Week 4 Story: The Student Without a Team

Mark really didn't like to take sides. If given the option, he would stay a third party observer to any conflict near him. This became relevant one day as he was attending his classes. His class was setting up for a debate, and Mark wanted to be close enough not to get called out for not participating, without having to actually choose a side. As the preparations for the debate began, both sides approached him, asking for his allegiance. He turned them both down, saying he had already partnered with the other group.
Finally, the debate occurred. It was a fiercely fought battle, and though no clear winner was declared, both sides felt good about the outcome. The professor, wanting to be nice, offered extra credit to anyone who wrote up a summary of their team's debate. Not wanting to miss out on a grade boost, Mark tried to join one group, then the other. Predictably, they both turned him down, believing him to be on the other team.
Still not wanting to miss out on the points, Mark instead decided to petition the teacher. He argued that this bonus assignment was trivial and ultimately useless to their learning and instead proposed a simple quiz in its place. However, the professor had already received a list of the participants of each side of the debate and noticed Mark's name wasn't on there. Now privy to Mark's attempted deception, the professor declined Mark's new idea, and gave him some advice:
"If you have make no friends before the battle, don't expect to be invited to the after party, and know that self-interested advice is often biased beyond use."

A visual depiction of one of the fables this story is based on.

Author's Note: This story is based on a combination of two of Aesop's fables: The Fox Without a Tail, where a fox loses his tail and attempts to convince the rest of the foxes that they should intentionally remove theirs, and The Bat, the birds, and the Beasts, where a bat refuses to take sides in an upcoming war, but it is averted at the last second and the bat has no one to celebrate with, each side believing him to be a member of the other. I took these stories, merged the main characters to one human, and placed it in the present day.


Bibliography: Fables by Aesop (Jacobs) - The Fox Without a Tail, and The Bat the Birds, and the Beasts

Comments

  1. AdrianFebruary 11, 2018 at 9:34 PM

    I really liked how you combined two stories into one story that incorporated the major themes from both stories. I enjoyed the modern take on two of the classic Aesop Fables. I think your retelling does a very good job of encapsulating the moral behind these fables and it would be something I used if I were trying to teach young children these morals as they could probably relate well to the modern version. Your story left me wondering how Mark reacted to being given advice from the teacher and if he felt bad trying to deceive everyone or if he was angry that no one wanted him on his team anymore. That makes me think, what if you explored more of Mark’s feelings throughout the story. You could elaborate more on why he didn’t want to take sides and then how he felt after being excluded by everyone after the end of the debate.

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  2. UnknownFebruary 15, 2018 at 10:04 AM

    Joe,

    Nice job blending mythology with a typical school setting. I think that, especially for this class, it makes it easy to access. In the future, I think that it would really augment your story to have some dialogue put in, especially for a story about a debate. I would've been interested to hear what they debated about and why it was so close.

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