Second Grade Read Aloud Banquet

Songs for February

The Old Woman Tossed Up in a Blanket



The Carrion Crow



Sur le Pont d'Avignon



Charley over the Water

Bed in Summer

In winter I get up at night

And dress by yellow candle-light.

In summer, quite the other way,

I have to go to bed by day.


I have to go to bed and see

The birds still hopping on the tree,

Or hear the grown-up people's feet

Still going past me in the street.


And does it not seem hard to you,

When all the sky is clear and blue,

And I should like so much to play,

To have to go to bed by day?

  Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday
Week 48 Drooping Wings from The Birds' Christmas Carol by Kate Douglas Wiggin Casabianca from Fifty Famous Stories Retold by James Baldwin Some More Friends Come with the Snow from The Burgess Bird Book for Children by Thornton Burgess Why the Sea Is Salt from Fairy Tales Too Good To Miss—Into the Woods by Lisa M. Ripperton Discovery of the Pacific from The Discovery of New Worlds by M. B. Synge A Castle on Brandywine (Part 2 of 2) from The Bears of Blue River by Charles Major Solomon on David's Throne from Hurlbut's Story of the Bible by Jesse Lyman Hurlbut
Dreams of the Future from Richard of Jamestown by James Otis
A Plague of Rats from Richard of Jamestown by James Otis
Treachery during Captain Smith's Absence from Richard of Jamestown by James Otis 		Fall Picnics from Outdoor Visits by Edith M. Patch The Fox and the Stork from The Aesop for Children by Milo Winter I Have a New Suit of Clothes from Robinson Crusoe Written Anew for Children by James Baldwin The Hill from The Golden Windows by Laura E. Richards Happy Jack Squirrel Helps Unc' Billy Possum from The Adventures of Unc' Billy Possum by Thornton Burgess The Trafalgar Story from The Sandman: His Sea Stories by Willliam J. Hopkins
The Cargo Story from The Sandman: His Sea Stories by Willliam J. Hopkins
The Willow Man by Juliana Horatia Ewing Heigho, My Dearie by Eugene Field A Thanksgiving Fable by Oliver Herford A Tragic Story by Albert von Chamisso The Children of Stare by Walter de la Mare Humility by Robert Herrick Old Granny Dusk by James Whitcomb Riley
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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.