because of how mant times I’ve commented and you’ve replied! I am sure my brother would be happy to pick up the crabs for me, he’s quite an interesting person. Anyways, I was wondering when I should go pick up my stuffed animal. I want to make sure you’re there so I can see you. Will you be there over the summer? Thanks for emailing your address!
Sincerely,
Hannah
Dear Hannah,
You’ll just have to start a new comment next time! I won’t be in the school this summer unfortunately. I believe that Mr. Veneto is in for a lot of the summer. He could probably get the stuffed animal for you. It’s in the closet in my room. Otherwise, I won’t be back in until the week before school starts so you’d have to wait until then.
Sincerely,
Mr. Avery
Awesome – well done to everyone who has been part of this project. How have your students benefitted from this do you think?
Dear Mr. Avery and class,
Having read each part of the story in turn, I’ve now reached your part 4. Mrs. McKenzie’s class left you with many possibilities so I had better read it to see what happens next.
Now this is a strange turn. A green or red button and a note warning Max and Tiffany not to trust others. The problem is, can you trust the writer of the note? I’ll read on.
Having seen Tiffany disappear after pressing the green button, Max was brave to select the red as the note had indicated. Will he find Tiffany? I’ll read on.
So, the red button led to a staircase but what about Tiffany? I can feel Max’s unease at being alone. With so many spiders around, I hope he isn’t an arachnophobe (person afraid of spiders).
Oh, a new character enters the story, Dr. Drakken and his lab. What sinister things are happening now? Tiffany is tied back-to-back with a stranger. I bet Tiffany now wishes she had gone back to class.
How strange, the cotton candy seems to be an important thing. Now I’ll have to go to Part 5 to see what they make of the story so far.
@RossMannell
Teacher, NSW, Australia
Dear Mr. Avery
Hi my name is Chelsea. I loved your story and also, how did you get your great ideas. Did you do it altogarther, or did you do it separatly. I could really visualise when Tiffany was going to eat the cotton candy. Bye
Chelsea
Dear Mr. Avery and class,
Wow! What extraordinary writing skills! I can tell you are high level writers.
My favorite part of your contribute to the terrific tail was when you mentioned that Ben Franklin was evil! Scary! I thought he was the nicest man under ground bedsides Max.
Your friend,
Royce
(Mrs. Yollis’ student)
Dear Mr Avery and class,
My name is Liv S and I am in Miss Jordan’s class this year. This is the second time I have had Miss Jordan as a teacher so I am very lucky. I recently just earnt my own blog. The address is http://livsblog.global2.vic.edu.au
Wow! I just loved this part of the Tale Trail, I look forward to see more. It was written so well. The part I could visualise the best was when Tiffany hit the ‘Green Button’.
Liv 🙂
Dear Liv S.,
Yeah, the green button part, I thought, was the best part described. like the part when
“There are the two buttons that the note talked about. You heard what it said. We need to hit the red one.”
Tiffany responded, “I don’t like that idea. There’s no name. We have no idea who wrote this note. And look at the date. It was written on April Fools’ Day! For all we know, they could be trying to trick us! Besides, the red button is always the bad one!”
And then, to be simplified, Tiffany falls through the floor. That part was pretty well described.
Anyway, thank you for commenting on the blog.
-Wesley K.
Hi Mr Avery
I’m from Year6rc and I just read that very, very, very long post but very, very, very creative post. I am a drawing freak and I loved all the drawings you did especially the second last one. They helped me paint a picture in my mind. I hope you have the most fun was your year ends. ( I have been told by my teacher that you start holidays next week)
Jess
Dear Jess,
Thanks for leaving a comment on the blog.
If you want to know, I drew the last picture, and yes, holidays start in a short
time.
– Wesley K.
Dear Mr. Avery and class,
We loved your new addition to the Tale Trail! It is fun to travel the trail!
Here are some quotes from the class:
“I loved how you explained how the snake and Ben Franklin became evil, I was not expecting that,” Sasha complimented!
“I liked how you made Dr. Drakken have a little tufts of hair,” replied Maya.
“I liked at the end where you put Ben Franklin, the two-headed snake, and the pink cotton candy back in the story,” Logan replied happily.
“Wow, what amazing pictures! My favorite one was the last one,” complemented Sammy.
“My favorite part was when Tiffany fell through the hole,” Alyssa said excitedly.
“I like how Dr. Drakken needed the cotton candy and Tiffany had it,” stated Jake thoughtfully.
We can’t wait to see what Mrs. Watson’s class does with the story! This has been so much fun!
Your writing buddies,
Mrs. Y♥llis’ students
Dear Mrs.Yollis’students,
Thanks for the great comment! We are so happy that you liked our part of the story! I agree that the pictures are great, but so are all the others! I’m sure that Mrs.Watson’s class will write a fantastic part!
Sincerely,
Will G.
Dear Mr. Avery,
I really like the part of the story that we a added. I really like how you used Andrew’s picture as part of the story. I really like how the story is coming to be. Keep up the great posts!
~ Your Student,
Frankie P.
Dear Frankie,
I liked Andrew’s picture too. The story, like you said, would not be as good without
this, or the other sections of the story.
– Wesley K.
Dear Mr. Avery,
WOW! What a great addition to the story. I really like this part. And what a long part, compared to the other parts. Not to say that the part isn’t as good.
– Wesley
Dear Wesley,
I totally agree that this is a great addition to the story so far. The other classes parts are great too. I can’t wait to see what the next class comes up with.
Sincerely,
Will G.