On January 20th, 2015 a great
tragedy struck in the northern England province of Yorkshire. The unexpected death of
Tortoise Thomas, a quit yet gentle animal, was witnessed by two of his closest
duck friends. Darla and Danny Duck noticed that Thomas was feeling quite sad
about missing a large party and decided to cheer him up. Thomas has was not able to make the great wedding event of the year because he was sick at home. Jupiter's wedding was the event of a lifetime, and the whole village was invited to celebrate on June 4, 2014. According to the wedding planner, 300 residents of Yorkshire were in attendance.
Ducks and Turtles
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"He was down in the dumps after missing the
great Jupiter's wedding when he came down with a cold," said Darla.
The two ducks decided to take Thomas to visit his family, who made their home on the South Embankment of the River Thames in London. Thomas's sister and brother lived there with their families. Thomas has reportedly not visited since the summer of the great rain in 2000. The two ducks carried Thomas by holding a sturdy branch between their two bills and Thomas clasping it in his mouth in the center. Darla and Danny explained the danger this action may have, but decided the risks outweighed the benefits.
"We told Thomas to be careful and not speak, as this action would cause him to let go of the branch," said Danny.
It was a rather long journey and Thomas was awestruck by the beauty of the countryside, according to Darla and Danny Duck. The wonderment overcame Thomas and as he went to comment on the beauty, his grip from the branch slipped and he plummeted to the earth. Darla and Danny raced down towards him, trying to outrun gravity, but could not catch up. As soon as they had noticed what had happened, Thomas was dead.
"We could hardly believe it. We just wanted to show Thomas a good time, and cheer him up," said Danny.
Detective Investigator Bradley Badger was on the scene moments after the incident. He ruled the death an accident, with no fault given to Darla and Danny Duck, according to police reports. Legislative action may be taken by Major Mark Mole, in the form of a law to increase public transportation for all animals across the Yorkshire province.
"In order to keep all of our neighbors safe,
we must take precautionary action to make sure a tragic incident like this
never happens again," said the Major during a press conference the day of
the accident.
Thomas was known for being a shy and quiet tortoise, but always kind and grateful to others. He also enjoyed carrying small animal children, like ducklings, baby mice and raccoons on his back during the summer. He was beloved by all in the village and often noted for his beautiful deep operatic voice. He sang in many village musicals and could be heard singing while cleaning his home or bathing in the sun.
Thomas is survived by his wife, Tiffany and their two children Tina and Thomas Jr.
Author's Note: This is a story about The Tortoise and the Ducks, in which a
tortoise regret not going to a wedding. When he is given the opportunity to see
the world, two ducks offer him a ride above the clouds
that ultimately ends in his demise. The story end on a sad note, so
I initially wanted to make the story more interesting a give the
characters a little more backstory that originally detailed in
the fairy tale. I think re-writing stories in a newspaper-like way makes
it very interesting and fun. You can bring in a lot of elements that were not
in the original story and create backstories for characters.
Also, the style of writing is so different from classic
fairy tales. I believe this really changes the way one may look at a
series of events. The newspaper article style also allows me to create a
sequence of events, a time line in a way, that helps give a greater meaning to
elements that I feel may have been left out in the original story. I
really enjoyed writing this in the news article style, especially
because I was able to incorporate other animals into the storyline.
Bibliography: The Tortoise and the Ducks from Aesop for Children (Winter) by Aesop and illustrations by Milo Winter.
Image
information (Ducks and Turtles, Source Nahant
Marsh Gallery)
Tortoise and Duck
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Hey, Colleen! I really liked your storytelling post. To start off, the title of the story definitely grabbed my attention. Also, from the first sentence onward, the point of view was very informative and greatly resembled a newscast. Also, the setting was very clear and was easily incorporated via the newscast which made it not awkward but adding even more so to how the story was presented. The picture was also great. I like how you decided to incorporate it towards the front so throughout the story I could imagine the animals from the story. I wish the author’s note elaborated a little bit more about the story you wrote rather than mainly talking about the story you derived it from but other than that, it was a really good story. I also found a punctuation error (the quotation marks had a period written outside of them and the sentence continued as well). Other than those two things, I was very impressed by the story. Keep up the good work!
ReplyDeleteGreat story, Colleen! I loved the way you wrote this story as if it were a newspaper article. You did a great job making these animal characters come to life. I'm a little sad for the tortoise...and I'm not totally buying that the duck's actions were an accident, but I'll wait to hear the final verdict of Detective Banger. Thanks for the good read!
ReplyDeleteColleen! Hello friend. In your story, you gave a few great descriptions that helped the reader fully understand the situation. For example, “trying to out run gravity,” gave the simple sentence more of an artistic expression.
ReplyDeleteThe last sentence made me laugh because of the traditional news writing style of the phrase. By adding it into the animated story, it surprised the reader and gave your story a bit of humor.
A suggestion for your story would be to more fully develop your characters. While the charters were just a couple of animals, you could more deeply describe their appearance or emotions to make the story more complete and compelling. The second to last paragraph did a good job at describing Thomas. You took a few sentences to really tell the reader more helpful information about Thomas’ personality.
When you talked about the legislative action I had a hard time following the sentence, so maybe try working on the wording of sentences with more complex ideas or words. Great job though!
Hello Colleen! First of all, great job! I really enjoyed reading your story; the idea of writing this like a news article or obituary was really creative. I like how you incorporated minor dialogue to the post to make it seem as though the ducks were interviewed before the news story was published. I also really liked how you included that there was an "investigation", and the details at the end of the story that describe what type of person the tortoise was makes the story come a little more to life. Such a creative idea! Awesome job!
ReplyDeleteHello Colleen. I have read the original and I think that your method of retelling this story was unique. I have never thought of retelling a story as what seems to be an almost newpaper type of article. This was a very good approach. Part of retelling stories is being able to put a unique spin on them so that they are able to reach people that would not normally read them, so you method works great. There were a few errors in spelling and what not that could be cleaned up in no time with a quick proofreading, and the errors did not take away from the experience of the story. overall this is a very creative retelling.
ReplyDeleteI chose you for my project commenting this week.
ReplyDeleteFormat:
I really like the format of your picture it is really nice! I like that it resembles a Polaroid.
I like that you did something new by putting the labels and other Gadgets on the other side, but it distracted me from your actual story. Since we read right to left I find my eyes being attracted first to the labels and then the story. It also didn't help that it is really wide. This is just something to consider.
The words in your story are highlighted with white in the background. This is also a bit distracting, but to fix that all you have to do when you paste something into the blogger just select “paste as plain text” INSTEAD of just “paste.” Also, before you “Publish” your blog post it might be useful to “preview” it, that way you know if you have any formatting issues.
The spacing is also a little too far apart for easily reading.
I really do like the pink with the black and red letters.
Colleen, I was very impressed with your story. I actually read the original story as well. It is in more than one unit, all told practically the same, but little details are different. I enjoyed how much thought and imagination went into making this story. You definitely made the story more exciting by having more characters, and by the characters having actual names instead of just the tortoise and the ducks. By the characters having names, you were able to make the story seem like it really happened. You also did a good job in the first paragraph catching the reader’s attention. You start your story off strong with the fact that there was a tragedy. However, you do not state what happened right away. Therefore, it made me want to keep reading. Great job!
ReplyDeleteA few typos that I noticed were,
In the first paragraph, “witness” should be “witnessed”.
In the last paragraph, “know” should be “known”.
These fixes will help the flow of the story.
Hi Colleen, I enjoyed reading your story about the tragic death of Thomas the tortoise. I think you did a great job giving background information to set up the plot and let the readers know exactly why Thomas was so upset to begin with. I did notice a couple spelling errors and punctuation errors, but it was good for the most part. And in the end of the third paragraph, I think you meant to say, “the benefits outweigh the risks” instead of “the risks outweigh the benefits”. It also may be helpful to clarify that the ducks were flying through the air as the Thomas was holding onto the branch. I think you did a great job building the story, though. I like the additional information that you added towards the end, such as the police investigation, the press conference, and the obituary style information about Thomas’s surviving family.
ReplyDeleteHi Colleen! Great story. I read this original but your changes were great. I love the approach you took to write it like a newspaper. The obituary aspect was a cool way to explain what happened to the tortoise and to give him human characteristics. I always like when people change stories to give the characters more back story. I also think there is an underlying moral in this story. A moral to be thankful for opportunities and to sometimes take them and not try to control the situation. The tortoise could have been more thankful for what the ducks were doing for him but yet again he opened his big mouth and we all know what happened after that. A few layout things is I would say to use the same font and text size throughout, your author’s note is a lot larger than the body. I would also include your image choice before the author’s note instead of after. It gets lost at the end. Besides that I think your newspaper style portfolio will be great!
ReplyDeleteThis was such a unique way to retell this story, Colleen! At first I thought I recognized this as one of the Indian fairy tales, but they must just be two similar versions from different regions. I have not seen a retelling done in this newspaper article fashion and I think it was an excellent choice! It let you do what you wanted to do with the story (give it some more background, personal information) and it was really different from all the other retellings I have previously read. You also did a great job at making the character of Tortoise Thomas relatable. I personally feel sad for Thomas' passing. I really liked the "legislative action" taken my Major Mark Mole. That seems like something ripped right out of the headlines, not only the situation but also the way in which it was handled politically, by the media, and by the public. Overall, you did a really awesome job on this story!
ReplyDeleteColleen, I think you did a great job with this story. I loved the changes you made and how you wrote it in a newspaper style. I loved the original story, but I thought you did a great job with this adaptation.
ReplyDeleteHere are just a few things that I noticed: "...a quit yet gentle animal..." I think you mean quiet. "Thomas has was not able..." I think you can take out has. "Darla and Danny explained the danger this action may have, but decided the risks outweighed the benefits." Wouldn't it be that the benefits outweighed the risks since they went through with it? "...being a shy and quite tortoise" I think you mean quiet rather than quite.
Overall, I love your creative idea in writing this story. I like that you brought in a backstory for why the Tortoise was needing to get from one place to another, and you explained more of who the Tortoise was. I thought this story was interesting and kept me intrigued to the end. Great job!
Hey Colleen!
ReplyDeleteAt first when I was reading the story I kept wondering who they were talking to. I love how later on in the story you find out that they're talking to a detective. That's a brilliant way to write the story!
I read the original story as well, and I would have never thought to write another story about it like this. I love that it's written like a news article! You really did do a fantastic job with this story. Also, I like the intimate-ness of the news-style story.
One thing I did notice is that in the first paragraph, second sentence, you wrote quit, when I think you meant to type quiet.
I also like that you have two different pictures for this story. I like that the pictures are of different parts of the story. It really helps with the visualization aspect of the story.
Great job!
Hey, Colleen! I truly enjoyed reading your story! The method of storytelling you employ here, a kind of news report or newspaper article with dialogue, details, and basic summary, all works together to create an amazing tale. Your creativity is boundless, haha.
ReplyDeleteHowever, there were a couple of small errors that I picked up on throughout your story. In your introductory paragraph, you say that Tortoise Thomas is a “quit yet gentle animal,” rather than a quiet yet gentle animal. Then in the paragraph where Thomas dies, you say that the ducks try to save Thomas and then contradict that statement by stating that “as soon as they had noticed,” their friend was dead. A simple change in wording should fix that contradiction. When Danny speaks after this event, there should be no comma before “and cheer him up,” and again there should be no comma before “according to police reports.”
Overall, though, I truly enjoyed your story and the style in which you told it. Fantastic work!
Alright, my initial thought reading this was that I liked your format! I am an avid news reader and find myself opening up my news apps multiple times each day, so writing your story as a news bulletin really appealed to me. One quick note, in your second sentence you misspelled "quiet" so you might want to give that a quick fix. I liked your story and felt like you created a connection with the reader and the tortoise. Your story reminded me of a book we use in grief groups for children ages 3-7 called "Danny the Duck." It tells the story of a duck who is hit by a boat and his friends (a turtle being one of them) have to learn to accept and understand that Danny is gone. We use it to explain death to the little ones in an age-appropriate way. Anyway, enough of that. Your story was a nice read and I thought you did a great job with it.
ReplyDelete