Hey everybody. Welcome to Storyline Online
brought to you by the SAG-AFTRA Foundation.
My name is Chris Pine
and today we are reading the wonderful book Clark the Shark
written by Bruce Hale and illustrated by Guy Francis. Let us begin.
In all the wide blue seas, in all the wide blue world,
the top school for fish was the Theodore Roosterfish Elementary.
And of all the fish at Theodore Roosterfish, the biggest and the strongest was Clark the Shark.
Clark loved school, and he loved his teacher, Mrs. Inkydink.
He loved to play upsy-downsy and spinna-ma-jig with his friends. Clark loved his life.
“SCHOOL IS AWESOME!” shouted Clark the Shark.
“Less shouting, more reading,” said Mrs. Inkydink.
"LUNCHTIME IS SWEEEEET!" yelled Clark the Shark.
"Munch your own lunch," said his best friend, Joey Mackerel.
"RECESS ROCKS!" bellowed Clark the Shark.
"You are playing too rough, Clark!" cried the other kids.
Yes, Clark loved his life with all of his sharky heart.
But he loved everything way too much.
He was too loud. He was too wild.
He was just too much shark for the other fish to handle.
After a while, no one would play with Clark. No one ate lunch with Clark.
No one sat with him at circle time. Even his best friend, Joey Mackerel, said,
“Cool your jets, Clark! You’re making me crazy!”
One day, Clark asked Mrs. Inkydink, “What’s wrong with everyone?”
Mrs. Inkydink patted his fin.
“Clark, sometimes you play too hard, you munch too hard, and —gosh— you even help too hard.”
“But life is SO exciting!” said Clark.
“There’s a time and a place for everything,” said Mrs. Inkydink.
“And sometimes the rule is stay cool.”
At recess, Clark tried to stay cool, but he pushed the swing with too much zing!
“Sorry,” said Clark. “I forgot.”
“Yikes!” cried Joey Mackerel.
At lunch, Clark tried to stay cool, but everything smelled so good that he munched a bunch of lunches.
“Sorry,” said Clark. “I forgot.” “We’re STARVING!” said his friends.
In class, Clark tried to stay cool, but a good book got him all shook up.
“Now, Clark!” said Mrs. Inkydink. “This isn’t the time or the place. Tell me, what’s the rule?”
“Stay cool,” said Clark. “Hey, that rhymes!” he cried.
Then Clark got a big idea in his sharky head.
Maybe if I make a rhyme, I’ll remember every time! he thought.
The next day, he put his plan to work.
In class, when lessons got exciting, Clark wanted to bounce up out of his seat.
Instead, he told himself: “When teacher’s talking, don’t go walking.”
And what do you know? It worked!
“Attaboy, Clark!” said Mrs. Inkydink. Clark smiled. “Lessons are fun!”
At lunch, everything smelled sooo yummy.
When Clark wanted to eat and eat and never stop, he told himself: “Only munch your own lunch.”
And it worked again! “Way to go, Clark!” said his friends.
Clark grinned. “Lunch is fun.”
At playtime, Clark told himself: “Easy does it, that’s the way.
“Then my friends will let me play.”
And playtime was fun. Once more, Clark loved his life.
But then a shadow fell across the playground—
a gi-normous shadow with tentacles galore.
“It’s a new kid, and he looks scary!” cried Joey Mackerel. “Swim for your lives!”
The squid squashed the slide, and it snapped off the swings.
“Oops. My bad,” said the new kid.
“Wait,” said Clark. “He just wants to play. Let’s find a way!”
And he swam at the new kid with all his might.
Clark played harder than he ever had before— upsy-downsy and spinna-ma-jig.
Why, he even made up a new game: tail-whump-a-lumpus!
“Wow, that was fun,” said the new kid breathlessly, and he settled down.
“If you want to come to school, you’ve got to stay cool,” said Clark.
“That’s right, Clark,” said Mrs. Inkydink.
“And thanks for taking care of our new classmate, Sid the Squid.”
“Hooray for Clark the Shark!” everyone cheered.
That night Clark’s mother asked, “What did you learn at school, dear?”
“There’s a time and a place for everything,” Clark said.
“Sometimes you stay cool.”
“But sometimes a shark’s gotta do what a shark’s gotta do.”
The end.
That was Clark the Shark everybody.
I think it speaks to all of us.
It talks about how we all want to do what we want to do , right?
We want to be ourselves.
and we want to yell when we want to yell and play and laugh and have a good time.
But as Mrs. Inkydink said, there's a time and a place for everything.
And there is a time and a place to be considerate of other people's feelings.
I think the lesson is: Be considerate.
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