Billy the second grader was swinging on the playground, daydreaming. He daydreamed about many things. He daydreamed about what was for dinner, his imaginary twin, Timmy, his real life best friend, Sally, and the race cars he'd get to play with once school was done for the day. While he was daydreaming, he remembered a conversation he overheard his parents had that morning about "how the world was just falling apart right before my eyes." He started to wonder what they meant by that and what that would look like. He started to imagine it as little pieces of the sky just falling off and tumbling to the ground. They would land with a huge bang and the whole world would shake as pieces of the sky came crashing down.

At that moment, the fifth-graders’ kickball struck the swing set poles. There was a loud crash and the swing set shook. Billy, remembering his parents' conversation earlier that morning and thinking about his daydream, knew it was the world falling apart. He began to run towards the school for protection, feeling like the sky could not possibly crush the school's strong roof.

As Billy started running, he ran straight into Sara, who asked him what was the matter.

“My parents said the world was falling apart and it’s happening right now! I heard it just now!” Billy panted.

Sara joined him in his run. The more kids they passed, the more questions they asked. First the second-graders asked what was happening, and once Billy explained, they joined Billy and Sara. Then the third-graders, then the fourth-graders, and then even the fifth-graders joined the mass of children running towards the school.

Right in front of the school’s entrance was Mrs. Smith, the second-grade teacher. When she saw the massive huddle of children running towards her, she whistled so loud it brought all the kids to a halt.

“What’s wrong?” Mrs. Smith asked the fifth-graders.

“The fourth-graders said that the world was falling apart,” they declared.

When Mrs. Smith asked the fourth-graders, they pointed to the third-graders. And when she asked the third-graders, they pointed to the second-graders. And when she asked the second-graders, they pointed to Sara. And when she asked Sara, she pointed to Billy.

Billy, out of breath, explained how he had heard the loud bang and how his parents said the world was falling apart and that was happening right now!

“Our kickball hit your swing set,” one of the fifth-graders noted. “Was that the loud bang you heard and the reason the swing set shook?”

“And parents are sometimes dramatic,” Mrs. Smith reminded the children. “They don’t always mean exactly what they say.”

Billy gave this some thought and calmed down. Maybe his parents were just being dramatic and the kickball just happened to hit right as he was considering the world ending. The other kids considered it too, and they too began to calm down.

“Now, everyone go enjoy the end of recess,” Mrs. Smith said, “before you must return to class.”

All the children ran back to where they were previously playing. Even Billy returned to the swing set to swing and daydream about life.

Author's Notes:

The story was based on The Foolish, Timid Rabbit. The Foolish, Timid Rabbit is a lot like the story I had heard growing up called Chicken Little. Both focus on a scared animal that jumps to a conclusion and ends up scaring all the rest of them.

I think the story deals with a lot of mob mentality and no age group represents mob mentality like elementary school children. Whenever I read the story, I just imagined all of the animals running around acting like children, because they acted on so little knowledge and instantly just went a little crazy. So that's why I changed my story for the main character to be a second grader and for it to take place at an elementary school. When writing the story, I wanted to start with a young grade and work my way up to an older grade. I thought this would show that with mob mentality it doesn’t matter who started it, once it gets going, people will join. It also is similar how in the original story, the panic started with the smallest animal and then worked its way up to the largest animal, going from the rabbits to the elephants.

Originally reading it, it was crazy to me that every single animal got so involved after not knowing the original source, especially the big elephants who are always described as wise. It took a teacher, far removed from the situation and wiser than the children (much like The King Lion in the original story The Foolish, Timid Rabbit) to get the kids to calm down. I really enjoyed writing this story and am proud of how it turned out.

Bibliography: "The Foolish Timid Rabbit" from Jataka Tales by Ellen C. Babbitt. Web Source

Image Information: Swing Set from Flickr Images

Playground from Flickr Images

Kickball from Flickr Images

Stop Sign from Flickr Images