How it works

Writing a story takes time and effort. So here are some tips to make sure there aren’t any glitches (technical or otherwise) when submitting your kid’s masterpiece. Here are a few things to keep in mind before you hit the ‘Submit’ button.

• Start filling your form only when you are ready with your kid’s story.
• Once you start filling the form, make sure you don’t close it till you finish. Your entries won’t be saved and you will have to redo it.
• Use an email ID that you check frequently.
• Submit your written story consisting of not more than 350 words.
• Use the writing section of the submission form to submit your story.
• The story should follow the theme
• All stories should be submitted by 30.9.20, 11:59 PM GMT. We wouldn’t be able to accept any submissions post this date
• Optional: To help us understand the story better, you could also send us a few self-drawn pictures by your kid. The file size should not exceed 10MB.
• The story should be original and not copied from any existing story.
• Most importantly, make sure you and your little storytellers have fun   

Stories will be judged on the following parameters: 

• Title of the story
  • How appropriate is the title of the story
• Relevance in the current world scenario
  • "How the story takes inspiration from pressing issues of today, from access to safe drinking water, quality education for both genders to being a responsible citizen of planet earth! "
• Thoughts and actions to make the world a better place 
  • Unique and heartfelt ideas which inspire
• Structure, grammar, and flow of the story
  • Choice of words with correct usage of grammar, punctuation and accuracy of spellings with a smooth and compelling progression of the storyline. 

• The story is not original work and/or contains snippets from an existing piece of work.
• The story contains any copyrighted and/or trademarked characters.
• Entry is submitted in the form of pictures of handwritten stories or attached documents.
• The story is over the word limit.
• The story doesn’t follow the theme.
• The story contains inappropriate content.
• The story is written in a language other than English, Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu, Urdu, Spanish, Portuguese or Arabic   

Saving the Rainbow

Once, there existed seven kingdoms on the rainbow, one each representing the colors - red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, and pink. They were each blessed with powers, and the subjects there lived happily. But not for long! An evil wizard named “Icy” used her magic and conquered one kingdom after another.
After many years of slavery, a great wizard child was born in these kingdoms. Her name was Smiley – She was very talented. She studied every magic book that existed and took down the spells that had trapped the subjects of the kingdoms. But she was unsuccessful in freeing the leaders of these kingdoms.
Legend said that these leaders were trapped in a spell that wasn’t in any magic book. They were locked in an old fortress hundreds of miles away. Smiley knew she would need help so off she went to the wise “guru”. He was an old and learned man and gave Smiley a fish-shaped key saying “This will help you!”.
Smiley started her odyssey to the old fortress, braving the challenges, and finally, she was in front of the fortress gate. She noticed a fish picture on the door. Instinctively, she kept the fish-shaped key there, and the door opened. Luckily there was no sign of the wizard and she soon found the leaders of her kingdoms. They had grown bitterness amongst them, they constantly blamed each other for their misery.
Smiley wondered how to undo the spell that kept them under bondage. The leaders told Smiley that Icy would visit them periodically and tell them how they were helping her strengthen the spel. Smiley pondered over this and concluded that perhaps the bitterness of the leaders was strengthening Icy’s spell.
She told the leaders to think about the virtues of each of their fellow-mates. As each leader immersed in these positive thoughts, the bonds broke and they were free!
Smiley and the leaders returned to the kingdoms. The leaders made an oath of unity. The kingdoms lived in harmony for generations! Even today, you can see all the rainbow colors together! 

Quest for Inspiration

​I really love reading books. I like writing more. But whenever I seem to have an idea, I realize that it's already used. So I decided to look into my life. In front of my table, there's a signboard which says - "There's always a story. You have to go find it."And so, started my Quest in search of inspiration.
As I stepped out of house, my neighbour, Neha, called, "Hey Aisha! Care to join me? I have something to show you".Maybe I could get inspiration there. Ongoing to her house, I found Neha holding a puppy in her hands."Can you guess how I got it?" she asked. I looked at the puppy and said, "Maybe you were walking across a deserted road, where you saw a group of boys taunting an abandoned puppy. So you tried to save it but they just ignored you. And in fury, you punched the face of the biggest boy and all the rest fled in terror. Such a brave adventure Neha!"Neha chuckled. That's an interesting theory but this is my birthday gift from dad.
A very disappointed me went to my house and sat on the sofa. My cat Marble sat on my lap."What have you been up to, Marble? Did you fall into a river, Or did you fight with your best friend for a piece of fish and then realized that you should have let her have it and now, are you waiting for her? Marble hopped off my lap for a bowl of milk.
I went into my room. I looked at all my books. It felt like the books stared at me. They were all good. Maybe, I could never be like them. I sighed and picked up a piece of paper from the dustbin. It had the draft of the stories I hadn't completed as I thought that they were dumb.
I looked at the sign. I wanted to tear it, but then I had an idea. And soon I was busy writing and there was a new sign, "Stop looking, Start writing".

How to write in languages other than the default keyboard on your device?

If your kid is planning to write their story in a language that is not the default language on your device, it might become difficult to figure out how to type in other languages.

Well, we have got you covered. Google Input Tools can help you type in all the languages permitted under Story-a-thon. It is available for Google services, Chrome, Android devices, and Windows, and in case you don’t have any of these devices or services, you can simply use it here.

So don’t let technical limitations limit your kid’s imagination. Let them explore the magic of storytelling in any language they are comfortable with.