Second Grade Read Aloud Banquet

Songs for November




Time To Rise

A birdie with a yellow bill

Hopped upon my window sill,

Cocked his shining eye and said:

"Ain't you 'shamed, you sleepy-head!"

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Week 24 The Island of the "Industrious Bees" from Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi The Story of Cincinnatus from Fifty Famous Stories Retold by James Baldwin More Robbers from The Burgess Bird Book for Children by Thornton Burgess The King of the Birds (Part 2 of 2) from The Boy Who Knew What the Birds Said by Padraic Colum The First Crusade from The Discovery of New Worlds by M. B. Synge Betsy Has a Birthday (Part 1 of 3) from Understood Betsy by Dorothy Canfield Fisher The Last of the Judges from Hurlbut's Story of the Bible by Jesse Lyman Hurlbut
Captain Smith a Prisoner from Richard of Jamestown by James Otis
I Attend My Master from Richard of Jamestown by James Otis
Several Islands Visited from Richard of Jamestown by James Otis 		Some Other Crabs from Seaside and Wayside, Book One by Julia McNair Wright The Lion and the Ass from The Aesop for Children by Milo Winter I Work under Many Difficulties from Robinson Crusoe Written Anew for Children by James Baldwin The Three Little Pigs from Nursery Tales from Many Lands by Eleanor L. and Ada M. Skinner Unc' Billy Possum Is Caught from The Adventures of Unc' Billy Possum by Thornton Burgess Building the Dam from The Boxcar Children by Gertrude Chandler Warner
When the Cows Come Home by Agnes Mitchell
Who Stole the Bird's Nest? by Lydia Maria Child 		  Under the Greenwood Tree by William Shakespeare The Ruin by Walter de la Mare Seven Times One by Jean Ingelow Obedience by Phoebe Cary
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The Aesop for Children  by Milo Winter

The Tortoise and the Ducks

The Tortoise, you know, carries his house on his back. No matter how hard he tries, he cannot leave home. They say that Jupiter punished him so, because he was such a lazy stay-at-home that he would not go to Jupiter's wedding, even when especially invited.

After many years, Tortoise began to wish he had gone to that wedding. When he saw how gaily the birds flew about and how the Hare and the Chipmunk and all the other animals ran nimbly by, always eager to see everything there was to be seen, the Tortoise felt very sad and discontented. He wanted to see the world too, and there he was with a house on his back and little short legs that could hardly drag him along.

One day he met a pair of Ducks and told them all his trouble.

"We can help you to see the world," said the Ducks. "Take hold of this stick with your teeth and we will carry you far up in the air where you can see the whole countryside. But keep quiet or you will be sorry."

The Tortoise was very glad indeed. He seized the stick firmly with his teeth, the two Ducks took hold of it one at each end, and away they sailed up toward the clouds.


[Illustration]

Just then a Crow flew by. He was very much astonished at the strange sight and cried:

"This must surely be the King of Tortoises!"

"Why certainly—" began the Tortoise.

But as he opened his mouth to say these foolish words he lost his hold on the stick, and down he fell to the ground, where he was dashed to pieces on a rock.

Foolish curiosity and vanity often lead to misfortune.