The Recycled Scarecrow
Mrs. Nechaev/Mrs. Rench’s 5th Grade
Once upon a time there was a city named Greenland. There were plants
and green everywhere because the citizens of Greenland loved their
environment. Their motto was, “Recycle, Reduce, Reuse.” Word got out about
how wonderful Greenland was, so more and more people decided to move there,
away from their cities that were full of trash. As they moved into beautiful
Greenland, they began to litter. They threw their trash all around, just like they
used to in their own cities. Eventually, the mayor, Mr. Green, told the people of
the city, “Citizens, please listen! Sadly, everybody needs to evacuate the city. It is
no longer safe to live here. It has turned into a dump!” Everyone left the city in
tears.
One of Greenland’s most famous areas of all was Farmer Roxy’s cornfield.
She took great care and pride in it, and even made a corn maze for children to
enjoy every during every autumn harvest. Even Farmer Roxy’s cornfield,
however, had taken a turn for the worse. After being unable to keep up with
both the crops and picking up the trash that people left in her field, Roxy had
been forced to leave her beloved cornfield as well. The crows took over and ate
the harvest, and the cornfield looked more like a junkyard than a cornfield.
Mrs. Nechaev’s and Mrs. Rench’s 5th graders hadn’t heard about the
evacuation from Greenland. They scheduled their yearly field trip to the corn
maze and happily boarded the bus to Greenland to visit Roxy’s cornfield. When
the bus arrived in Greenland, there was a terrible smell. The excitement of the
field trip had everyone smiling, but their smiles soon turned to frowns. As they
looked around, their teachers asked the bus driver if he had driven them to the
wrong place. Surely this couldn’t be Greenland! They came back to the students
and announced to their dismay, “We are in the right place.”
As everyone stared at the trash and the hundreds of crows that had taken
over the cornfield, Leyna, Nicole, and Staci put their heads together to come up
with a way to save Greenland, starting with Farmer Roxy’s cornfield. They smiled
as they turned to the rest of the class. “OK everybody, we have come up with an
idea of how to get rid of this trash, and it is a way to get rid of these pesky crows
as well. We’re all going to need to work together.”
The students began to pick up all of the trash, and as they did, Leyna,
Nicole, and Staci began to assemble it into a scarecrow. They used a milk jug for
the head, caps for the eyes and nose, a rubber band for the mouth, and found
some shredded paper to use for hair. The class helped by forming a body out of a
cereal box, arms and legs out of empty plastic bottles and shoes out of cans. They
even found some unused paint lying around. When they were finished, they
placed the scarecrow in the middle of Farmer Roxy’s cornfield, and topped it off
with a cute little crow.
Soon the crows noticed the scarecrow in the middle of the field, and one by
one they began to fly away. The trash in the corn field was now gone and had
been recycled into a scarecrow. A family that used to live in Greenland was
driving by, and stopped to see what was going on. They were amazed to see trash
turned into something useful. The family began to pick up trash in other parts of
Greenland. The father built a skateboard for his son out of an old board and
some wheels from some broken toys. The little girl made a cool necklace out of
bottle caps. Mom found a coffee can and turned it into a pencil holder for her
desk at work. They called their friends to tell them about what they had done,
and once again, word spread.
People poured into the city, but this time people had a purpose. They
picked up all the trash and turned it into something useful. Whatever they didn’t
need, they took to a recycling plant. Soon, Greenland was green again and Roxy
was back in her cornfield. Mrs. Nechaev’s and Mrs. Rench’s class were back on
the bus for another field trip, but this time they were headed to City Hall for an
award to thank them for saving the city. After they received their award, Mayor
Green and Farmer Roxy unveiled the new statue in the center of the town square.
It was the recycled scarecrow that the children had made that had turned
Greenland back into a city that actually deserved its name, and had taught all of
the citizens what to do with their trash.
The End