If I Were a Peabody Duck...

My first grade book club just finished reading The Case of the Elevator Duck, by Polly Berrien Berends. Such a cute story--a boy who wants to be a detective finds a duck in the elevator of his housing project, and he has to find the duck's owner before the housing inspector finds out that he is hiding a duck in his apartment. Every year when we read this book, our culminating project is to create an Elevator Duck movie. I have spent the last couple weeks running around campus with seventeen kids in tow (one dressed like a duck, of course!), filming in strange locations (in an actual elevator!), and trying not to be too nitpicky about editing in iMovie. I have to brag on my kids a bit; I usually end the movie with a "blooper reel," but these kids are so good at movie-making that we haven't had any bloopers! I'm having to improvise, and we're going to film a "dance party" instead. Today I had them all dance out of the elevator, and it was hysterical.

I digress... my point in blogging about this is that here in Memphis, we are lucky enough to have our very own "elevator ducks" at the Peabody hotel! I couldn't pass up the opportunity to share my love of my hometown, so my students spent some time learning about our feathered friends downtown. First we read John Philip Duck, by Patricia Polacco. It is a fictional story about how the first ducks came to live in the Peabody fountain, but it is loosely based on true events. Of course, after reading that story we had to listen to some John Philip Sousa marches! I learned that it's pretty much impossible for first graders to sit still while Sousa is playing, but that's okay. It was almost recess time anyway. :)

I found a great video on the Animal Planet website that shows the ducks' fabulous digs at the Peabody. You can find it here. I'm thinking about applying to be a duck--their apartment is much nicer than mine!

Finally, the students wrote about what it would be like to be a Peabody duck for a day. Their stories were precious. To be honest, I came up with this writing assignment at the last minute--I needed to fill some book club time while I finished making preparations for filming our movie. I just sat them down with paper and pencils, no guidelines, and I was thoroughly impressed with their creativity! I wanted to take pictures of their stories, but that would make this post incredibly long. So instead, here are some of the stories, typed, including the original, ahem, creative spellings:

"If I was a duck at the Peabody I would feel good because I would have friends and a nice place to live. Also I would have a nice place to spend my day. I would have lovely red carpet to go down. I would also go back to the wild after three months. I would say hello with a quack to everyone I see." (Side note: She really paid attention. The ducks really do go back into the wild after three months!)

"If I was a duck in the Peabody I would run around in circles saying quaaaaaaaaaaack and singing! If I was a duck in the Peabody I wish I could quack in guys ears. If I was a duck in the Peabody I wish my name was Superman! But I don't know if they'll name me that? If I was a duck in the Peabody I wish I had my own home with no neighbors."

"If I was a duck at the Peabody I would sit and swim. I would quack a lovely hello to everybody in the morning. I would be looked at by a lot of people. If everybody didn't know the curious one, I would climb up the statue, and stand out. I would have an awesome time."

"If I was a duck at the Peabody I would wake up at 2:00 in the morning. After that I would start quacking like crazy. At 9:30 I would get in the elevator and get readdy to walk in the founatan and see a lot of faces. I problay would get anoyed by the cherring [cheering?]. I would love living in the pent house."

"If I were a duck at the Peabody... I would like it because I would get to swim in the fountin everyday. It would also be cool because it would be cool to live in the replica of the Peabody. The pent house would be cool too. You have a private fountin. The marching would be cool too."

"If I was a duck at the Peabody, I would swim in the fountain a lot. I would walk down the red carpet and get in the elvator I would go to the roof of the building. And stay up there for the rest of the day. The next day I would wake up and get into the elvator. I would go down to the bottome with the duck master. I would walk down the red carpet. Then get in to the fointain."

"If I was a peabody duck I would walk on the red carpet and quack a lot. I would swim a LOT. I would have fun being a peabody duck. But I would not like all of those YEA things. That would hurt my ears. I would have LOTS and LOTS of fun!"

"If I were a Peabody duck I would march down the red carpet proudly. I would like making people laugh. I would always snugle up in my little minnie hotel. It would be fun getting to swim all day. I would like to be a Peabody duck!"