In the summer of 2010 I drove a school bus route for Spring Branch Elementary School in Independence, Missouri. Between the time I arrived in the morning and the time in which some of my students were to depart I had approximately 5 to 10 minutes with them on the bus.
I thought it would be fun to have them give me an idea for a story instead of me telling them short stories as I have recorded from the Chicken Festival. So I asked them the questions below along with what interests they had. I thought it might be fun to put together a story using as many, if not all, of the suggestions they gave.
As I knew I was going to record in video the story. I thought it better not to use the copyrighted names used on the cartoon program SpongeBob SquarePants, which are Barnacle Boy and Squidward in the story. Therefore I have changed the name to Squid for the bad guy and Barnyard for the popular kid in school.
Please note that this is not a fully refined and finished story as is “The Little Witch Doll”. But I had promised to have the story would be on my website by 1 August 2010 and I have made every effort to do so despite life getting in the way.
The following is the list of the things that the students on School Bus 116, which I drove, said that they would like to have in the story. Go through the list and listen to the story and see how many of the things I have included or what has not been included:
Foreign country: Mexico
Wild animal: tiger
Girls name: Lexie
US State: Mississippi
Boys name: Isaac.
Character trait: courage
Height: 4’6″
Age: fifth-grade
Favorite sport: baseball
Favorite food: cheeseburger.
School: Spring Branch Elementary School
Favorite Teacher: Ms. Richards.
Bully from TV: Squidward.
Good guy from TV: Barnacle Boy,
Favorite music: Hip-Hop
Best friend: Chris
