PALMER — Pupils in Todd Kellaher's third grade class at Old Mill Pond Elementary School went around the world with the help of a story they created about four students in search of a golden nugget that would end hunger.
His class came up with the initial idea for "Legend of the Golden Nugget," featuring four children who met in New York City, where they encountered a giant, mutant poisonous frog in the subway tunnel that gave them their first clue to the whereabouts of the nugget. The frog told them that an evil scientist would not return her to her original form until the nugget was found.
Kellaher said the students voted on the names of the characters and their talents. One was a gymnast, another was a hula dancer. One was a shark tagger and the other, the son of the president.
"Everything was their imagination ... We started the beginning of the story and left it as a cliffhanger," Kellaher said.
The story then traveled all over the world, with students in the United Kingdom, Russia, Australia, Germany, Spain, Austria, Poland, Turkey, Greece and Romania adding their twists and turns in the quest to find the nugget and avoid the evil scientist.
The students said they learned about the other countries by participating in the project, such as what they ate (vegemite in Australia) and what they were known for (the Spanish students wrote about the running of the bulls, the Romanians wrote about Dracula, and the Greek students incorporated mythology, referencing a centaur).
"This class probably worked harder than any other class," Kellaher said.
After a chapter was written, it was sent back to Kellaher's class, so they could edit it and check it for spelling and grammatical errors. Most of the participants from the other countries were just learning English, Kellaher explained, and they were grateful to participate. The foreign students ranged in age from other third-graders to high schoolers in Turkey.
Aaliyah Placanico noted that there were spelling mistakes in the submissions they received.
They kept seeing color spelled "colour," the British way. They also learned some of the finer points of writing, as the project was part of their English lesson. Some of the problems they encountered with the submissions they hadn't learned about yet in class.
"We learned how to use quotation marks. We hadn't gotten to them yet," Aaliyah said.
Sometimes, Kellaher moved up their English lessons so they could get to the topics they were addressing in the story. It was challenging for them because third-graders are emerging as readers and writers, he said.
Aaliyah said she liked learning how the other students were different from them, and how they lived.
Kellaher's class ended the story. Chance K. Merceri said the poisonous frog turned out to be singer Taylor Swift, and because the students found the golden nugget they ended world hunger and created world peace.
The story ends with "people across the world were so happy that many wonderful things began to happen. Countries that were rich shared their fortunes with those who were poor. Countries that were fighting began to get along with each other. The wish of millions of people around the world was coming true ... world peace was becoming a reality. People finally realized that 'it is a small world after all.'"
Kellaher said he plans to do the project again next year.
"We're very proud of them," Kellaher said about the students. "It was a huge undertaking for the entire year."