Second Grade Read Aloud Banquet

Songs for January

The Sugar-Plum Tree

Have you ever heard of the Sugar-Plum Tree?
'Tis a marvel of great renown!
It blooms on the shore of the Lollipop sea
In the garden of Shut-Eye Town;
The fruit that it bears is so wondrously sweet
(As those who have tasted it say)
That good little children have only to eat
Of that fruit to be happy next day.

When you've got to the tree, you would have a hard time
To capture the fruit which I sing;
The tree is so tall that no person could climb
To the boughs where the sugar-plums swing!
But up in that tree sits a chocolate cat,
And a gingerbread dog prowls below—
And this is the way you contrive to get at
Those sugar-plums tempting you so:

You say but the word to that gingerbread dog
And he barks with such terrible zest
That the chocolate cat is at once all agog,
As her swelling proportions attest.
And the chocolate cat goes cavorting around
From this leafy limb unto that,
And the sugar-plums tumble, of course, to the ground—
Hurrah for that chocolate cat!

There are marshmallows, gumdrops, and peppermint canes,
With stripings of scarlet or gold,
And you carry away of the treasure that rains
As much as your apron can hold!
So come, little child, cuddle closer to me
In your dainty white nightcap and gown,
And I'll rock you away to that Sugar-Plum Tree
In the garden of Shut-Eye Town.

	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday
Week 2	Master Cherry Gives a Present to Geppetto from Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi	King Alfred and the Beggar from Fifty Famous Stories Retold by James Baldwin	The Snowball from The Seasons: Winter by Jane Marcet	Fruit for the King's Son from The Girl Who Sat by the Ashes by Padraic Colum	Julius Caesar from On the Shores of the Great Sea by M. B. Synge	Aunt Harriet Has a Cough (Part 2 of 3) from Understood Betsy by Dorothy Canfield Fisher	How the River Jordan Became Dry from Hurlbut's Story of the Bible by Jesse Lyman Hurlbut
	The Tooth Thrall from Viking Tales by Jennie Hall	Suet Pudding for Woodpeckers (Part 2 of 3) from Outdoor Visits by Edith M. Patch	The Tortoise and the Ducks from The Aesop for Children by Milo Winter	I Make My First Voyage from Robinson Crusoe Written Anew for Children by James Baldwin	Cupid and Apollo from A Child's Book of Myths and Enchantment Tales by Margaret Evans Price	The Stranger from the North from The Adventures of Prickly Porky by Thornton Burgess	The Blacksmith Story from The Sandman: His Ship Stories by Willliam J. Hopkins
	The Mountain and the Squirrel by Ralph Waldo Emerson	Wynken, Blynken, and Nod by Eugene Field	How Doth the Little Crocodile by Lewis Carroll	The Plaint of the Camel by Charles Edward Carryl	Tired Tim by Walter de la Mare	Norse Lullaby by Eugene Field	Granny by James Whitcomb Riley

The Aesop for Children by Milo Winter

The Fox and the Stork

The Fox one day thought of a plan to amuse himself at the expense of the Stork, at whose odd appearance he was always laughing.

"You must come and dine with me today," he said to the Stork, smiling to himself at the trick he was going to play. The Stork gladly accepted the invitation and arrived in good time and with a very good appetite.

For dinner the Fox served soup. But it was set out in a very shallow dish, and all the Stork could do was to wet the very tip of his bill. Not a drop of soup could he get. But the Fox lapped it up easily, and, to increase the disappointment of the Stork, made a great show of enjoyment.

The hungry Stork was much displeased at the trick, but he was a calm, even-tempered fellow and saw no good in flying into a rage. Instead, not long afterward, he invited the Fox to dine with him in turn. The Fox arrived promptly at the time that had been set, and the Stork served a fish dinner that had a very appetizing smell. But it was served in a tall jar with a very narrow neck. The Stork could easily get at the food with his long bill, but all the Fox could do was to lick the outside of the jar, and sniff at the delicious odor. And when the Fox lost his temper, the Stork said calmly:

Do not play tricks on your neighbors unless you can stand the same treatment yourself.