Online school assignment

May 11th, 2020 – during the Covid-19 pandemic

Read the story and answer the multiple choice question below.

“Once upon a time, relatively not so long ago, on a far corner of an average galaxy, not too far from a smallish star, there was an ordinary planet. Not too big and not too small, not too cold and not too hot, nothing special, just an ordinary twelve-in-a-dozen-planet. And on this planet there were, among other things, seas and lakes and rivers and forests and fields and deserts and mountains and valleys and plains.

And this ordinary planet was full of life. Everywhere there lived all kinds of things and creatures. There were big ones and small ones, and long ones and short ones. Some lived in the seas and never came on land, and some lived on land and walked around, and some climbed in the trees and some could fly in the sky. There were even some who lived underground, and some who could walk on land and swim in the seas.

Some creatures ate grasses and different fruits and other plants, and some creatures hunted and ate the other creatures. For example, if there were too many creatures who ate the round purple fruit, then some other creatures ate some of those creatures, so they would not eat all the fruit, and there would be some round purple fruit left for the other creatures as well.

On this otherwise ordinary planet, there was one special thing that made this planet somewhat less ordinary. That was one type of creature who was different from all the others. These creatures understood the whole system of the planet and knew how all things worked, and they looked after the planet and fixed things if something needed fixing.

They lived on land, and could not fly, and though they could swim, they could not live in the seas. But they were clever and they could build things that could move on land, and things that could fly, and things that could float on the seas. And with these things they could travel to all corners of the planet to check that everything was all right.

The materials for all these things these creatures got from the land and the sea. They could dig holes in the ground and even under the sea to get minerals and materials, but they were always careful not to take too much, and they made sure they did not harm the other creatures or plants with their digging.

And they built all kinds of things to make the planet better for them and for the other creatures, they even built things that made other things, and buildings were these things could make the other things.

These clever creatures lived in groups, and the groups joined together to form bigger groups, and together they all formed one really big group, that included all the clever creatures on the planet. They chose leaders to lead these groups, and every creature could say who should be the leader. But they were really clever, and they had a system where they kept the choice of every single creature secret, only the end result was known to everyone.

And since being a leader is hard work for any creature, even a clever one, they had a system where leaders would not have to be in this hard job for too long. Some jobs were so hard that they chose a new leader when the planet had gone around the star once, but some jobs were easier and they let the planet go around the star twice, or four or even six times, before the leader needed a rest.

Other jobs were easier, and you could stay in one job all your life, or change jobs when you wanted to, you just had to have the knowledge and the skills to do the job. And there needed to be someone for every job, since every job on the planet was important. Every job, however small, was part of something bigger and needed to be done, so all other jobs could be done.

The creatures were taught all kinds of knowledge from an early age, and you could choose what you wanted to know more about, and learn about things you had not heard of yet. Some creatures learned how to grow things, some how to make things, some how to fix things, and some how to use things, and so on; everyone learned something important about the planet and how it worked.

But first, before everything else, every single clever creature learned one very important thing, which was the basis of all existence, and the foundation that all other learning built on. And that thing was that they were the guardians on the planet, and they were responsible for it.

So, they knew they had to take care of all the other creatures and the lakes and the rivers and the seas and the forests and the fields and deserts and the plains and the mountains and the valleys and all things on the planet, so every plant and creature could live and everything stayed in balance.

And as far as we know, the descendants of these clever creatures still keep guarding the planet, and will live on it happily ever after.”

Multiple choice question:

How can you tell that the above story is a fairy tale?

A The characters in the story are imaginary and literally out of this world.

B This is obviously science fiction, but with no science and a lot of fiction.

C The characters are not maximising extraction industry profits.

D The political system in the story is totally non-partisan.

E The educational system described could not possibly produce intelligent beings.

F The story begins with “Once upon a time” and ends with “happily ever after”.

More than one choice may be correct.

We will discuss this in class once the pandemic is over and schools will open again, hopefully in about four or five or six months.

NOTE. This will not be a group presentation due to the social distancing measures, which will likely still be in place once we meet, so you will present your answers individually from a safe distance.

REMEMBER! Write your answers down somewhere safe, otherwise you may forget it and have to do this task again sometime in the fall, or in 2021.

UPDATE: … or maybe we will discuss this in 2022.