The Little School that Could

A Tale Based on the Classic Childhood Favorite by Watty Piper
Re-Written by Shannon Hagerman


Chug, chug, chug. Puff, puff, puff. Ding-dong, ding-dong. The little school opened its doors every morning.

It was a happy, little school for there were so many exciting things happening inside. The classrooms were filled full of smiling boys and girls.

Inside, there were classrooms with new paint and old carpet – classrooms with new books and old books, and best of all, a brand new library – with new paint, new carpet and new books!

There were also teachers – new teachers and experienced teachers, an art teacher, a gym teacher, a music teacher and many, many more. There was even a pet rabbit!

And there were special programs and events to help bring learning to life for all of the students. Enrichment Clusters and Brown Bag Lunches, field trips and guest speakers gave the children chances to learn about the things they were most interested in.

But that was not all. There were parents and friends who liked to come to the little school.  They volunteered in the classrooms helping the children read or playing math games. They worked on special projects together and made the kids feel special.

The little school offered all of these wonderful things to its students. But this isn’t how it always was for the little school.

For many years, the little school had puffed along merrily. Then all of a sudden, things slowed down. Students started to go to other schools, and the school began to decline. It tried and tried, but something was just not right.

Lots of things were tried, programs came and went. The school needed help but nothing seemed to work. Time went on and things continued to get worse. Eventually the little school lost half of its students and people began to think that the little school must not be very good.

Then one day, people who lived in the neighborhood decided it was time to figure out a way to help the little school. They talked to each other and then went to the district to ask for help.

After some time, the school found out that it was going to be “revitalized.” The first step was to find someone to help the little school make some changes. The little school went looking for a new principal.

Along came a lady who wanted to know what was wrong with the little school. She went to the parks and walked through the neighborhood asking, “What is the matter, my friends?”

“Will you help us get back on track? Our little school has broken down and the good boys and girls don’t have a great place to learn.”

“I’ve never done this before,” said the lady. “And it sounds kind of scary.

She looked around the room and saw all of the faces. She thought of the good little boys and girls who might not like school unless things changed.

Then she said, “There must be something we can do to make this school shine. I think we can. I think we can. I think we can.”  She hitched herself to the little school. Together they pulled and pulled and tugged and tugged. Slowly things started to change.

Puff, puff, chug, chug, went the little school. “We think we can -- We think we can – We think we can, We think we can -- We think we can – We think we can, We think we can – We think we can – We think we can.”

Faster and faster things began to change at the little school until new students started to enroll and new programs were implemented.

“Hurray, hurray,” cried the community. The good little boys and girls in the neighborhood will be happy because we all worked together to make a difference.