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Welcome to Stellar Stories, our magazine for kids and the adults who love them! This StoryMaker edition contains short stories written and illustrated by students in Toronto, inspired by their own lives and fuelled by their imaginations!

©2020 Story Planet Cover art by Sabrina Tu | www.breetwo.com Book design by mumblethief | www.mumblethief.com With thunderous third-planet thanks to the Ontario Trillium Foundation for their support! All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from Story Planet.

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Welcome to

For ten years, Story Planet has been wholeheartedly committed to helping kids write and share their stories. So when the pandemic hit, we pivoted to meet the extraordinary needs of students and teachers by taking our workshops online—and to be honest, this was not without its challenges! From students who lacked computers or stable Wi-Fi, to learning how to join breakout rooms and chat, to figuring out how long we could keep 10 kids engaged on-screen (55 minutes, give or take), it sometimes felt like we spent as much time troubleshooting as writing stories. But in the end, we did what we always do: we learned together, and imagined, and created. These pages are a celebration of the wonderful young authors we had the pleasure and honour of spending these months with. When we think of our best possible future, it is their voices and their stories we hear. Enjoy!

We have the honour of being guests on this land, the traditional lands and waters of the Petun and Wendat Peoples, the Anishinaabek and Haudenosaunee Confederacies, and most recently the Mississaugas of the Credit River, as well as many other Indigenous nations, some of whose names are no longer remembered. We acknowledge all who came before us and have travelled the lands and waters of this territory. By saying the names of its original keepers, we remember that this territory continues to be subject to the Dish with One Spoon Wampum Belt Covenant, an agreement between the Haudenosaunee Confederacy and Three Fires Confederacy of the Anishinaabeg to peaceably share and care for the resources around the Great Lakes. Today, the meeting place of Toronto is still the home to many Indigenous Peoples from across the continent, and we are grateful to work in the community on this territory. While reconciliation means different things to each community, let it compel all of us to move beyond words of acknowledgement. If it were a word in Anishinaabemowin, it would be a verb meaning to make right the wrongs, and in context, to commit to learning the history and responsibility in the genocide, displacement, and theft of land from the Indigenous nations across the land known as Canada, and to continuously decolonize colonial frameworks and roles that were imposed upon Indigenous nations. We remind ourselves of how urgently current this history is and that we all have a choice in how we participate in the treaty of this place.

Black Lives Matter. We understand that acts of racism and violence against the Black community are rampant and perpetuated through systemic oppression, which we have witnessed within our schools and communities. We also understand that systemic oppression is perpetuated through silence. Story Planet unequivocally advocates for justice and equity in all moments and situations in life. We are a team from diverse cultural backgrounds who knows that racism is not just rampant in the United States but here in Canada to a degree that is equally systemic and devastating. We stand in solidarity with the freedom fighters who demand for the conviction of all four officers who murdered George Floyd. We demand justice for Regis Korchinksi Paquet. We demand justice and dignity for all Black and Indigenous lives— both those that have been lost, and those that are still here, fighting to overturn these systems of white supremacy. We support the calls to dismantle and defund the criminal justice system, specifically police and prison institutions, as it currently stands. We also support the redistribution of police funds to community organizations who are working in health, education, and legal services, to eliminate deep societal inequities. Story Planet believes in action, and we are committed to doing the following individually, and as an organization: •

To stand up to and confront acts of racism both explicit and subconscious by committing to speaking out

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To continue helping children tell and share their stories

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To continue prioritizing our work in neighbourhoods that are most vulnerable to these inequities To help children see the value of themselves and their lived experiences

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To continue conversations and to share resources internally that allow us to; support those in pain, confront our own privilege and biases, educate ourselves on racism and white supremacy, and use these reflections to inform all of our work with young people.

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To work with partners to amplify the voices of young people, and work to dismantle systems of oppression.

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To better prepare ourselves with words and concrete actions to respond to acts of racism and inequity we see in the schools and in the stories we read and tell

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To investigate how to combat systemic inequality in the education system and advocate for deep changes

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To reflect on the story structures children are taught that implicitly and explicitly maintain systems of power, on how Story Planet is a part of that, and on how we can work to shift that paradigm.

Ms. Kent’s and Ms. Dicenso’s classes 10 • Arthika Surendiran �� The Adventures of Petal and Tackle 14 • Ceylin Karacan ��Doctor Vefa 16 • Cindy Phe ��Rosie and Rubicca 18 • Delland Jr Banton ��The Family 20 • Elizabeth Thang ��The Reality Of A Planet Of Doughnuts 24 • Emine Karaalp ��Slippery Soap 25 • Haneen Shallo ��The Video 27 • Jerome Mensah �� Missing Parents 29 • Long Hoang �� Lo and The Secret Tea 31 • Maya Ramsingh �� The Nurse 32 • Varshiga Nagapraman ��Arial and the Forest of Gems 36 • Hassan and Cailyn ��Donut Planet 38 • Emine and Arthika ��Slippery Soap vs. Sicky 40 • Long and Ceyline �� Legend of the Money Stone 41 • Jeannea and Johanna �� The Potion

Mr. Ahmad’s Class 44 • Adom Baffour �� Life with the Apocalypse (parts 1 & 2) 47 • Angelina Latchminarine-Gonsalves ��The Enchanted Forest 49 • Baran Firooznam �� Lizzie’s Special Diamond Ring 51 • Naja Jack-Richardson �� Patchie Making Friends in Dogland 52 • Osazee Otaniyen-Erhabor ��Accusation 55 • Chimadbi Peace Onyeama �� How Tom and His Friends Got Stuck on a New Planet 57 • Ruwayda Hassan ��Lost Friends 60 • Visvaasjine Maneeswaran ��Kate’s Story 62 • Robel Lulu �� Illustration

Ms. Darote’s Class 64 • Brent Adrien Antonio �� The Lost Siblings 67 • Eric Tran ��Cricket 68 • Jenae Stennett �� Latoya and Family 70 • Mai Mang ��Roly Makes a Friend 72 • Moses Ayegba �� The Amazing Adventures of Blake III! 74 • Nima Ali �� Alien Apocalypse 76 • Olivia Lawlor ��My Short Story 78 • Rachel Akintola ��The Legend of the Gold Wonders 83 • Ramazan Atarman �� The Egg Army 85 • Ramazan Cinucen �� Steve and the Red Apple 86 • Taveyah Peters ��The Monkey Scientists 88 • Treshauna Walters �� The Bully 89 • Zayd Jihad ��Phillip Gets Lost

Ms. Seibert’s class 94 • David Tran ��Dragon and the Aliens 96 • Esme Loo Ng ��My Story 100 • Jayden Le �� Squidson’s Best Day 102 • Naaneka Palmer & Justin Arana-Cajamarca ��Toothpaste to be Nice to da Shark 104 • Salma Noor �� Dragon the Dragon Makes A Friend 106 • Umar Abdulaziz �� The Quest 107 • Wahaj Malik �� Drago and His Frenemy Squidson 110 • Yasmin Jeilani ��My Short Story 112 • Zayd Mohamed-Inshaf �� Fire and Friends

Community Friends 116 • Gavi Engel-Yan ��Four Eyed Willy and the Saturn Centaurs 118 • Zachary Rayment �� The Centaur’s Quest

The Adventures of Petal and Tackle

by Arthika Surendiran

“Why does it smell so bad?” said Petal.

On the Planet of Donuts there was an alien named Tackle. Tackle was a strong and caring alien, and he lived in a town named Cloudsdale. Tackle’s best friend’s name was Petal. They did everything together.

“I don’t know,” replied Tackle. They also saw green goo and smoke. “That’s weird.” Then…POW! They saw Sicky! Everyone in the cafe left through the fire exit. Only Petal and Tackle were left in the cafe.

One afternoon Tackle and Petal were at karate class. Tackle said to Petal, “I really want to meet Sicky one day.” Petal agreed. Sicky was a bad alien. He made people sick, and nobody knew where he lived.

“Leave, Sicky! You’re not supposed to be here!” said Tackle. Petal and Tackle were getting ready to fight using their karate moves. However, Sicky spoke up. “Please don’t hurt me,” said Sicky. They were confused. Wasn’t Sicky

After karate finished, they went to a cafe. When they entered the cafe, it smelled like dirty socks.

a bad guy? “I am only here to make friends.” Petal and Tackle did not believe him. But Sicky wasn’t doing anything, he was just standing. “Fine,” said Tackle, “if you can prove that you will be nice, we will believe you.” Sicky nodded. “The first thing I need you to do is clean up the mess you made,” said Tackle. Sicky started cleaning the goo and the smoke. When he was done, Petal told him to apologize to everyone who was in the cafe. Sicky went to go look for everyone. They were all outside the cafe. Everyone was going to leave, but Sicky explained everything. “I am very sorry that I frightened everyone. I hope that you can forgive me.” They all nodded and agreed to forgive Sicky. Petal and Tackle were getting friendlier with Sicky. “Okay, this is your last task. You need to announce to the Planet of Doughnuts that you are a kind alien now.”

you can speak on the radio,” said Tackle. Sicky didn’t even know how that was possible, but he said he would try. When they arrived at the station, Sicky asked the radio station manager, “Hi, can I please do an announcement?” “Well, as long as you follow the three rules: It can’t be useless information, you cannot play with the buttons, and you have to pay,” said the manager. Sicky didn’t have any money, so he didn’t know what to do. “Miss, I don’t have money,” said Sicky. “I don’t want money, I want a precious red ruby from the Forest of Gems,” said the manager. The manager needed the gem because one of the buttons was broken, so she needed a ruby to replace it. Sicky was scared to find the gem alone, so Petal and Tackle agreed to help Sicky. “Don’t worry Sicky, we have your back!” said Petal. Sicky told the manager that he could do it, so he went on a mission with Petal and Tackle.

“How am I going to do that?” asked Sicky.

When they arrived at the Forest of Gems, they started searching for the ruby.

“You need to go to the radio station and kindly ask them if

“We’re never going to find it!” said Petal.

“Don’t be so negative,” replied Tackle. One hour later, Sicky saw a ruby! “Guys, I found the ruby!” “Okay, get it and let’s go!” said Petal. When Sicky picked up the gem, the bushes started shaking. “What’s happening?’” said Tackle in a frightened voice. Suddenly, a fox jumped out of the bushes. “That’s my ruby!” exclaimed the fox. “If you want that ruby, you’re going to have to fight for it.” The fox kicked Sicky in the leg. Then all of them kicked and punched the fox back. POW! BOOM! CHING! “Okay! You win, you get the ruby!” yelled the fox in pain. The fox left and Sicky got the ruby.

“Let’s get out of this forest before we have to fight again,” said Tackle. When they left the forest and went to the station, they gave the ruby to the manager. “Thank you for this ruby. You can go make your announcement,” said the manager. All of them ran to the radio room. An employee showed them where the microphone was. “Hello everyone. It is Sicky. I am not a bad guy. I was just here to make friends, and I do not make people sick. It is just a rumour! I have changed who I am, and I am sorry for who I was before. I hope you can accept me as a friend one day. Thank you.” The next day, the whole Planet of Doughnuts welcomed Sicky with kind arms. Sometimes, aliens can change for the best.

Doctor Vefa

by Ceylin Karacan

Doctor Vefa was a very good doctor. He was nice and cheerful. He was protecting everybody and helping everyone. He was tall and also had long hair and was a little shy. He spent most of his day in the hospital. He was checking sick people with nurses in the emergency.

He thought about how he would care for them. Sick person was crying and he thought he would die soon. Vefa was trying to find a solution. He called his mom to bring a mask if she had a mask. His mom said, “I don’t have one, but I can sew for you, don’t worry.”

One day a very sick person came to the hospital and needed to be examined. Sick person cried as soon as he sounded. Everyone in the hospital was staring at him with wonder. Sick person asked the doctor to look at him. Doctor Vefa came to check him, but something was wrong since he didn’t have a mask and gloves.

She sewed the mask ready in five minutes. She dropped the mask and gloves for Doctor Vefa and nurses. Vefa took the mask and gloves and examined the sick person quickly. Sick person was happy and Doctor Vefa felt so good to help.

Rosie and Rubicca

by Cindy Phe

Rosie was still sleeping when she heard a scream. The scream sounded like… “Rubicca!”

Once upon a time there were two girls named Rosie and Rubicca. They had a pet deer, and it was an adult deer to help them if they got hurt. They lived in a house in the Wecky Forest that had bright red trees.

Rosie was so worried about Rubicca she put on her things and looked for Rubicca. When Rosie went to look she saw Rubicca’s phone on the ground! She was so worried she jumped when something touched her!

One night, Rubicca saw something in the forest and Rosie was asleep. Rubicca tried to wake Rosie up, but she failed. So Rubicca put on her shoes and her jacket and her phone in her jacket pocket and she went off in the forest, but not any forest, a WeCkY ForEst.

It was their deer. Rosie said to her deer, “Hey girl what are you doing here?” The deer picked up Rosie and put her on her back. Rosie had no idea what her deer was doing, so she asked, “Um, do you want to come with me to look for Rubicca?” Her deer put

Meanwhile…

her head up and down for a yes. So they went off (again) to look for Rubicca. TwO hOurs LatER! MorNinG Rosie and her deer were so tired and hungry they looked like homeless people, but a good thing was that the WeCKy foResT had fruits, so Rosie got some fruits off of the tree and she gave some to her deer and they got stronger. The bright red fruits were magic fruits that had different magic powers. So Rosie and her deer got stronger, and they got stronger. Now they could go look for Rubicca for the whole day. FoUR HouRS LatER nOoN It was noon. Rosie was starting to lose hope to find her sister, but then they saw a half circle homebase thing, but it had a code pad. The homebase was made of glass, and when Rosie got close enough she saw Rubicca in it and she

realized she had gotten kidnapped. But she didn’t know how to get inside, but then she had an idea. Remember the fruits were magic fruit so she found a tree that had fruits on it. She now had a fruit. She ate the fruit and she got big, but she knew that she was not big for long so she punched the glass and she went little again but that was not a problem. She asked her deer to lift her up and she did. Now Rosie was inside but then she saw a random cave inside, but she just went off to the real reason that she had come here. When she saw Rubicca she untied her, but when she did that a dragon came out of the cave. So Rosie grabbed Rubicca by the hand and went off. But the deer came jumping through the broken glass that Rosie did and the deer ate the apple and she went big and knocked the dragon down and they left with their deer to go home.

The Family

by Delland Jr Banton

One day a man called John, whose last name was Reggae, was in high school and everyone was making fun of his last name.

Then his parents said sorry and they cried and said, “It is our fault that we didn’t do anything about it, we have to talk about it.” So they did.

He went home crying to his parents and he told them that he got bullied so bad that he didn’t want to go to school anymore because he got bullied. Then his parents said, “It is okay.”

Ten years later they died, and he cried. He said, “Hi, Mom and Dad. I wish you could come back alive.” After that day John got bullied at his work job. One day he was in the gym and he felt something. It was super powers, and he was getting bullied again and he used his super powers.

But he said, “It is not okay, you guys have their back but not mine.” So he walked to his room. He said, “It was not fair I got bullied.” Then he went to sleep. Then he got the saddest school sleep.

He said, “Wow, I didn’t know that I had super powers,” and he saved the city.

John stopped a robbery, and later he had a baby, but John died one month later.

His girlfriend said, “Your mom said that and I just don’t want you to be sad.”

His wife was sad. She was named Scarlet and the baby was called Jack Will and last name was Reggae.

He said, “Is that why you told me that?”

Jack Will got bullied four years later and he was crying to his mom and said, “I miss Daddy so much.”

Then he went to talk to his mom. He said, “Why mom? Why did you not tell me that? Mom, I do not want to be sad. You are saying the same thing as my girlfriend.”

Nineteen more years later he got a lot of friends and was famous, but one day someone got so jealous that he got punched in the face. But then Jack Will got super powers and he left his work and told his girlfriend.

Well Jack Will got beat up so badly and went to the hospital. His mom was crying and same thing for his girlfriend, but he said, “I am fine,” and he walked out of the hospital.

His girlfriend said, “You have the same story as your dad.” Jack Will said, “What? You didn’t tell me that!”

One year later his mom died and as his mom got rushed to the hospital her son got his first kid. Jack Will’s son was born the same day his mom died.

The Reality of a Planet of Doughnuts

by Elizabeth Thang

doughnuts all over the floor, so I suggest you wear a pair of shoes that you don’t mind getting dirty. If you don’t, let’s just say I warned you. Also there is this doughnut print tiger so don’t mistake it as a doughnut. Don’t get me started, there’s this pool but it’s so small that it can only fit five people so if you have a big family, sorry you gotta miss out on that fun.

Hey! The name’s Jungkook. You might know me as the youngest member of BTS! I am 23 right now and I mostly wear black, and I usually get scared by jump scares. My favourite drink is banana milk. Also, today I thought I would tell you about the reality of the Planet of Doughnuts. . .DUN DUN DUNNN!! So first it starts with so many doughnuts. You might be wondering, “Jungkook, isn’t that good you get to eat doughnuts all day?” Well you got that right, unless you want to get a stomachache. HAH *Laughs* Oh, and there’s

Now for the park. It has a couch made of peacock feathers and you must be like, “Oh my god, it’s so beautiful I don’t want to ruin it.” Well, sorry, it’s a picnic bench, and at the park they have automatic swings. That’s the good part,

but it’s held by strong plants, so beware that insects might be on you. Oh, and you should be aware of this “germ monster,” Sicky. He hates water and soap. Yesterday, me and my friend Taehyung and his dog Yeontan had to stop him. *FLASHBACK* It all started when me and Taehyung were taking Yeontan on a walk and we saw Sicky finding people to attack. Taehyung said to me, “Jungkook, hurry behind the rock.”

poured it all over Sicky, but it wasn’t enough. But he didn’t know I was preparing my claws out of my backpack to shoot hand sanitizer at him. I went for the risk and now shot it at him. *skrt* *skrt* *splash* *splash* The bad smell was now gone. He got so mad he tried to shoot lasers at us, but WE QUICKLY DODGED. I shot more hand sanitizer and he melted away. *END FLASHBACK*

Then I said, “Okay, let’s get our gear on.” Yeontan then went in front of Sicky to distract him with his cuteness while Taehyung started shooting soap at Sicky. Sicky noticed him so Yeontan quickly grabbed his puppy bag that was filled with water and

Now let me just admit it. . .WE HAVE BEEN UNDER CONSTRUCTION FOR FIVE YEARS!!!!! But the good part is that there is a huge diamond stadium where I perform for my armys (what my fans are called). Let’s all remember that the best part is that you get to see me right?

Slippery Soap

by Emine Karaalp

finds kids that are healthy and chases them. He eats the gems in the forest and gets energy.

My character’s name is Slippery Soap. My character lives in the washroom beside the sink. It cleans everyone’s hands. My character visits schools and hospitals with his friends, Gloves and Mask, to catch the corona virus and kill it.

Slippery Soap is trying to be faster than Sicky, but Sicky is evil. Slippery Soap has a sword and tries to fight Sicky, but Sicky’s spike shield never lets him lose.

Slippery Soap’s problem is kids go to the forest or school but don’t wash their hands. They touch their faces and their mouths. Sicky monster finds the kids, spits at them, and makes them sick. Sicky is faster than Slippery Soap. He makes way more sick dirty kids than Slippery Soap cleans. He hides on top of a tree in his forest and

Slippery calls his friends from the forest, the Mask and Glove. Slippery Soap is flying and making masks and gloves rain. Kids catch the gloves and masks and now Sicky monster can’t give them germs fast because the kids use masks and gloves.

The Video

by Haneen Shallo

her? Her stories are absolutely atrocious!”

My character’s name is Claire. She writes all her stories in her bedroom with a computer. Claire is an online writer; she writes historical facts about life and she loves to read. She publishes one story almost every day because she is motivated.

Then, Emma De Williams commented, “You better work harder, Claire. I’m super disappointed.” Emma wrote the comment as a joke, but then Claire took it seriously.

One day Claire made a video about her inspiration, Emma De Williams. She wanted Emma to see her passion. She was very dedicated to her work.

“What did I do wrong? I always worked hard! And my favourite inspiration isn’t inspiring me, but being rude!” Claire sobbed. She had worked hard for seven years on her writing and Emma still thought it was a joke.

A few weeks later, Emma De Williams found Claire’s video on the internet. She giggled and laughed, “Oh boy, I wonder why I inspired

Claire replied to Emma’s comment, “I don’t get it, that wasn’t a funny joke, Emma. I took it seriously.” Emma saw and replied, “I’m sorry, I thought you loved jokes! But lucky you, I’m publishing your stories in my famous book: Emma’s Most Loved Stories!” “Thank you so much! I can’t believe it! You’re amazing!” Claire wrote. She felt proud of her writing and videos!

Missing Parents

by Jerome Mensah

thinking that maybe they went somewhere and they left him a note. So he decided to look to see if they left him a note. He was searching for five minutes and he didn’t find any note so he knew something wasn’t right, and his parents must be in trouble.

The Beginning Once upon a time there was a land of animals. There were a lot of animals, but there was one animal that other animals called a hero. His name was Aqua Hog! He loved saving and helping others. The first time he saved someone was when he saved his friend from falling in water.

Looking for His Parents So he went looking for his parents. The first place he went to was the grocery store. He looked around each aisle and didn’t see them. Next, he went to the school because maybe they were going to pick him up. He looked all around and he

Missing Parents One day, his mom and dad weren’t at home. He was very confused because his parents were always there when he came back after school. He was

didn’t see them. Then he found an underground cave close to a bush. He decided to go and look inside. Finding His Parents When he went inside he saw a weird looking lab and saw his parents in a cage. “Mom! Dad!” he said. His parents were going to say something but then a fox came in. “Well, well, well, look who’s here,” said the fox.

Saving His Parents Aqua Hog ran off and saw a blue gem. Aqua Hog never saw a gem before so Aqua Hog touched it and he got water powers. The fox got scared and ran away, and Aqua Hog went to go save his parents and went home.

“Who are you and why did you take my parents?!” asked Aqua Hog.

His mom and dad were proud of Aqua Hog, so they gave him a free house as a gift. He was so happy. He invited his friend Blaze over to play in the tree house.

“I’m planning to take over the world and I’m going to control your parents and make them my helpers.”

Thirty minutes had passed and Aqua heard someone screaming help and Aqua Hog and Blaze went to go find out. To be continued. . .

Lo and The Secret Tea

by Long Hoang

Lo furiously shouted, “I will never teach you that!”

After the first story, Lo and Ng bought a shop where they sold tea for one dollar. So many people liked Lo’s tea, and he had a secret about tea.

Lo and Humcat 1 got into a fight. Lo couldn’t win because he didn’t have a superpower like Humcat 1.

One day not like the others, Lo saw a guy he didn’t like. The guy was Humcat 1.

After that he needed to find Humcat 2 or he’d have to teach Humcat 1 the secret tea recipe to him. Finally he found Humcat 2 under the trash can. And he told Humcat 2 the story.

“I thought you were dead!” Lo questioned. Humcat 1 replied, “I never died.” Lo asked, “Why did you come here?”

Lo and Humcat 2 were fighting with Humcat 1, and he was about to lose.

Humcat 1 answered, “I came here for the secret tea recipe.”

Humcat 1 took Ng out and said, “If you don’t teach me the secret tea I will kill her.”

can kill me? Even though he is my blood he is still weaker than me.”

Humcat 2 ran over to Humcat 1, and Humcat 2 threw Ng to Lo. Humcat 2 tried to kill Humcat 1, and at same time, they both killed each other.

When she heard this Ng decided to surprise Humcat 2 with a party at her tea shop. In the afternoon, after cleaning up all of Humcat 2’s wounds at the hospital, Lo and Humcat 1 returned to the tea shop to find all their friends and family waiting there for them with pastries and drinks.

Lo and Ng stood there and cried rivers for their close friend. They decided to give him a funeral and picked him up, but when Lo picked him up, Humcat 2’s eyes suddenly opened, startling Lo. Humcat 2 chuckled and said, “Did you guys really think something like my brother

“Surprise!” they all yelled. Lo and Humcat 2 stood there shocked but with a smile.

The Nurse

by Maya Ramsingh

The nurse works at a hospital and helps people. The nurse needs a nurse uniform to work at the hospital. The nurse works seven days a week just to be at the hospital to help people. The nurse needs to provide the best care for the patient.

The nurse is using limited stuff a day to save people and protect herself from being exposed to Covid 19. The solution to Covid 19 has not been found, but a lot of people are helping by making masks and donating supplies. Social distancing is kinda helping with the Covid 19. People need to wear masks to help, so the Covid 19 and also people are in self isolation.

Then the Covid 19 pandemic started. Now the nurse is working 16 hours a day for seven days a week just to keep people safe.

Arial and the Forest of Gems

by Varshiga Nagapraman

Arial lived in Cloud City. Cloud City was in the sky. The houses there were on clouds. To get up and down you just had to call for a rainbow slide, stairs, elevator, or escalator. Her house was always organized and clean.

There once lived a girl named Arial. She had dark brown hair with light brown highlights. She wore glasses, but the glasses weren’t normal ones—they acted like robots. Arial had magic powers because she was born with them. Her favourite colour was teal, her favorite fruit was mango, and her favorite hobby was helping people out and hanging out with her best friend Mia. Mia was a very helpful person. She was very confident and caring. Arial had a puppy named Lulu. Lulu had golden fur and little wings on his back and was quite playful.

Arial was a doctor at a hospital called Rainbow Ribbon Hospital (RRH). She wanted to help people from Sicky the germ monster. You see, Sicky was a virus. Sicky was only his nickname—his real name was Coronavirus—but Sicky was what people called him. Sicky was not an organized person. His whole house smelled like dirty socks except the

bathroom—the bathroom smelled like roses, and Sicky hated roses. He used a laser gun that shot germs so whoever he got close to would get the germs. Sicky had small wings on his back and carried an umbrella that he used as a shield. He also had teleporting powers, but that took a huge amount of energy to use. Arial was with her friend Mia taking Lulu, her puppy, for a walk when she heard two of the townspeople saying it was the Annual Gems Day. “It’s the Annual Gems Day, we better get decorating,” they said. Annual Gems Day was the day when the first gem tree grew from the Forest of Gems (that first tree was the great tree). The Forest of Gems was a forest with bright red trees that have gems instead of leaves and each one has its own gems. The grass there was red and green mixed together. The red grass was hot, and the green grass was cold. There were many things that lived there like animals, such as the gem squirrels (that had a gem in the middle of their stomachs), golden rabbits (that were very shiny), talking parrots (they were colourful and could actually talk), some people, medical masks, and gloves that help you when you get sick, and ya.

In the middle of the forest was the biggest tree of all which grows all the gems in the universe. In the middle of the great tree was a multi-coloured gem which gave the whole forest its colours. If it was ever stolen then the forest would lose its colour and whoever had that gem would be very powerful (but that won’t happen because the forest is so protective, right?). Now back to Arial and Mia. ‘‘I totally forgot that, I mean how can I forget I mean my great great great great great I DON’T EVEN KNOW HOW MANY GREAT grandfather planted the first tree,” said Arial. ‘‘What, you didn’t tell me that!” shouted Mia. ‘‘Oh, I guess I forgot, but let’s go home and decorate for Gems Day!” They both went back to their homes in the sky. Sicky the germ monster didn’t know anything about Gems Day or the forest until now. Sicky was going shopping for free stuff like always (because Sicky is a virus that spreads and obviously no one wants it) when a piece of paper flew in his face.

“What is this?” he said as he took it off his face. “Annual Gems Day: for more information, go to the library. I don’t like reading, but this sounds tempting, why don’t I just take a look?” Sicky went shopping then headed to the library. As he read about Gems Day he got more and more interested, but the thing he got interested in was the gem in the middle of the forest in the great gem tree. He wanted to take it. “With that gem I will be the most powerful germ in the universe!” Sicky got a map and followed it to the forest. He stepped on the red and green grass and a big wall appeared. “Ha! Nice try but I knew that was gonna happen so I’ll just use my wings.” Sicky flapped and he flew but when he tried to go in, an invisible shield was around the forest. “What! I didn’t know this was gonna happen. I guess I’m gonna have to use my teleporting powers.” He tried and tried and tried, and then it worked, or he thought it had, but in a second he was back outside of the forest. Sicky took a deep breath then he put his fingers together and it

worked. The only problem he had left was getting the gem out. The animals were watching it. All the parrots went to the people who lived in the forest and told them. “Oh no! This is terrible, but if we go close to him he will shoot us with germs!” said Rob, the leader of the forest people. When Sicky touched the gem, the grass shone bright red and made waves. “Oh no I bet someone saw that I better hurry,” he thought, and yes someone had seen that. Arial and Mia were the ones who had seen it. They put on their flying boots (boots with wings attached to them) and headed to the forest. Arial and Mia didn’t have trouble getting in because they weren’t evil. Then they saw Sicky trying to take the great gem. “Sicky, stop!” the girls shouted. “Why would I ever listen to some pesky girls!” he yelled. “Well why do you even want it?” asked Arial. “To be the most powerful germ in the universe, duh!” shouted Sicky. “Oh no you don’t,” said Mia.

“Then try me,” Sicky said in a deep voice as he shot germs at them.

It was a battle. Arial vs. Sicky. Let the battle begin!

Arial dodged all of them, but Mia got shot.

Mia, the forest people, the animals, the gloves, and masks all wanted to help.

“Oh no! I got shot,” said Mia. “It’s alright because I know the cure for it,” Arial said as she did the spell called “healing waves.” As Arial said those words Mia felt better than ever. Sicky took a diamond from one of the trees and used that to get the great gem out. It took some time but then it was out. “Ah ha! I am now the most powerful one!” he shouted. All of the forest and things that lived there were drained of colour. Arial got super mad. She then transformed, and her hair grew longer. She grew humongous wings and she shone so bright.

Sicky fell and was defeated. The gem was restored, the colour was back, everything was back to normal. Sicky got up and ran sadly. Arial went after him. He said, “I didn’t want to be the evil one. It was a part of my family to be evil, but I don’t want to be bad anymore.” “Sicky, you don’t have to be bad. I can be your friend if you want me to,” said Arial. “Thank you,” said Sicky. Arial, Mia, and Sicky have been friends ever since, and Sicky also ditched his germ laser gun ever since too.

Donut Planet

by Hassan Aden and Cailyn Gandalera

and Hybrid hate each other because their parents did. While Tayson and Hybrid were fighting, Dumpy the alien swept in and used their ice power to help Tayson win. Tayson was surprised because he usually fought solo and wasn’t expecting help. Dumpy the alien also had fire and ice powers, which is why they noticed Tayson. Dumpy wanted to be friends with Tayson because they like good people. Dumpy could sense that Tayson was pure of heart.

Tyson was in the Forest of Gems fighting his enemy, a dragon lizard named Hybrid. Tayson looked like a wolf and could talk to animals. He had a red gem on his right arm and a blue gem on his left arm—those are the colours of fire and ice. Tayson and Hybrid had been fighting since they were kids. Tayson’s parents were royalty: his mom was the ice queen and his dad was the fire king. Hybrid’s parents didn’t have magic power. They had to work hard and develop their martial art skills and were jealous of Tayson’s parents. Tayson

Tayson asked Dumpy to prove themselves as a teammate. Tayson and Dumpy left the

Forest of Gems to go on a journey together so that Dumpy could train to become an excellent sword fighter. If Dumpy trained well, Tayson would give them the gift of a sword (that’s a big deal because Tayson never gives gifts!). Once Dumpy received the sword they would be friends and teammates forever. Tayson and Dumpy approached the Donut Planet. When they got there they discovered that Sicky, a giant germ monster, was terrorizing the planet. Tayson had only ever fought in the Forest of Gems and had never battled a germ monster before. Tayson tried to use his sword, but it didn’t work on Sicky. Sicky’s body was made

of slime and would instantly heal any cut. Dumpy had never fought a germ monster before either. Dumpy used their fire power to try and melt Sicky, but that didn’t work. The slime was already melty, so it didn’t make a difference. So Tayson and Dumpy tried an experiment so they could defeat Sicky. They made an experiment and put all their powers in it and they poured it on Sicky, and Sicky was defeated. Tayson and Dumpy were happy that Sicky was not terrorizing the Donut Planet, and the Donut Planet thanked them and gave them donuts, and they were best friends.

Slippery Soap vs. Sicky

by Emine Karaalp and Arthika Surendiran

Soap decides to leave the washroom to face their fears of Sicky the Germ Monster, but not before finding some other soap friends to help protect the people in the washroom while Slippery isn’t there.

Slippery Soap likes to hang out in the washrooms on the Planet of Donuts. They are there to help people wash their hands to protect them from the Sicky Germ Monster. “Remember to sing the ABC song or happy birthday for 20 seconds!” they say loudly and happily to anyone who comes in after the people get some soap from them.

Slippery Soap flies to the Forest of Gems where they know it’s Sicky’s favourite place to hang out. They gather their friends, Mask and Gloves, along the way. It takes about 10 to 15 minutes to get there, depending on the wind.

Even though Slippery Soap is very happy on the outside, they have one big fear: Sicky the Germ Monster! Sicky is faster and stronger than everyone else on the planet. One day, Slippery

There is already a group of people hanging out in the Forest of Gems, as they know Slippery Soap needs help with

the fight. These people are also there to eat some of the forest’s gems for energy. Sicky is fighting with everyone, and making them sick at the same time! Because Sicky has spikes on their body, they can shoot these out and make people sick. This makes people get a headache and fall asleep, making them unable to fight. But some of the people are able to eat gems for more energy! To be continued. . .

Legend of the Money Stone

by Long Hoang and Ceylin Karacan

needs masks and gloves to fight Sicky. On their adventures, Fliy and Dr. Vefa find out that the Money Stone is on earth, and the person who has the Money Stone right now is Low.

Fliy is an alien who is looking for a magical stone called the Money Stone. Fliy needs the Money Stone because his planet is dying; there is no food on his planet. The Money Stone is far away and in another universe so Fliy has to travel far from his planet to find it.

To be continued. . .

On the way, Fliy meet Dr. Vefa. Dr. Vefa is also looking for the Money Stone, because she

The Potion

byJeannea Lewis and Johanna Oduro

was going to make friends. He didn’t know he was sick until he started growing gooey things on his face.

Hanna and Nea met in class in Grade 3. They were introduced to one another by a different friend because they both loved doing gymnastics and dances at school at lunch.

When Sicky went to the city, everyone saw that he was a monster and started running from him. Nea and Hanna ran to the gas station. They saw some of their friends at the gas station. They told their friends, “Go home before you get sick too. We will take care of Sicky.”

One day they were walking home from school and they heard something coming from a house and they went to check if the person was alright. It was a scientist who was making a potion and it went wrong. A virus spread to a gorilla and he got sick, and then he turned into a monster called Sicky. Sicky lived in a dusty, messy, gooey, nasty house in the forest. Before he got sick, he

They went up to Sicky and said, “Sicky please calm down, you’re being very mad and scaring them. You’re also making people sick from your breath.”

Sicky sat down and said, “Help me! My anger is taking control of me.” The girls felt sad for Sicky. They wanted to help him. They took Sicky to the scientist to make a potion to get the virus out of him. Sicky drank the potion and started feeling better. They made more of the potion to help everybody who was sick from the virus. Everyone was so happy and thanked Nea and Hannah.

Life with the Apocalypse

by Adom Baffour

But there were two left, and they were making more Deadheart people, and one of them killed Jack!

Long ago there was an apocalypse called Good vs. Evil—it was not good. Good people were called Campers and the evil people were the Deadheart. They were called the Deadheart because they had no feelings due to an infectious outbreak called. . .the eternal storm XXAAAAAAAS. The eternal storm infected the Campers. The Deadheart roamed the open land. The Deadheart were trying to infect the Campers and turn them into Deadhearts.

Momo, Jack’s best friend, said, “No, poor Jack!” but then they went back to war. “Looks like we’re going back to war.” The Campers would always miss one of the Deadheart people, day after day until they could not fight. Then the bad people had to kill all the good people, but they still did not get along. Then some of the Deadheart people got along with the Campers, so they decided to stay in a safe place together.

One of the Campers called Jack and said, “We killed all the Deadheart people, yay!”

One of the Campers in this safe place was named Jake. He discovered a formula to make the Deadheart people good. The evil Deadheart people noticed that more and more Deadheart people were becoming good and getting along with the Campers. They investigated the whole camp because they were really good sniffers. They sniffed out Jake’s formula and found out why the Deadheart people were becoming good, so they smashed it! Now without Jake’s formula the Deadheart became a bigger pack. However, there

was one Deadheart person who could control themselves: a boy named Taylor. Taylor made wristbands for the Deadheart to control them. Then they got along so they lived happily everly after, or did they? Someone, a Deadheart named Neffee, broke the wristbands so that the Deadhearts would go wild and turn into wolves because she wanted a wolf pack. They went to hide in the woods, and then she said, “I own the night.” GOOD vs. EVIL 2 coming soon Out Spring 2021

Life with the Apocalypse 2

by Adom Baffour

Then they had an election with Campers and the Deadheart. The votes came in and the Deadheart won, so then they had a school dance and it was only the Deadheart and the Campers. Then the wolves came and the humans let them into the school because they were afraid of the wolves but thought if they were nice they wouldn’t hurt them. Then there was an earthquake, and it stopped. The wolves somehow found their moonstone underground. Then they got healed, so they had the party where the moonstone was underground. Everyone got along!

So Neffee, the girl who turned into a wolf, was starting to take people and somehow turn them into werewolves. Then they became a pack. Then they said something about a moonstone being able to control the wolves, so they didn’t go wild. But then a dangerous storm came, and they all had to stay in the school. The wolf pack came inside with all the Deadheart and the Campers. They got scared, then one hour later the storm stopped and everyone was so happy because they did not have to stay with the wolves. The next day the wolves wanted to go to school, so they did.

The Enchanted Forest

by Angelina Latchminarine-Gonsalves

On a hot day Bon bon woke up to the birds chirping on her window ledge. Bon bon went to make breakfast for her and her sister when she realized someone had stolen food from the fridge. Bon bon didn’t want to scare her sister, so she decided to wake Anna up to go for a walk in the forest to gather vegetables and fruits. While walking, Bon bon and her sister stopped by the river to talk to the frogs, swans, and little fishes.

In the forest, where unicorns fly and rainbows shine, was a girl named Bon bon. Bon bon wasn’t no ordinary girl, she was special. Bon bon lived in a house in a rare tree that lived for many years. In her house she had a fridge, a bed, a closet, and a wooden desk that she made for drawing. She painted the walls pink and blue, her floors were yellow and made of glass! As a little girl, Bon bon grew up with her sister Anna in an enchanted forest where the sun shines and never rains, snowmans talk, lions and zebras are friends, pigs fly, and the most beautiful part of it all is flowers blooming everywhere that never die. The secret about this forest is that everything is made of something sweet!

They kneeled down to fill their water bottles with water. “What’s that smell?” Anna asked. Bob Bon looked up and saw smoke coming from a part of the forest. “Let’s go check it out Anna,” said Bon Bon.

They hopped on a tiger and went towards the smoke. As they got closer, Anna and Bon Bon got off the tiger and tippy-toed through the grass. They peeked from behind the tree and saw a lonely woman who looked lost, building a fire with some of the fruits and vegetables that Bon Bon had in her fridge! “What do we do?” asked Anna. “I have an idea, let’s bring tiger with us for protection,” she said. So they approached the woman slowly. “Crack, Crack, Crack!” went the sticks on the floor. “Who’s there?” said the woman. Bon Bon and her sister walked towards the woman. “Hello, this is my sister Anna, and my name is Bon Bon.”

The woman looked scared. “I was stranded wandering this amazing forest and came across a house in a tree. Nobody was home and I was very hungry so I took some fruits and vegetables. I’m sorry,” said the woman. Bon Bon and her sister introduced the tiger to her. “Would you like to come live with us?” asked Bon Bon. “I would love that, I have no family or friends,” said the woman. Bon Bon was so happy that she made a friend. Bon bon, her sister, and the woman hopped onto the tiger, and on they went through the enchanted forest.

Lizzie’s Special Diamond Ring

by Baran Firooznam

would know. The castle had a bunch of security cameras that recorded any intruders.

Lizzie is a 12-year-old princess who lives in a castle. Lizzie has golden hair, white skin, and blue eyes. One day Lizzie was flying with her unicorns. They were flying over her castle playing a game. Lizzie had six unicorns.

When Lizzie got the alert that someone was in the castle, she felt scared and stopped the game. Lizzie and the unicorns went into the castle to see what was happening, but the thieves had already run away.

While Lizzie and her unicorns were flying, a group of three thieves snuck into the castle to seal Lizzie’s special diamond ring. Lizzie’s diamond ring had the power to make its owner rich: that’s how Lizzie became a princess.

The next day, while Lizzie was sleeping, the robbers came back and stole the ring! They broke the protective spell. Lizzie didn’t hear them come in because she was sleeping. When the alarm finally went off, Lizzie felt terrified. She ran to check her security camera and saw three robbers breaking the

What the thieves didn’t know was that Lizzie’s ring had protection around it so that if anyone tried to steal it, Lizzie

protection spell and taking the ring. Luckily, Lizzie still had her castle and the rest of her stuff. The robbers knew it was a special ring that would make its owner rich. They got into a huge fight over who got to keep the ring—they all wanted it because there was only one. Then, the head robber showed up. He was the charge. The head robber took the special diamond ring. The three robbers ran after them. Lizzie was on her unicorn flying over the forest when she saw the robbers running after the head robber. Lizzie was happy to have found her ring. She knew she had to hurry in case they hurt the ring. Lizzie felt scared and sad. It was a very special ring that her grandmother had given to her for her fifth birthday. Her grandma had since passed away, so the ring was very important to Lizzie. Lizzie’s plan to get the ring back was to go to the robber’s house while

the robber was sleeping. She was going to steal it back! That night the head robber had the ring at his house. The robber was holding the ring and there was a bunch of money and gold and diamonds around him. He was getting pretty rich. Lizzie was getting really mad because the robber was using her special diamond ring. When the robber went to sleep, he dropped the special diamond ring onto the pillow next to him. Lizzie saw the diamond ring. She snuck into his house very quietly so that she didn’t wake up the robber. She grabbed the diamond ring and then flew away on her unicorn. Lizzie was so happy to have gotten the ring back. The next morning the head robber woke up and saw that the ring was gone and felt so confused. The other three robbers were so mad at him for losing the ring. The robbers knew that they were going to be poor forever.

Patchie Making Friends in Dogland

by Naja Jack-Richardson

The other small dogs ask the big dogs to stop, and tell the big dogs, “You don’t need to bark. You can just ask to be friends.”

Patchie is a male, long haired chihuahua. He likes to run around outside and play with his rope toys. He is scared of other small dogs because sometimes the small dogs bark at him. When he is scared he runs behind his owner.

The big dogs shake their heads to say okay. Patchie comes back to the big dogs and is not afraid anymore. They all play hide and seek together. One big dog is “It.” Patchie hides behind a tree, and the other dogs hide in different places. One hides by the slides and others hide by the swings.

Patchie has one friend named Naja. Patchie wants to make more friends with other small dogs. The problem is that the big dogs don’t want chihuahuas to have friends because the big dogs don’t have friends themselves and they don’t want the small dogs to be happy.

The big dogs find the rest of the dogs but not Patchie. Patchie stays in his hiding spot until it is time to go. Before they leave they all think of going to the lake tomorrow. They all return to their owners and go home.

One day Patchie tries to make a friend at the dog park, and the big dogs bark at him. Patchie runs behind his owner.

Accusation

by Osazee Otaniyen-Erhabor

and Rodrick got detention for six weeks.

Once upon a time there was a boy in my community named Boyboy. Boyboy had blue spiky hair, red eyes, and orange Nike shoes. He had six fingers on each of his hands, and six toes on each of his feet. Since it was impossible to find gloves that fit, he made his own with a sewing machine and animal hair.

One day Boyboy was walking home from school. He saw Rodrick and the police on the sidewalk. Rodrick said, “Here’s the person who took the ball from school!” Boyboy tried to defend himself that he didn’t take the ball, but he didn’t have his backpack with him to prove it. The police arrested him and took him to a holding cell.

Boyboy was always ready to learn and not to make trouble. He was afraid of a boy named Rodrick who was always trying to get him in trouble. Once Rodrick brought a frog to school and put it on the principal’s desk and tried to frame Boyboy, but it didn’t work,

At home, his mother was watching Judge Judy when the news interrupted the channel.

“Here is some breaking news. A kid is accused of taking a ball from school. He says he didn’t do it, but no one knows the truth.” They flashed a picture of Boyboy and his name. Boyboy’s mother rushed to the jail and got him out. She didn’t want to yell at him in public or else she would look like a bad mother, so she waited until she was home. At home, she told him to pack up and get out of the house and go to America. “I can’t travel to America. I am a Canadian,” Boyboy said. His mother thought since Boyboy had never stolen before, he could stay. She said, “Fine, you can stay.”

The next day Boyboy tried to resolve the problem, but his mother didn’t listen. The argument continued till the very last day of the week, Sunday. On that Sunday afternoon, the police officer that was investigating the case came and knocked on their door and said, “Sorry, your son didn’t do it. It was one of the bad boys at his school that framed him up.” Then the police left. His mother gave him a hug and apologized for yelling at him. Boyboy also apologized for talking back. They promised each other that they would never do anything bad to each other again, and to believe in each other, and they all lived happily ever after.

How Tom and His Friends Got Stuck on a New Planet

by Chimadbi Peace Onyeama

“Welp, hope you get used to being stuck on a different planet. Are you ignoring the fact that we could potentially die here?” Tom said.

One day Tom and his friend Jessica were exploring a spaceship that they weren’t supposed to be on, and they got stuck on a different planet. Jessica was the one who wanted to go into the spaceship, but Tom was the one who pressed the button that got them stuck. Tom pressed a button clearly labeled “Do not touch please,” and then the spaceship threw them to a new planet.

“Well, technically yes, but at the same time we could potentially be saved or survive,” Jessica responded. “JESSICA THERE IS A WEIRD FLYING THING COMING TOWARDS US!” Tom screamed, unaware that the flying thing was actually a UFO.

At first they thought that the new planet had not been discovered yet, so they thought about a name for it.

“There’s a girl inside the UFO,” Jessica said.

“Circum,” said Tom The UFO landed so hard on the ground that everything went flying to the sky. The door opened.

“No,” said Jessica, “Circum doesn’t sound like a good name.”

Inside there was a girl. “Hello there!” said the girl.

really nice. The purple alien agreed to help them.

“What is your name?”’ Tom asked.

“I found a nice alien,” said Jessica.

“My name is Lina. And you?” the girl replied.

“Skiudwwior,” (which means I could help you in guano) said the alien.

“My name is Tom. And Lina is a pretty cool name.” I like this girl, Tom said in his mind. “So why did you come here in a UFO?” Jessica asked. “The aliens captured me and brought me here, those dirty aliens,” Lina said. “Let’s find a way to get out of here!” said Jessica. “I’ve got a plan. Let’s look for a nice alien to help us find out which button starts the rocket ship, then we can get off of this planet,” said Tom. They went searching for a nice alien. Jessica saw a green alien and thought it looked nice. The alien didn’t sting her, but then it started screaming at her. Then the green alien did sting her, but luckily it wasn’t that strong. Jessica ran away. Then she met a purple alien and it was

“It’s a good thing I can speak guano,” said Tom. “Since when did you speak that weird alien language?” Jessica questioned. “Actually it’s called guano,” said Tom. “Jessica, look behind you!!” Tom shouted. Jessica had been standing next to an alien hole but she didn’t know it. The alien got angry and stung her. Jessica fainted. “Jessica, Jessica! Wake up!!!!!” Tom cried. “I don’t think Jessica will ever wake up,” Lina said. Jessica was pronounced dead. Everyone was sad. The purple alien still helped them, and luckily Tom and Lina made it back to earth.

Lost Friends

by Ruwayda Hassan

Once upon a time there was a little boy named Zac who was about 7 years old. Zac had brown hair and green eyes, and his favourite colour was blue. He liked to play with Savannah, his best friend, and he was very scared of snakes. Savannah had light brown hair and blue eyes, and her favourite colours were pink and purple, and she loved to water her garden, and she was scared of bees.

helped her get over her fear of eating vegetables. When he was around six years old, he even snuck out of the house to go and visit Savannah.

Zac and Savannah had been best friends since they were in kindergarten. When they first met, Zac was a little shy, and Savannah helped him build up his courage. Savannah was so scared of eating carrots! Zac

They went off to different colleges so they were not going to see each other any more. This is because Zac’s college was in Dubai and Savannah’s was in NYC (New York City). They went off to college,

They loved to skateboard together, but not in the rinks, just around their houses and stuff. Just to let you know, they were neighbors, so they went to each other’s houses all the time.

and didn’t see each other again. They didn’t even have time to say good-bye. They were best friends, but they split apart and were really sad about it. Now let’s move on. They were done college, all four years, and hadn’t heard from each other since they left. Zac had a nice condo in Dubai and Savannah had a nice apartment building in New York City. Savannah got Zac’s number again from one of his friends and decided to give him a call because she missed him. Zac remembered her voice even from all those years so they met up. Zac flew into New York City. If you’re wondering why Savannah didn’t come to him it is because Savannah couldn’t leave her job, so that’s why. Things got complicated because all the flights were

cancelled, so Zac couldn’t fly over straight away. Savannah was really sad about this as she wanted to talk about life with him. Thankfully, he only had to wait a few hours until the next flight. They just got to talking about life and their jobs. Suddenly Zac got a great idea: he wanted Savannah to come live with him. She didn’t think it was a great idea because what about her job? Zac told her that she could work with him because his job place was hiring. Savannah said yes, so they flew to Dubai and Savannah got the job at Zac’s workplace! Zac had an extra room in his condo, so Savannah took that room, and they were best friends again and everything was back to normal!

Kate’s Story

by Visvaasjine Maneeswaran

After Mark moved, Kate’s dog, Matt, protected her, but she couldn’t take Matt to school. Kate liked to play soccer with her dog in the backyard. She liked it so much that she started soccer lessons and became a champion! A lot of her classmates teased her about it though. They said, “Kate, why are you playing soccer? You’re not a boy!” but Kate ignored them because she liked playing soccer.

Once upon a time there was a girl named Kate. At the age of six her best friend forever (BFF) left for another city because his dad’s work was there. She thought that she could call Mark whenever she wanted, but his family changed their number so they stopped talking and no one knew why. After Mark left, Kate went to the park a lot because that’s where they met. She liked to go there for the memories. She sat under a big oak tree and imagined Mark sitting beside her. She read stories and pretended Mark was listening to them. After school, she sometimes locked herself in her room and cried.

Then Kate was twelve. Nobody liked her because she was a loner, so the kids bullied her a lot. She mostly got bullied by Sally. Sally was new to the school and always bothered Kate so she wouldn’t get bullied herself. Sally had

blonde hair, green eyes, wore a lot of pink and a pink bow. Her hair was mostly in pigtails. Sally once cut Kate’s hair, but it grew back fast. One day while Sally was bullying her, a boy yelled, “Stop!” Sally stopped, and then the boy went to Kate and brought her to lunch. The boy was Kate’s old BFF, Mark! Mark recognized Kate but didn’t tell her who he was because he wanted it to be a surprise, and he wanted to protect her but also wanted to make sure no one bullied her.

“Kate,” said Kate. After that, both of them were quiet for the whole lunch. Then they went to the park. Mark asked, “Can you tell me about your past?” “Sure,” said Kate. “So it all started when I was six, my BFF left me so I became lonely. My parents bought me a dog. I named him Matt. I wish I could find my BFF!” “What is his name?” said Mark. “Mark Yu,” said Kate. “That’s me!” said Mark.

Kate asked, “What is your name?”

Kate hugged Mark. “I missed you so much,” said Kate

“Mark,” said the boy. “What’s your name?”

“Me too,” said Mark.

illustration by Robel Lulu

The Lost Siblings

by Brent Adrien Antonio

got around by rolling. Then, suddenly, the coconuts used a leaf to blindfold Hakuna while Blake wasn’t looking. Then the coconuts took Hakuna away from Blake. Blake couldn’t find Hakuna anymore, he went back to the treehouse to see if Hakuna was there. Hakuna was lost! Blake felt lonely and didn’t know what to do.

One day there were two siblings, Hakuna and Blake, who went to the jungle to study the flora and fauna. Little did they know, it wasn’t just a normal jungle, it was filled with mysteries and a lot of things to study. They lived in a treehouse filled with scientific stuff. Blake happened to be an archaeologist, but Hakuna was a doctor so Hakuna joined Blake and became an archaeologist as well.

Then Blake met the giant living tree named Britannica. Britannica agreed to help him find his sibling. Blake promised to take care of Britannica while they were searching for Hakuna. After doing all the research, Blake still couldn’t find Hakuna. He then built a detector to detect Hakuna’s last known scent and

The jungle was filled with living coconuts, a king birch tree whose name was Britannica, yellow grass, yodelling goats, and lots more. For a long time Blake and Hakuna didn’t know that the living coconuts were evil. The coconuts

finally found his chance to find his sibling. Britannica had an unknown material that came from their leaves. It was invisible and no one could touch it. The material used the earth’s magnetic field to detect a person’s location. The material needed the scent of a person to locate them. Unfortunately, the sensor didn’t detect far, so they had to walk around a lot to find the trail. Blake started calling out to him. Then he heard a voice, “Help! Hello? Help please!” That was the voice of Hakuna.

They found the living coconuts, and Blake now knew what happened. The tree called his friends, Birchinta and Betuler, to help get Hakuna. The catch was a success and the coconuts disappeared out of nowhere. Now Blake said, “Did those coconuts do anything to you?” Hakuna answered, “They captured me and put me in this prison with some yodelling goats!” They chatted and chatted until the evening. They lived happily ever after—for now.

Cricket

by Eric Tran

Cricket’s home looked like a hole, and the hole had a tiny bedroom and a big bedroom. After a year Cricket accidentally ate all the food, so Cricket had to go get more.

Once upon a time there was a bird named Cricket who lived in the city with his friend who was a bug. “I wish the humans would stop trying to eat us,” Cricket said.

However, Cricket was too full, so he couldn’t go and said, ”I’m too full I can’t get the food, but I could get it tomorrow.”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand what that feels like,” said the bug.

The bug said, ”You have to get it today.”

After a year of always having to avoid humans, Cricket decided to move to the desert for safety. The bug decided to come with him. Cricket thought this was out of friendship but the bug seemed to have different ideas.

The next morning Cricket was too hungry and could not fly, so the next day they passed away.

Latoya and Family

by Jenae Stennett

also lots of stuff to do in Florida. She liked her school and her friends. She loved history class and had a great history teacher. Most importantly her best friend, Melinda, was in Florida and she didn’t want to leave her. Latoya and Melinda had known each other since they both moved to Florida when they were 13.

Latoya was an 18-year-old girl with long straight hair and bangs. She was a brownskinned girl with light brown eyes wearing black jeans, a white long sleeve top, and Nike shoes. Latoya went to school, and she had friends. She lived in Florida with her family, but there was a problem: her family wanted to move back to Canada even though they had been living in Florida for five years.

Latoya told Melinda that she was moving to Canada, and Melinda wasn’t happy about that.

Latoya’s home in Florida was very fun. She preferred the weather in Florida to the weather in Canada—she liked humidity and wouldn’t get so much of it in Canada. There was

Melinda said, “No! Please stay!” So Latoya decided to stay! Latoya met with her family.

“What about if we go to Canada for a couple of months, and if you like it you can live there and I will go to school in Florida. I will just come to Canada every month if I have enough money,” Latoya said. Her family agreed! There was still a problem, though. Her family said they didn’t want her to waste all her money every month, so they said that they would come and visit her. She had to go to school and they didn’t want to mess up her time at school because she needed to learn. Latoya and Melinda decided to move in together and be

roommates. Their apartment had everything pink-ish, and there were white fluffy carpets. They had a big TV. The couch was dark white and fluffy. They ate healthy food, and Melinda cooked most of the time. They also got a puppy named Samia. They did their school work and talked about school and other things. Latoya missed her family, but she talked to them on the phone. Latoya’s parents came to visit, but they only stayed for a couple of weeks at a time because they had work to do. Everything worked out and everyone was happy!

Roly Makes a Friend

by Mai Mang

have any friends today?” and Roly said, ”Um, I think so, yes.”

My character’s name is Roly. She is 12 years old. She comes from Tokyo, Japan but she went to New York, USA to study abroad. In Japan there are a lot of flowers and Disneyland. For fun, Roly likes to draw and make art.

When her parents heard that they were really happy. This is why Roly didn’t have friends. You know that in USA there aren’t a lot of Japanese people so that’s why Roly doesn’t have any friends. Now let’s go back to the story!

You know that Roly goes to USA to study abroad, right? So the first day at school was really hard for her because she couldn’t make friends with anyone. She was really sad so she decided to not tell her parents about that.

Some days later, she made a plan to find some friends. So, she looked around her classroom at lunch. And after looking and thinking she knows who will be her friend. His name is Braden. Braden was friendly and spoke Japanese.

At the end of the school day her parents picked up Roly and said, ”Are you okay? Do you

So she came to his table and said, “Hi, do you want to be my friend?” Braden said, “Sure! Why not? So do you want to play with me and my best friend during recess?”

Roly said, “Yes!” So they played with each other during recess and now they are best friends forever! They both felt happy to have a friend.

The Amazing Adventures of Blake III!

by Moses Ayegba

dark-skinned as Mars and lives in a treehouse with a naturally sourced elevator and also has an arcade and a lab.

Once upon a time, there were two 17-year-old brothers, Hakuna and Blake, who were living in peace together with their family in the jungle. One day, they were building a treehouse, and while searching for materials, they got lost in the jungle and they got separated. But Hakuna and Blake survived! But then they were separated for three months. Now they were trying to find each other!

Hakuna is also 17 years old with long red dreads and wears a light red shirt and dark red jeans and Converse. He is also dark-skinned, also likes to time travel and has a similar treehouse like Blake’s. Like Blake III, Hakuna is also friends with all animals. Fact: Blake III and Hakuna can communicate with each other with their brains!

Time to get to know Blake and Hakuna! Blake III is a 17-yearold boy with a short blue afro with bangs. He is a time traveler and has a sweater with all the jewels in the world! He always has a hoodie on with baggy jeans and likes to time travel to the 1980s. He is as

Back to the story! One lovely Thursday morning, Blake III was ready to start early to work on the portal. He was doing well, but he didn’t know

what was coming at him very soon, otherwise he would have been scared. Meanwhile at the dark side of the jungle, the evil coconuts were trying to plan an evil trick on Blake III so he couldn’t build the portal. The portal was a lot of fun and the evil coconuts were the enemy of fun. The coconuts weren’t always evil. They became that way when they rolled into the dark side. Later on, the king of the evil coconuts said, “We should plan a sneak attack from the back entrance. He will never know we are coming!” The others agreed.

Now back to Blake. He was doing okay, but he didn’t have any souls so he had to get some. He went to a part of the jungle called Lost Souls Forest. He took jars and scooped them in. It was that simple! Later, as soon he took a step, the coconuts rolled in with a big *BANG* and everything was gone. One of the coconuts said, “Ha! What are you going to do without your portal?” Blake said, “Dude, I have a second one,” with a shrug. Then he kicked all of the coconuts out, all the way to the dark side! Then Blake continued to work on the portal!

Alien Apocalypse

by Nima Ali

fell to Earth. They stepped out of the spaceship and saw colourful grass, flowers, and houses. They tried to eat the grass. It tasted like dog poo. Even so, they thought the place was so beautiful that they wanted to stay.

Lumoon had short hair, blue jeans, and green eyes. He was a fifteen-year-old male with parents that were legends and had super powers. He wore a lot of hoodies and he loved plants. When Lumoon was younger, he got 15% on a test and he started getting bad grades and getting into fights. So his parents said they couldn’t deal with him anymore. They broke a cave from a mountain and threw it onto someone’s roof and made him live there. He did home school from there.

The aliens happened to have the names and ages of all the humans on Earth. A scientist had tried to get rid of all the people’s information and threw the five files up, wrapped in bubble wrap, and threw it into the Milky Way and a few days later it had landed on Pluto.

One day there was an alien apocalypse. A bunch of aliens from Pluto had a spaceship and it became a wreck and

The aliens had lazer guns. They started shooting at people. The people had to go to Mars. The

aliens were killing most of the people on Earth but Lumoon got most of them to Mars. Then aliens came back one day so there was war. Lumoon

and his people won and got to go back to earth. When they went back to Earth everything was gone so they had to start a new life.

My Short Story

by Olivia Lawlor

She started feeling dizzy. Her mom rushed her to the hospital because her temperature was hundred and twenty. When she got to the hospital they were all wondering if she was okay. Her mom came into the room and Isabella was awake. She got hotter, her skin was red, and if you touched her skin it would burn you. After one hour her mom saw her skin on fire. She calmed Isabella down and her temperature went down. Isabella and her mom didn’t tell anyone about her power: fire.

Once there was a girl named Isabella. She was very wealthy and lived in a mansion with her mom. She had orange and blue hair with an orange hair tie, and a red necklace. Isabella had a blue and white t-shirt with a heart on it and a tank top because her shirt was short. Her jeans were ripped blue jeans with a red lining at the top and bottom, with blue and black running shoes. Her dad was always on a business trip because he worked for a cruise ship company. Isabella went to a private school in LA and she had two best friends named Lily and Zake.

Isabella and her mom decided to keep it a secret from everyone. The only people who knew were her dad and Isabella’s mom.

One day when she was at home Isabella started burning up.

The Legend of the Gold Wonders

by Rachel Akintola

gods, goddesses, and more live. The city is really different from the human world. In our city we have rainbow sparkly foods and snacks.

Hi, my name is Lilliana. I am thirteen years old. I have light blue and purple hair. I have one blue eye and one pink eye. I am half-unicorn, half-goddess and half-human. Most of the time I look like a regular girl but since I have one pink eye and one blue eye I cover it with my hair or an eye patch. When I want to transform, it gets stormy and thunder comes and a bright light comes up, then I transform into a half unicorn-half goddess. I also like to wear light colored clothes and black shoes.

The schools are way different. The schools are sparkly and rainbow. Each classroom has walls made of gold. We don’t have many subjects at school. We only have Math, English, Mystic P.E. (a class when you open the door, you see a forest with a lot of obstacles that you have to use your wings and powers to pass), and History of Mysticism.

I live in a secret land called the Gold Wonders. It is a place where mystic creatures and people like unicorns, dragons,

The parks look regular, but when you step on the park it teleports you to the Rainbow

Play Forest. Clothing and shoes are regular colors but very sparkly. The rest of the things and places are regular. Since I am half human, I go to a regular school and live with my friend Stacy. She is also half human/half elemental goddess, and like any grade 8 student, I think it’s boring. Even though my friend and I are not fully human, we still behave like regular people but no one knows who we really are. But there is one problem in the mystic city. There used to be a really nice angel named Alex. He was nice to everyone and everything, especially the plants. One day when he was walking through the rainbow play forest he went really deep into it. Of course no one knew about it because they wouldn’t even think of going that deep. Alex came across a dark, black, stony cave that he thought seemed suspicious as everything in the forest was rainbow and green. Immediately he went inside the cave and the dark angel Tegan grabbed him and turned him into a dark angel and put all his powers into a dark magic bottle. So his job now (since he didn’t have any of his powers and couldn’t control himself since

he had become a dark angel) was to start taking all the parents of the mystic creatures in the city and capturing them into the cave. The dark angel also convinced him to take Stacy and me to the cave, but somehow we managed to escape. Since then we have been trying to defeat the dark angel Tegan but we lost countless times. We were only able to take the dark magic bottle that Alex’s power was in. Now Tegan has been trying to find us and take over the Gold Wonders and the human world so it is all in our hands to find Alex, turn him back to a light angel, and battle Tegan once again. One day, as school was over for Stacy and me, we saw a strange boy chanting some word and he transformed into a dark angel. “I think that’s Alex!” said Stacy. “We have to get him to quickly transform!” I said. At that moment we realized it was Alex. We realized we were the only ones who could help Alex because all of the other mystic creatures had already been captured by Tegan. If we didn’t, Tegan would capture

everyone in the human world and turn everything dark. We transformed into our mystic mode as fast as we could. “Ultra Transformia,” we said together as we transformed and teleported ourselves to a battlefield. After a few hours, we finally won. We gave Alex back his light powers and he transformed back to a light angel. Then we all went back to the guardian light angel because Alex was her son, and we all started to prepare for the battle against Tegan. Soon it was time for the battle, so they all transformed and teleported to the battlefield. Tegan was already there, so we suspected something was wrong. “Well, well, well if it isn’t the guardian angel and her little friends. I am unstoppable! Can’t you see that you can’t defeat me? Shadows Attack!” said Tegan. Within a blink of an eye, multiple shadows started attacking them, but we fought the shadows and defeated them.

Then it was Tegan’s turn. Tegan used her dark sword to slash the guardian angel from behind. Stacy and I attacked her together with our unicorn magic. With that we were able to discover Tegan’s weakness. “Guys I don’t think we can survive this. She is too strong. We should just give up already. She is going to defeat us any way,” said Alex. “I think we figured out her weakness!” Stacy and I said. “Her weakness is teamwork. When Stacy and I attacked together, she got a little damaged.” “We have to fuse powers!” Stacy and I said. So we fused all their powers together and attacked. We finally defeated Tegan, and all our parents were set free. We lived happily ever after with nothing to worry about. We made a peace treaty with the king of the human world, and all the mystic creatures were allowed to go to the human world in their mystic form.

The Egg Army

by Ramazan Atarman

and Ramazan didn’t know the egg army was about to arrive, and they were scared.

One day two friends named Ramazan and Jordan went to the forest and found a house there. It looked to be about 3,000 years old. Just as they were about to go inside the house, Jordan heard a noise from the sky. It was an alien! The alien spaceship landed and out came an alien! It looked just like a Dorito.

“Are we going to die?” they asked. “No,” Bob said confidently. The army arrived and Bob gave both of the friends a pair of boots so they could all stamp on the eggs.

“I’m a friendly alien and my name is Bob,” the alien said. “I come from Mars.”

Even though there were a billion eggs, the attack only lasted a few minutes as once the egg army saw their fate, they got scared and ran away back into space. Bob, Jordan and Ramazan had won the attack!

Ramazan was shocked by Bob the alien. Bob came because the egg army was coming to take over the planet! They had come from a black hole in space. Jordan

Once the attack was over, Bob said goodbye to his new friends and left in his spaceship. Jordan and Ramazan went back to their houses. They had so much excitement that they didn’t explore the old house in the end. They told their parents all about the attack from the egg army and about Bob the alien. Their parents didn’t believe them. “You’re not going to that forest again because it’s dangerous,” they said.

Steve and the Red Apple

by Ramazan Cinucen

A random kid screams, “Are you ok?”

My character is Steve. Steve likes to play Minecraft and he likes to eat red apples. He does not like green apples. Steve is 27. He wears a blue shirt, dark blue pants, and grey leather shoes, and he has brown hair and blue eyes. He really wants to get a red sports car.

Steve says, “I want to eat more red apples!” The kid says, “I’m going to call my dad for help!” The dad comes back with a chainsaw and cuts the fallen tree.

Today Steve is alone in the forest exploring and looking for red apples to make apple juice.

The kid’s dad drives Steve home and Steve gives them apple juice and apples and says, “Thank you for helping me.”

Steve knows every single trail, but a tree is blocking one and Steve gets lost. He screams, “Help! I want to eat more red apples!”

Steve goes back to play Minecraft and eat more apples!

The Monkey Scientists

by Taveyah Peters

Blake III lives in the forest. He likes to play with his friends that are animals. There is a giant gorilla in the forest and he’s the king. One day the king goes missing and all of the animals go searching for clues to find him. The clues are pieces of a map. When they put the pieces together they find out where the king is: in a lab over on the other side of the forest.

The scientists in the lab are monkeys wearing little monkey lab coats. The monkeys are doing experiments to find a way to become bigger and stronger, like the gorilla king. Blake III is with some friendly snakes and the gorilla king’s kids. They all found the lab together. There is a square door on the roof of the lab. They decide to sneak in to confront the monkey scientists!

The Bully

by Treshauna Walters

Isabella and her mom decided to keep it a secret from everyone. The only people who knew were her dad and Isabella’s mom.

One day when she was at home Isabella started burning up.

Phillip Gets Lost

by Zayd Jihad

One day his friends Midis and Kevin came to his house to play NBA 2K20. Zack and his friends were in his room playing 2k for an hour and noticed that his cat Philip was not in the room anymore. Zack asked his friends if they saw his cat and they said no. They went downstairs and checked the whole house and he was not there. Then they went to the door and saw that it was open.

Zack is my main character. He is short and has blue hair and black eyes. He is nine years old. He is funny, nice, and has a great personality. His favorite things to do are playing with his friends, Midis and Kevin. Zack lives in a house in Toronto. It has four rooms and two bathrooms. Zack’s room is on the top floor of the house. It has a big TV where he and his friends like to play video games. Zack also has a very special pet named Phillip. Phillip is not like other cats because he is a talking cat. He can only speak to Zack and the people Zack chooses, like his best friends Midis and Kevin.

“Sorry Zack, I must have left the door open when I came in,” said Kevin.

“It’s okay Kevin. I know it was a mistake, but we really need to find Philip,” said Zack. Zack was worried because he and Phillip had never been separated before and Zack was scared he would never see him again. Phillip had never run away and even when he was scared he would hide under the couch but he had never left home without Zack. He did not want to lose his best friend Phillip. Zack was very sad because he knew if he did not find Phillip, there would be no one to take care of him and he would be all alone in the streets without a warm home or a best friend. “What should we do first?” said Midis. “We need to look around the neighbourhood,” said Zack, and they all ran outside. Zack told his friends that they needed to split up so they could find Phillip faster and meet at his house in an hour. Kevin went to the school to look for the cat. He had to search every classroom to see if Phillip was there, which took a long time. After looking in all

the classrooms he searched the library, cafeteria, and washrooms and still could not find Philiip. He decided to look outside at the playground and searched the entire field and did not find him. Midis looked at the local store. He showed a picture of Phillip to the worker at the store and asked if he saw him. The worker said no, so Midis looked around the store himself. Then he went outside and asked people around the store if they had seen Philiip, but no one did so he headed back to Zack’s house. Zack walked around his neighbourhood looking for Phillip. He even searched near a smelly dumpster but could not find his cat. After, Zack went down the street near his house and asked his neighbours, but they did not see Phillip either. Zack was on his way home, sad that he would never see his cat again, when he remembered that Phillip would hide under the couch when he was scared, so he thought maybe Phillip might be hiding under a car. He started checking under cars to see if Phillip was there. After searching under all the cars in his neighbourhood he heard a meowing sound coming from

under a car and looked under it and saw his cat Phillip. Zack was so happy that he found Philip, and Philip was happy too and he jumped into his arms. Zack took Philip home and met up with Kevin and Midis. They were all so happy to see Phillip and see that he was

back home safe. They made a promise that they would keep an eye on Phillip and make sure they would close the door at all times so he did not get out again. Then all of the friends went back upstairs to continue playing NBA 2K20 .

Dragon and the Aliens

by David Tran

finished his house, he started to explore the enchanted forest.

There was a dragon named Dragon who lived in an enchanted forest ruled by Drago the Fox Dragon. Dragon was alone and felt a bit sad about it. He didn’t have any friends as he was new to the enchanted forest.

While exploring the enchanted forest, he found something that looked like a UFO. He didn’t know what it was, so he went closer to see the object better. He found some small green aliens that were the size of ants. He was both scared and surprised, so he ran away and returned home to his house. Sometimes he returned to see the aliens because he was fascinated even though he was scared.

Before he came to the enchanted forest he was in a dragon world that was in space with his family. He wanted to explore but decided to make the enchanted forest his new home. After making the enchanted forest his new home, he made his own house. He built a house with logs and leaves. When he

One day, Dragon worked up the courage to talk to the aliens. He

walked up to their UFO, which looked like a classic flying saucer, and asked what their names were. There were ten aliens, and two of them, who seemed to be the leaders, introduced themselves. “I’m Tom,” one said. His voice sounded like a fish. “I’m Sam,” said another in a very high-pitched voice. Tom and Sam each had three eyes, the rest only had two. “Where can we find fuel for our ship?” they asked in sync. “We live on a purple planet with other aliens. There’s lots of goo.” “I think I can help,” Dragon said. He got a plastic cup and filled it with rainbow water. He filled the fuel tank and the UFO shot into the sky. Dragon followed the ship into space. He wanted to see something new. On the purple gooey planet, Dragon explored for a while. It was similar to earth, but gooier.

After a while, he realized he was lost. He couldn’t tell the aliens apart, so he couldn’t find Tom and Sam. He tried to fly back to enchanted forest, but got lost and then stuck in a shower of flying objects. Then suddenly he saw his home world, the dragon space world. The world had expanded and turned rainbow couloured. Dragon’s family lived in the center of the planet, which was flat like a plate. He found his parents doing work on their computers. “We are so shocked to see you,” Dragon’s parents said. “You were gone a whole five years.” From then on, the family had a good life. They taught other dragons how to fly and they played computer games.

My Story

by Esme Loo Ng

on a smaller one. The leaves smell like tofu.

Drago is a dragon and fox at the same time. He eats the coronavirus! In the summer he breathes fire and in winter breathes ice. Other people like him. His roommate is named Ice. Drago does not get along with his brother. His brother lives in a different cave.

When Drago is all by himself he likes to explore the outside world. He is forbidden from going to the human city. His mother forbade him because humans are dangerous (according to his mother). When he’s with Ice they play a game together called Hide and Sneak. It can only be played at night. They use their sense of smell to find each other. Sometimes Ice gets scared. In the day they play Hide and Seek.

Drago lives in the Enchanted Forest. He sees trees, trees are of all sizes. There are lots of flowers. There is a mountain in the middle of the forest. Drago’s cave is next to it. There is a ramp that leads all around the mountain. Inside the cave it looks like a regular cave. There’s a huge leaf that Drago sleeps on. Ice sleeps

They are in the Forest playing Hide and Sneak. What they don’t know is that they are being watched and that the

forest is haunted. There’s a secret demon on the loose that’s hiding. He has a magical wand that lets him get into the forest. Drago and Ice think that everyone else is sleeping, and they think they’re the only ones outside playing. They have no idea that the Demon is there too. The Demon is going to try to take over the forest by getting rid of Drago by snatching him and putting him into a bag that he’ll throw into the garbage. It’s not any kind of garbage, it’s the garbage that’s in the city. The Demon is hoping that Drago gets caught by the humans and then they will take him to a lab to study and do tests on him. The Demon is watching Drago and following him. He grabs him and puts Drago into the bag. Drago is trying to get out but the Demon is prepared for Drago and his superpowers. The Demon’s boss is the Devil and he knew what Drago could do with his sharp claws and fiery breath so he made sure the bag was fire, ice and scratch proof. Ice has no idea this is happening. So when Drago is in the huge bag that is only ten inches bigger than Drago there is also a can of beans. Drago hates beans. He wants to

throw them out. The smell of them is grossing him out and he hates it. He actually hates the smell even more than he hates lollipops. When he gets dumped he doesn’t really know where he is because it’s dark. The Demon isn’t aware that there are kids near the dump. The Demon just leaves. The kids go look and they try to open the bag, but it’s hard for them. When they finally open the bag, they find Drago with the beans. Drago screams and flies up but then he quickly flies back down because his wing is broken. The kids just say, “Whoa! A dragon fox!” They don’t really seem scared. One of the kids just learned about dragon foxes in his history class and he didn’t believe they existed. Now that he’s seen one, he can’t believe it. There are three boys and one girl. That boy decides to take Drago home and sneak him into his house. Luckily he lives in a mansion and his room is huge, so Drago fits in there no problem. There’s even a bouncy castle in the room. This boy has five dogs and five cats. He has always wanted a pet dragon, but even cooler is a pet dragon fox.

Drago doesn’t know how to get home. Drago is feeling weird. He doesn’t know if the boy is going to kill him because his mom always told him that humans were dangerous, especially children. The boy wants to do something nice, so he gives Drago a lollipop. But Drago hates lollipops and freaks out. He tries not to lose his temper so he runs around the boy’s room twenty times. Luckily the boy’s parents are away visiting his grandmother in California and they can’t hear all the noise. All the running makes Drago so tired that he falls asleep on one of the cat’s beds, but he breaks it. Once Drago is sleeping, Jacob, the boy, sees that Drago doesn’t like lollipops so he gets Drago chocolate instead. There are many kinds of chocolate: dark, light, white chocolate too. There are even apples just in case. The boy also has a sister, and she faints when she sees the dragon. Drago finally wakes up, sees the chocolate and eats it all. But he eats so much that he throws up.

The boy lives on the other side of the city. Drago is trying to talk to the boy. He only speaks “Fox” but he is able to write in English because he went to school. It isn’t an ordinary school. It is like home school but it is dragon school and he learns different languages there. So he writes down a message to Jacob, and Jacob understands that he has to get Drago back to the Enchanted Forest before the scientists find him and start to do testing on him. So the boy and Drago start their adventure to return to the Enchanted Forest. Along the way they get to know each other and they discover that they have a lot in common and that they want to be friends. Once they get to the edge of the forest, Drago has to go. But the friends decide to meet often. They also decide that they will make a plan to one day defeat the demon.

Squidson’s Best Day

byJayden Le

gets a job in one of the offices. People are nice. Sometimes the workers party in the office after work. They get snacks, like chips and chocolate, and listen to funky music. They have so much fun they make a mess! After, they clean it all up.

Squidson is a squid monkey. He lives in a city in Cloudtown. One day Squidson is going for a walk. Squidson sees other squids and cloud buildings. Suddenly Squidson sees a car crash. It’s a 300 year old car. He decides it’s not his business and he walks away. He goes to the ice cream shop. He orders an apple ice cream in a cone. But he doesn’t have any money.

Squidson works for 24 hours, then he walks back to the ice cream store. He orders his apple ice cream cone and feels happy. Squidson eats his ice cream, and then walks home. Squidson has met fun new friends at the office and is going to go back the next day.

Squidson decides to look for a job. He looks at a tall building that has many offices. A lot of workers are walking in and out of the front doors. He applies for a job in real estate and

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And then the next day he goes back to work. After work they have another party. They invite the ice cream shop owner, and he brings fruit ice cream: strawberry, apple, raspberry, and banana. After the party they all head to the park. It is afternoon and sunny. They see a bunch of people chasing a famous person (Squidson the Deejay, who is a squid-koala). Squidson the Deejay does not realize he is being chased by the crowd because he is running away from the police. He has robbed a bank and,

while he was running away, caused a car crash. This time Squidson (the good Squidson) helps the person in the car (named John) by calling 911. Squidson pulls John out of the car to see if they are injured. They are kinda injured. The ambulance comes and helps. Everyone goes to the hospital. The driver is okay. John decides to quit his job and get a job in the office with Squidson. John never drives his car ever again. Squidson and John play ball in the afternoon.

Toothpaste to be Nice to da Shark

by Naaneka Palmer and Justin Arana-Cajamarca

Squidson and all their friends jumped into the clouds to start swimming. The cloud plane crashed into the beach and turned into more ice cream sandwiches.

Once there was a cloud world where flying squids lived. In this cloud world, there was a beach made of ice cream sandwiches. The flying squids loved to swim in the blue clouds surrounding the beach.

As Squidson was swimming away from the crash, a magic tree below made Squidson’s brain switch with Drago, their Dragonfox frenemy from the enchanted forest below!

One day at the beach, Squidson Washington III and their friends had taken lollipops off their sticks to play with them like beach balls. All of a sudden a cloud plane was about to crash into the beach!

At that moment, Drago was flying through the sky in a game of fox-dragon tag, which was like hide and seek mixed with tag, high above the treeline (the dragons used clouds to hide from

“Everyone get out of the way!” Squidson yelled. “There’s a plane coming!”

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each other). Drago was chasing another fox dragon when they suddenly found themselves transported into Squidson’s body. For both of them, it was a very weird feeling. Suddenly, in the cloud ocean, a baby shark came towards Squidson and their friends. Usually, Squidson was afraid of baby sharks, but Drago as Squidson was not, they released their special ink that was like blue toothpaste at the shark, which made the baby shark’s teeth

clean and beautiful. This was important because the shark had a thousand teeth! Just then, Squidson was having a very difficult time flying in Drago’s body. They were used to flying as themselves. They crashed into the squid cloud ocean and into Drago as Squidson. When Drago crashed into Squidson they both returned to their regular bodies. Everything went back to normal, except now the baby shark had very, very clean teeth.

Dragon the Dragon Makes a Friend

by Salma Noor

“Ouch!” they both said at the same time.

Dragon the dragon was alone in the Enchanted Forest and felt a bit sad about it. He didn’t have any friends right then because he’d just arrived there. Before he came to the Enchanted Forest he lived in Dragon Space World with his family. It was pretty much a regular home. He left Dragon Space World to explore, but got lost along the way and now he couldn’t find his way home.

“Hello,” said Dragon the dragon. “Hello!” said the other dragon. “My name is Blaze.” “My name is Dragon,” said Dragon. “Are you new here as well?” “I have been here for my whole life!” said Blaze.

Before now, Dragon hadn’t ever left his home, so he found it hard to get back straight away.

“Wow!” said Dragon the dragon. “I am new here and I’m trying to find my way back home.”

Dragon was exploring the Enchanted Forest when he bumped into another dragon. He was so surprised!

“Where do you live?” asked Blaze.

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“I’m from Dragon Space World. It’s in space.”

went on Dragon and Blaze became better friends.

“Actually, I think I know the way to the Dragon World!” said Blaze.

First they started driving, and then they started asking questions to get to know each other.

Dragon the dragon was very happy to hear this. He flew around with joy.

Dragon asked, “What’s your favourite colour and favourite food?”

“It’s very far away,” warned Blaze. “It will take at least four days to get there!”

Blaze said, “My favourite colour is green, that’s why I picked this old car that’s green!”

Blaze had a very, very old car that they were going to use to get to Dragon World. The car was green and rusty with a lot of scratches. Even though it was old, the car could fly through space, but you had to drive it for four whole days before it would fly.

Dragon told Blaze that his favourite colour was red.

Dragon and Blaze got to Blaze’s house to pack up for their trip. Blaze packed two toothbrushes, one tent, some money ($50), two pairs of shoes, and two jackets. Luckily Dragon the dragon had a bunch of food, so they packed that too. They made a couple of gas station stops along the way to buy more food and for bathroom breaks. As the drive

After driving for four whole days Blaze pushed a button on the car and the space feature opened. They were flying in space! Once they were in space it only took two minutes to get to Dragon Space World. When they landed, Dragon ran back to his home. He went up to his parents and gave them a big hug. He was so happy. Blaze said goodbye and went back to the Enchanted Forest. Blaze said that he would always come back and visit Dragon in the Dragon Space World. Dragon knew he’d made a friend in Blaze and he didn’t feel so lonely anymore.

The Quest

by Umar Abdulaziz

Jack’s friend but now they were no longer friends because they used to get into lots of problems. They would sometimes argue about where to go. Jack once called the police, but the police didn’t care.

There was a person named Jack who had a pet dog named David, and they lived in a tiny house. Jack had black eyes and brown hair, and he always wore a black shirt with brown pants and red shoes. David had brown eyes and half of his body was black and the other half was brown.

To solve this problem, Jack had been trying to raise money so he could sneakily move somewhere else at night, but David kept on biting the money. Jack decided to pretend that he was homeless so that people could give him money. This plan worked and he was able to get enough money to move somewhere else.

Their house was made out of wood, and they had one bed to share. They usually met friends at the park since they were very nice. They sometimes got ice cream. Jack’s favorite was chocolate, and David’s favorite was strawberry. Every week, Bill always showed up at their house. Bill used to be

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Drago and His Frenemy Squidson

by Wahaj Malik

Once upon a time there was a Squidmonkey named Squidson Washington III, and a Dragonfox named Drago. Let’s begin with the story of Squidson...

The next day, Squidson was battling his frenemy Drago (who ruled the Enchanted Forest). They knew each other from even before they were born—in their mothers’ separate bellies.

Squidson’s Origin Story of Flying

Despite their history, Drago didn’t know that Squidson could fly, as Squidson was still trying to learn how to fly the last time Drago saw him. Just as Drago was about to defeat Squidson, Squidson flew! Drago was so surprised that he lost concentration and Squidson used his tentacle-hit move. The hit was only kinda powerful, but Drago lost a lot of power, so he was knocked into a nap for the whole afternoon (also known as an afternoon nap).

Squidson was learning to fly and got incredibly tired. He could not fly. After a while Squidson sat down on a cloud to rest, but the cloud was squishy and soft and Squidson fell through it. He was so scared that he yelled, “Fly tentacles, fly!” His tentacles were jiggling in the sky so quickly that he flew.

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Drago’s Origin Story Drago used to live in a magical dragon realm. In this realm there was a magic fountain, and whenever a new dragon was born it was taken to the fountain and assigned an element. If the new dragon wasn’t taken to the fountain, they wouldn’t have any magical powers. When Drago was born, he became the ruler of the realm because he was stronger than all the other dragons and learned all the elements. Only the ruler could learn all the elements—the other dragons could only learn one. When Drago became ruler, Squidson brought in an entire army to the dragon realm. “I was never your friend, Drago. I just wanted to destroy your realm once you were ruler!” Squidson said. Drago didn’t expect that because Drago thought they were friends as Squidson had been nice to him, but it had all been an evil plot! Squidson’s army destroyed Drago’s entire realm, so Drago used the axe-summon-slash to create the Enchanted Forest.

How Drago Learned the Axe-Summon-Slash After Drago’s entire realm was destroyed, Drago and his people had to go to find another realm, but Drago went on a separate journey to find a realm. He was tired after trying to find a realm. He saw a cave nearby, and he went inside. He didn’t know there were challenges inside the cave. He had to fight monsters to get through. Once he had defeated them all, he found a scroll at the end of the cave. It was full of techniques of how to do axesummon-slash. He read the scroll. Then he went to find his people. He found them and used axe-summon-slash in front of them and created the Enchanted Forest.

The Separation After winning their last battle, Squidson demanded a tax from Drago’s people: the chickendonkey and other dragons. Squidson needed money to repair the cloud village, which had suffered from many damages in past battles with Drago. Drago had damaged the cloud world, because in the past Squidson (who had been his friend) brought an army to

destroy Drago’s realm, which was a magical dragon world. After the dragon world was destroyed, Drago became even more powerful and ruled over the Enchanted Forest. In the present, Drago was very upset after he lost the most recent battle. One good thing had come out of it: he’d remembered an old move called axe-summon-slash. It was an important move because it was legendary. He’d used axe-summon-slash to create the Enchanted Forest. He had

forgotten it since then, but remembered it now. The next day Drago and Squidson started to fight again. Drago used the axe-summonslash on Squidson. Drago was just about to win, which would have given Squidson’s realm a lot of damage, but then Drago’s father appeared. Drago’s father was legendary. He had a power move: he separated the two realms. Now Squidson and Drago’s realms were super far apart and they never fought again! Dun dun dunnnnnnn.

Drago and the Bearasaur

by Yasmin Jeilani

poker and then used the poker to push a button and lower the bridge.

One day Drago left their house to meet a new friend. Drago was a part dragon, part fox. They were 12 years old.

Drago crossed the bridge and went inside. When Drago got to the throne room, they saw that the T-Rex was gone. One of T-rex’s servants was there instead. The servant introduced himself to Drago. He was a half-bear, half-triceratops named Bearasaur.

The first place that Drago went was Animal Castle. Animal Castle was a castle filled with animals. The biggest animal in the Enchanted Forest, a T-Rex named Rex, lived in the castle and ruled all who lived there. Drago ran into some trouble crossing the bridge. It was up, so they couldn’t get across. Drago asked a few of the animals to help them gather wood. Once they’d gathered enough wood, Drago nailed it all together to make a long

Bearasaur was nice. He told Drago that the T-rex would be gone all day. Drago told Bearasaur to quit his job because being a servant was too tiring. So, Bearasaur quit his job and left the castle with Drago.

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The next day the T-rex went back to his castle. He noticed that his drawbridge was down and asked some other animals who had been there. The animals told T-Rex that Drago had come by to talk to T-Rex. T-rex went looking for his servants, but he didn’t find any. They’d all quit! Through his window he saw Drago flying around the forest. T-rex decided to ask Drago where all of his servants went. Drago told T-Rex that he hadn’t seen his servants, but secretly he’d told them all to hide in the cloud world so that they could be free. The T-rex left the Enchanted Forest to go look for the servants. Once he had left,

Drago told Bearasaur to come out of hiding. Drago built a house for Bearasaur right next to his house. The T-rex gave up on being the king because he was sick of all the work, he never got to go outside, and he didn’t have any friends. T-Rex was lonely, so he left the Enchanted Forest forever. He moved to an island filled with other dinosaurs and became friends with them. Drago and the Bearasaur were so happy. The king was gone and they were free! Drago and Bearasaur became best friends and lived happily ever after.

Fire and Friends

by Zayd Mohamed-Inshaf

friends with Squidson because Squidson was nice.

Fire the dragon was born in a mountain far away. He was a big dragon with big wings, two big horns, and a tail with a triangle at the end. He had a special power, which was breathing fire out of his mouth. He used his special power to keep warm and to go and get food, like deer and anteaters.

Fire first met Squidson II at the small island where everyone went to see the sunset. It was the most beautiful place to see the sunset. When someone was bleeding, Squidson treated them with first aid right away, without thinking. After that, Fire wanted to make friends with him.

He lived with a roommate called Ice. Ice was just like Fire but the opposite. She looked like Fire, but her scales were white, and she used her ice power to make ice cream and ice cups to keep cool.

Squidson was scared of the candy asteroids, so he had wandered into the deep sea. Only when the candy asteroids stopped coming would Squidson come back. The candy asteroids were big and they got heavier and heavier when they got to the atmosphere,

Fire’s goal in life was to make friends with Squidson II, a squid who lived in the deep sea. He wanted to make

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then slowed down and destroyed people’s homes. To stop the candy asteroids, only Fire and Ice could do it together. Ice said she would only do it if Fire got an ice crystal from the other side of the world. Fire said okay. He went alone but met some friends. There was an obstacle to get the ice crystal. He had to pass the obstacles in the five story tower. For example, he had to walk on water without making the water ice. There were also four other towers with two stories each. Fire passed all the obstacles. The ice crystal was so far up it hit a bit of the atmosphere. Fire had to go all the way up to get it. But there was a trap: if you got the ice crystal, the tower would fall down and break. But Fire could fly! He got the crystal, which was sparkly and in a diamond

shape and small and really powerful (even when the sun hit it, it could make ice). But it had a curse: whatever touched it would turn into ice. The only way to break the spell was with fire. Fire took a cloth and held it, and the cloth turned into ice. Fire did all he could and breathed lots of fire at it. It worked! He took the crystal back to his side of the world. When she got the crystal, Ice said she would help Fire defeat the candy asteroids. She made a thick layer of ice over the land, and Fire made sure everyone was warm. The candy asteroids hit the ice instead of the earth, so the land was protected. Squidson heard the news. He came back up from the deep sea. After he heard who had saved the land, he made friends with both Fire and Ice.

Four Eyed Willy and the Saturn Centaurs

by Gavi Engel-Yan

big breath and burned down the whole forest. Some fire caught on one of Four Eyed Willy’s shoulders! Four Eyed Willy inhaled and blew out the fire on his shoulder. His shoulder was burned and his home was destroyed.

Once upon a time there was a centaur named Four Eyed Willy. Four Eyed Willy was a Saturn centaur because he lived in a forest on Saturn. One day Four Eyed Willy was walking with his favourite tree (oh, did I mention that all the trees in the forest could talk and walk?). Suddenly Four Eyed Willy heard a sound. It was the sound of the dragon’s evil fiery breath. Four Eyed Willy’s favourite tree ran away and so did all the other trees, animals, creatures, and even Four Eyed Willy.

Suddenly it started pouring rain luckily, which extinguished the fire. But there was something special about the rain: it was healing rain. One drop of the healing rain got on Four Eyed Willy’s shoulder and healed his burn. The flying centaurs, who lived on one big cloud above the forest shaped like a tree, saw what happened to the Saturn

Unfortunately, since Four Eyed Willy had been walking for so long his legs were too tired to run. The dragon inhaled a very

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centaur’s home: their beautiful forest was now just ashes. The cloud centaurs invited the Saturn centaurs to live on their cloud. The Saturn creatures said yes!

Each flying centaur flew down, put one or more creatures on their back, and flew back to the cloud home. They kept on doing that until all the creatures were on one big cloud, and they all lived happily ever after.

The Centaur’s Quest

by Zachary Rayment

rising up from an ancient mountain said to be the lair of a dragon. Thunderhorn was shocked. The mountain hadn’t smoked for almost a thousand years.

Chapter 1: Mysterious Smoke The SkyCity of Tameran was peaceful as Thunderhorn and his falcon Storm flew high through the skies. Thunderhorn was one of the few flying centaurs in Tameran. Thunderhorn did a loop-d-loop midair and Storm dived and did other types of acrobatics.

Storm had noticed it too, “Burn my feathers!” he shouted, terrified. They raced back to the city to report what they had seen.

“You’re going to nail the flying race this year,” Storm said.

Chapter 2: Orange Fire

Thunderhorn knew it, he had practiced hard all year and was feeling confident. He was about to race Storm back to the village when he saw smoke

Four-eyed Willy was galloping around the trees picking apples as he went. He was a centaur from the forest tribe. It was a normal day in the forest,

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nevertheless, Four-eyed Willy felt something was wrong. He frequently looked up at the Mountain, muttering things like, “Something’s about to happen”, or “I feel the forest chill in my bones!” The feeling of unease subsided; just when he was about to calm down, he saw an orange burst of fire from the mountain. He rubbed all four of his eyes to make sure he wasn’t imagining things. Then he ran back to his village, blowing a warning cry from his horn as he went. Chapter 3: The Meeting of the Clans Both clan chiefs of Tameran had heard about the smoke sightings and called an emergency meeting in the valley. Thunderhorn, Storm, and Foureyed Willy were all waiting nervously at the back. In an attempt to ease the tension, Storm cracked some jokes like, “That dragon must have a pretty bad cold to sneeze out all that fire!”, but it didn’t help. Finally the clan chiefs agreed to send out one member from each clan to investigate the source of the fire and the smoke. They wanted to know the problem so they could try and fix it.

Thunderhorn and Storm plucked up their courage and agreed to go on behalf of their Clan. Four-eyed Willy agreed to go as well, and that day they set off. Chapter 4: Journey of the Centaurs The first obstacle they faced was the great ravine. Thunderhorn and Storm could have just flown over, but because of Four-eyed Willy they had to find a path through. After doing some scouting, Storm spotted a broken down path that they could take. They traveled along the dusty trail. Suddenly, a giant spider jumped out from behind a crevice! Four-eyed Willy saw it coming and had his bow ready. He shot the spider in its biggest eye. Then they all rushed away from the spider. They were through the canyon, but still had to go through Broken Down Woods. Many of its trees were violent - they were mad at humans for cutting down trees in their forest! Four-eyed Willy, Thunderhorn and Storm cautiously made their way through the forest, they made sure they stayed in the center of the path and kept their weapons drawn.

They were walking past a large oak when it bent down and grabbed Four-eyed Willy! Thunderhorn and Storm immediately took to the air. Thunderhorn dived toward the oak tree and cut off the front branches with a slash of his sword. The oak tree dropped Four-eyed Willy on the ground hooves first! The heroes dashed out of the forest. As they were leaving Storm cracked a joke, “That tree is definitely rotting!” Climbing the mountain was easier than they had thought, a trail had already been carved, so they made it to the top by nightfall. Chapter 5: Battling the Dragon Once they arrived at the top of the mountain, they saw a large opening and inside was a glittering red dragon. Four-eyed Willy and Thunderhorn immediately drew their weapons. When the dragon heard the

sound of a sword being drawn from its sheath he suddenly woke up and attacked the centaurs with a belt of fire! Thunderhorn and Storm rose into the air and Four-eyed Willy galloped around trying to get a shot at the dragon. When Four-eyed Willy had fired his first arrow he realized that the scales protected the dragon from any attack. He told this to Thunderhorn who dived at the dragon with his sword. The dragon took to the air to meet Thunderhorns attack. With the dragon’s underbelly exposed, Four-eyed Willy started firing his arrows viciously at the dragon’s belly and wings. Finally, when the dragon was losing altitude, Thunderhorn stabbed him through the mouth finishing off the vicious dragon for good. The trio went back to the valley, reported everything to the clan chiefs and Tameran was peaceful once more.

1. Get a pen or pencil and some paper. 2. Find an object in your home. It can be a spatula, a bed

sheet, a DVD, a table, a chair, a plant, a sculpture! Play with how big or how small the objects are.

3. Write in the voice of that object. What would it say if it only had one chance to speak? 4. It can be their secret thoughts and dreams, a bedtime story, an angry speech. The possibilities are endless.

5. What would it say to the person that uses it the most?

Would it be angry or happy or thankful?

6. Read the piece out loud and find their voice and rhythm. 7. Keep finding different objects and writing different stories. YOU CAN ALSO: 8. Use the object like a puppet, and make it talk! Make sure you choose an object that isn’t easily breakable.

9. Make different objects talk to each other. What would their interaction be like?

10. Place your objects in different locations. What would they say there?

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Get in touch! We love hearing from folks (especially the little ones)!

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until next time...

Le t y o u r s t o r y shine br i g ht!

Talking trees and evil coconuts. Lost dogs and best friends. Fantastic discoveries and false accusations. The stories in these pages are a portal to the imaginations of students during the COVID-19 pandemic, a time when real life was almost stranger than fiction.

ISBN 9780991884155

9 780991 884155