Student Stories
The following stories were written by students at one of my schools during a chain writing activity. I won’t put their names or year in this post. I purposefully left all of the original mistakes in the text – so these are copied verbatim, incorrect capitalization, punctuation, spelling, and grammar included. I have been correcting these for about 2 days, and thought I’d share some of the ones that struck me as particularly interesting. This is not to make fun of their English (though I excuse native speakers who giggle at the funny stuff), but to show what kind of weird stuff comes out when you tell them to write with a time limit and nearly zero direction. It also shows you the level of English that I tend to deal with in high schools. Each story was written by a group of 4 in 5 minute shifts without any outside ideas. I hope you enjoy it.
Sometimes you get the story that tacks on a bit of a contradictory explanation of its mood at the very end as a closing. Didn’t sound all that happy to me, unless you count watching a bully get scolded as “happy.”
There is a 12-year-old boy named Taro. He is being bullied by a bully named Ken. One day, when Taro went to school, there was Ken in front of classroom. Taro stopped there, too. Ken punched Taro. Taro became angry. Taro informed against Ken for his teacher. And Ken was scolded the teacher for long times. Ken think about himself. This is happy story.
Here’s an example of a storyline getting pulled in 4 different directions, where the last kid gets the final word on what actually happened. Ha ha. This kid likes using sudden death by another character’s digestive tract as a deus ex machina. (Did it in every story the group wrote. Ha ha.)
Once upon a time, Many sheeps and sheepherder are lived on highest mountain. There looks a calm mountain. But a terrible wild animal deep into the forest. One day, many hungry tigers attack his sheeps. Then one man appeared. And he fought the tigers!! But he was eaten by the tigers. The tigers conquered around the world. The tigers is very nice!!
This was the sweetest / most romantic of the bunch. Stuck out because the group was mostly guys…hmmm…what is up with that, anyway?
Once upon time, there is normal man. His name is Nick. He live a single life. One day a beautiful girl appeared in front of him. He was fascinated at her. He fell in love with her. She noticed him. At that time he unconsciously shouted, “Shall we have a tea? Do you have time?” The beautiful woman answered. They had a tea together. They fell in love each other and had marriage.
Here’s an example of the intrusion of other foreign languages into my English lessons! The French was entirely their doing. They even wrote “Fin” at the end. I have to admit, I was kind of proud. I did that in high school – more than once, if I remember correctly.
A long time ago, there was a man who was bullying everyone. His name is Davide. He is from Mars. He always thinks about everyone, and make them fun. Because he is from Mars, he has strange power. He could speak with animals, so a lot of men could listen to their pet’s opinion and become friend with them. He is wonderful man that can speak anything. He is perfect man. His earth life is a test that whether he could king. or not. He came back to mars!! Fin.
Here is an example of a disturbing story. Yikes.
Suzuki is a pitcher in the baseball team. That day, he practice to master a slider as usual. Then he hurt his shoulder by throwing too much. He was very sad. He gave up the baseball. He began the soccer. But he hurt his legs. He gave up all sports. He was at a loss and killed himself.
Here is a great example of the dictionary being your enemy. I think he meant “he was able to breathe underwater,” but I’m not gonna bother to look that up. I just placed a thousand ? marks around the offending section. Ha ha.
One day, A Person went to camping with his friend. They enjoyed fishing. Then a big fish was appeared. Supprisingly, he was eaten by the big fish. “Wom….” he said. After ten years, he returned from the river. He lived in liver 10 years. He has become branchial respiration.
This would be another slightly disturbing story. Really.
Once upon a time, a old man live in small town. He went to shopping to department store. He went there to buy washing machine for his wife. Because he felt sorry for her washing in the river. The river was dyed red. Because World War IV was happened. Because his wife continued to wash. their clothes became red.
Here is a great example of students ragging on their teachers through their English assignments. (Oh yes, this happens.) This time they were egging him on, though. He was thrilled when he read it. He’s a good guy. I dunno about the glasses, though.
Oence upon a time. There were a pair of glass in 202 classroom. All students of 202 thought whose glasses were they. One day, a student wore the glasses. Then he saw a strange view. He was very surprise. Then a teacher came. He laughed and speaked to everyone. “That is my magic glasses. If you wear that, you can be a cool boy like me.” The teacher was W. Takashi.
This next kind of story is another rollercoaster. Plots shouldn’t just be a negation of what the first person said. But sometimes that is what happens. I blame the time limit. (No I don’t. I blame laziness.)
One day, a dog was born in Imabari. The dog was named “Pochi.” In fact, it was very very smart dog. It can speak words slightly. There were a word that it always said. One day, the dog run away from his house saying a word. It said “I can fly!” It tried to fly in the sky. But it failed. So it said “I can’t fly.”
What happens when most people in Asia are lactose intolerant? Really goofy stories about the perils of drinking milk. Of course, some ideas are more -ahem- supportive of milk…
Once upon a time, a girl is very short. She wants to be tall. So she drinks milk every day. But, she couldn’t be tall. She got angry about that. And… At last she gave up trying that. And she tried to reach up all the time. But, she couldn’t be tall. Because she drank much milk, she became caw. She said moooo. At last, she became big. Her weight is 300 kg.
This happens a lot too – the “everybody is scared to commit to an idea so we’ll just write a vague sentence and let the next person decide what the heck this story is about” method of writing. Vague indeed. At least we know he’s an elf. So?
Once upon a time, there was a boy. The boy lived in a forest alone. He have a difference with everyone. His appearance was more beautiful than other person. So he was a elf. One day, when he walked in the forest, he encountered wonder.
That’s all for now. Ha ha. Hope you enjoyed it. 
