1. INT CLASROOM -- DAY
Ms Mole and Elinor are chatting in the classroom. The scene opens as they are mid conversation.
Ari rushes into the frame.
ARI
Elinor, Ms Mole! Guess what? I was showing my sister how cool ants are, and she tried to eat one!
Elinor shivers in disgust, and Ms Mole shakes her head.
MS. MOLE
Oops! Eating ants is not the best idea. BUT it reminds me that it’s time for our story, which is all about ANTS and SISTERS!
Ari looks surprised.
ARI
What? Ants have sisters too?
Olive and Tito Mouse come to join them. Ms Mole turns to her desk, and we see a really long book lying closed with drawings of ants on the cover.
OLIVE
Wow, I’ve never seen a book that big before!
MS. MOLE
Yes, it has lots of
ANTS-ers
in it.
The kids giggle. Tito and Ari help get the book open. Tito Mouse ends up holding on to the edge and gets lifted into the air as it opens.
On the first page of the book, we see the top of an anthill above ground.
ARI
Why is the book so big, Ms. Mole?
MS. MOLE
To show you how big anthills are under the ground!
Ms. Mole reaches under the page, and the long page unfolds down, revealing a cutaway view that shows the vast underground tunnels leading down. The kids <OOHHH...>
Ms. MOLE (CONT’D)
Anthills are really big! There is room for THOUSANDS of ants.
ANGLE ON: The book illustration animates and we see lots of little ants scurrying around. The ants are realistically depicted.
ELINOR
Wow! There are SO many!
We zoom in on a room with one ant that’s bigger than the others by 2-3x.
MS. MOLE
But there is one special kind of ant called the QUEEN ANT.
OLIVE
Is she in charge of the other ants? Like a real queen?
The other ants crawl all around her.
MS. MOLE
Sort of! She’s the mother of most of the ants that live in the anthill. They actually help take care of her!
We see the little ants bringing her food.
ARI
All those ants are... brothers!?
MS. MOLE
And sisters! They are one BIG family.
The ants snuggle in a bit to the queen.
ELINOR
Why is the Queen Ant so much bigger than the other ants?
We see a sideways view that shows the queen ant 2-3x larger than the other ants. Ref: https://www.
terro
.
com/media//articles/images/421/19-queen-ants
.jpg
MS. MOLE
She has to be big enough to lay all the eggs. That’s where her children come from!
Back to the kids:
ELINOR
I wonder what it’s like to have so many brothers and sisters.
ARI
I really love my sister.
OLIVE
Do you want a thousand more sisters?
Ari ponders this for a moment.
ARI
I’d rather have a thousand sisters than eat one ant.
They all giggle.
ELINOR'S tOWN
104 INTERSTITIAL: Ms Mole Story time: ANT GARDENS
Written by
Jorge Cham and Daniel Whiteson
Follows "The House that Ants Built." This dives deeper into how ants use the rooms in their nest.
Curriculum: The kids learn that ant nets are big and that leaf-cutting ants feed leaves to their fungus garden.
Learning Goals:
LS4. Begin to understand that animals and plants depend on other living things and nonliving things in the environment to meet some of their needs. [ Ant use leaves to grow their fungus food ]
ND3. (RTL Crosscutting concept ‘Structure and Function’) Understand that structures and materials in the natural world can be used or can inspire the engineering of structures with similar function in the designed world. [ Ants have gardens just like we do.]
Address
Phone Number
Ms. MOLE
ARI
MS MOLE
ELINOR
OLIVE
ELINOR/ARI
Kids
(V.O.)
(O.S.)
(O.C.)
(CONT'D)
(SUBTITLE)
INT
EXT
I/E
1
ARI: I HAVE A COUSIN THAT EATS ANTS
ARI: WHAT DO ANTS TASTE LIKE?
INT CLASROOM -- DAY
DAY
NIGHT
AFTERNOON
MORNING
EVENING
LATER
MOMENTS LATER
CONTINUOUS
THE NEXT DAY
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FADE OUT.
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FADE TO BLACK.
120