Hello Greencloaks!! There here is your Town Square *gestures towards a mossy enclave with a sunlit patch of wildflowers at the center. The air is warm and damp, and the sweet smell of the flowers drifts past you. Excited squirrels chatter overhead*

I tested out this idea in the WoF forum and it seems like something everyone is excited by. This is my way of having better communication and transparency with all of you.

In this space, there are a few things that can happen.

1. Announcements: This is where I'll post announcements about the forums or other matters

2. The Question Corner: Where you can ask me questions about posts, bans, life, and more! I cannot promise I will answer every single question asap, but I'll try my hardest to make sure everyone gets answered.

3. Forum Prompts: I'll post writing prompts from here on out on a weekly fashion. I hope this provides some inspiration for stories, poems, characters, whateva! To keep this thread not too jumbled, please make your own threads for the prompt.

4. Recommended Reads: I think this is something other mods used to do. Basically, in this section I'll post the thread number for some RPs or posts that I think are really quality content and posts I think everyone should read. This could be writing tips, a long running RP some folks might have missed, interesting posts about Spirit Animals, etc!

5. Warnings: This is a test area. One of the biggest issues I have is warning people about their post content when their post got caught in the filter. Especially if they were trying to make a new thread, there's often no good place to let them know what they were trying to say was ban-worthy. This area is the perfect space to solve that issue. If this becomes a problem I'll stop doing it but right now I think it could be really great and help with having a more transparent forum. Let's see how it goes!

I will try to post once a day, at least before 5pm EST. A warning in advance - this may not always happen, but I'm going to try really hard to keep it consistent. I can make an announcement for days where I am not on the forums at all for whatever reason.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________

Here is an example of what this will look like. This is all one post:

[Announcement]

I'm making a Town Square! Wew!

[Question Corner]

@____ You were banned for giving out your last name and birthday

@____ Your post didn't go through because you used the phrase "Shut up!"

@____My favorite food is sushi

[Forum Prompts]

Your prompt of the week is: What Halloween costumes would the Great Beasts wear?

[Recommended Reads]

Check out thread /341853 for daily prompts! #selfpromo

[Warnings]

@____ you recently tried to post a URL to a different site. This is a warning that URLs are against the rules. If you try again, I'll be forced to give you a 24-hr ban.

@____ you tried to use a word that is inappropriate for the forums in one of your RP posts. Avoid using that word in the future. If you continue to use language like that, I'll need to give you a 24-hr ban. 

_________________________________________________________________________________________________

Please, enjoy your time wandering the Town Square. I hope it becomes a comfortable place for you to ask questions, get inspired, and read the news.

-Becky B

Hear yee hear yee, it's time for the First Edition of the news! The sun is high, the woodland critters are off doing their own thing, and the RPs are full of life!

[Announcement]

The Scholastic SafeChat will be retired at the end of this week. This was decided because of some updates we're making to the Scholastic kids site as a whole, and the chat just doesn't work with those updates. I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news here :( On the better news side, something is coming and chat may not be gone forever, just this iteration of it

Edit: It was decided we would shut down the chat today. I hope to have something cool to show you soon to counteract losing stuff! We've also been removing some forums that are inactive, as I know some of you may have noticed. This is all part of a big site update as well as a mysterious thing that I can't give many details about yet. 

[Question Corner]

@Arl Dark blue or rose! Depending on how I feel that day :)

[Forum Prompts]

One day, you receive a handwritten note: "You must be powerful enough to have earned such powerful enemies. Come. We must talk." 

[Recommended Reads]

 (if you would ever prefer not to have your thread in here, just let me know and I'll edit the post to remove it)

Check out thread /342240 for what the SAMB does on Halloween night by Eternity

And check out /342069 for Rune's thread using the Charactober prompts!

[Warnings]

-nothin' to see here folks-

Hear yee hear yee, it's time for the Evening News Edition (Evening in EST). Please gather round. 

[Announcement]

The site chat has officially been retired. I know some of you on the SAMB are understandably upset about that and all I can say is I'm sorry. I hope to have more exciting, positive announcements for you all next week. So that I'm not giving false hope, I need to be clear that the chat won't be coming back to the site. It will exist in a new form elsewhere. I hope you will be able to continue talking in the forums with your friends even if it's not your ideal environment. There are some benefits! Like being able to say "go" again instead of "gol"

[Question Corner]

@Snow-Elysium (is that your correct nickname?) Redwall, Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, Warriors, Series of Unfortunate Events, Eragon, Chronicles of Narnia, Animorphs, most of the Tamora Pierce books, and a bunch of manga series.

[Forum Prompts]

One day, you receive a handwritten note: "You must be powerful enough to have earned such powerful enemies. Come. We must talk." 

[Recommended Reads]

 (if you would ever prefer not to have your thread in here, just let me know and I'll edit the post to remove it)

Check out thread /340292 if you like Ouran and/or Black Butler for a fun crossover thread by Nightshade. Who'da thunk you'd ever see Sebastian and Tamaki in the same space?

Check out thread /341375 for a short story by Samurai. I love to read your short stories!

[Warnings]

-nothin' to see here folks-

Hear yee hear yee, it's the news! Hot off the press!

[Announcement]

-no new announcements today-

[Question Corner]

@Mills what would you want it to look like? Decorate away!

@Galaxian Ha well I hope you don't have tooo many powerful enemies. I'd make a new thread based off the prompt, otherwise this news thread could get overcrowded and hard to understand. 

@Salt I'd guess many of you may be in high school. Certainly it skews a lot older than when I was an intern here many moons ago and the books were still coming out!

@birdbloodhoud1760 I posted in the announcements yesterday but unfortunately the chat has been removed from the site. There will be chat in the future in another form, but it won't be back here on the site.

@Adam Hi, adam :)

[Forum Prompts]

One day, you receive a handwritten note: "You must be powerful enough to have earned such powerful enemies. Come. We must talk." 

[Recommended Reads]

 (if you would ever prefer not to have your thread in here, just let me know and I'll edit the post to remove it)

If you're feeling stressed, check out thread /343843 where Catwolf has created a cozy space for pillow forts and pillow fights. And smores.

[Warnings]

-nothin' to see here folks-

[sorry yall, today has been busy here in Scholastic HQ and there won't be an end of day newsletter! on the plus side, it's due to the mysterious thing we're working on and I hope to have some quality content to share with you soon! Have a nice morning/day/night/evening/afternoon :)]

Hear yee hear yee and forsooth! The news has arrived.

[Announcement]

-no new announcements today-

[Question Corner]

@Unicorn I always get Hufflepuff when I take house quizzes, so they;re my favorite!

@Powerfulwizard I'm sorry that it was deleted so abruptly and before I'd started making announcements so they could have been warned. Are they able to come to other MBs to meet up with each other? 

@Tony oh I will absolutely be updating everyone when new things start to happen. I said in a previous post, but I hope to be able to post an announcement with some more details as early as next week. If not that then still pretty soon.

@Cain Drawing for sure. I am a much better drawer than writer. 

@Rosalind Probably no more animals, but there will be new stuff outside the Spirit Animals game! Look forward to it :)

@Galaxian I haven't participated in any RPs yet but personally I've made OCs before. I didn't call them OCs then, but I've come up with whole stories and characters and they've stuck with me through the years. The stuff you create here will probably stick with you too!

@Mills lookin forward to it!

@Darmidnight that sounds like a glitch to me. We'll look into it!

[Forum Prompts]

Friday prompt!

tick tock tick tock you watch the clock hands march their steady beat. Until what? Wait, where are you? What were you doing? You realize you can't remember. The only thing you know is that you're waiting. For something. Tick tock. 

[Recommended Reads]

 (if you would ever prefer not to have your thread in here, just let me know and I'll edit the post to remove it)

Love the Halloween posts! Check out /343074 for some spooky goodness by Black and Galaxian

And check out /342564 to give Andalite some writing prompts! This is a great style of post.

[Warnings]

-nothin' to see here folks-