Second Grade Read Aloud Banquet



Songs for May


My Shadow

I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me,

And what can be the use of him is more than I can see.

He is very, very like me from the heels up to the head;

And I see him jump before me, when I jump into my bed.


The funniest thing about him is the way he likes to grow—

Not at all like proper children, which is always very slow;

For he sometimes shoots up taller like an india-rubber ball,

And he sometimes gets so little that there's none of him at all.


He hasn't got a notion of how children ought to play,

And can only make a fool of me in every sort of way.

He stays so close beside me, he's a coward, you can see;

I'd think shame to stick to nursie as that shadow sticks to me!


One morning, very early, before the sun was up,

I rose and found the shining dew on every buttercup;

But my lazy little shadow, like an arrant sleepy-head,

Had stayed at home behind me and was fast asleep in bed.



  Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday
Week 8 Geppetto Makes Pinocchio New Feet from Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi Bruce and the Spider from Fifty Famous Stories Retold by James Baldwin Jenny Wren Arrives from The Burgess Bird Book for Children by Thornton Burgess Through the Three Woods and to the King's Castle from The Girl Who Sat by the Ashes by Padraic Colum A Great World Power from The Discovery of New Worlds by M. B. Synge A Short Morning (Part 2 of 2) from Understood Betsy by Dorothy Canfield Fisher Saint David from Our Island Saints by Amy Steedman
Gyda's Saucy Message from Viking Tales by Jennie Hall The Call of Wild Geese (Part 1 of 3) from Outdoor Visits by Edith M. Patch The Boy and the Filberts from The Aesop for Children by Milo Winter I Visit the Wreck from Robinson Crusoe Written Anew for Children by James Baldwin Arcas and Callisto from A Child's Book of Myths and Enchantment Tales by Margaret Evans Price Prickly Porky Nearly Chokes from The Adventures of Prickly Porky by Thornton Burgess The Unloading Story from The Sandman: His Ship Stories by Willliam J. Hopkins
The Night Wind by Eugene Field Humility by Robert Herrick Disobedience by A. A. Milne The Sea, Anonymous Unstooping by Walter de la Mare God Bless Our Native Land by C. T. Brooks Lullaby of an Infant Chief by Sir Walter Scott
First row Previous row          Next row Last row
The Aesop for Children  by Milo Winter

The Milkmaid and Her Pail

A Milkmaid had been out to milk the cows and was returning from the field with the shining milk pail balanced nicely on her head. As she walked along, her pretty head was busy with plans for the days to come.

"This good, rich milk," she reused, "will give me plenty of cream to churn. The butter I make I will take to market, and with the money I get for it I will buy a lot of eggs for hatching. How nice it will be when they are all hatched and the yard is full of fine young chicks. Then when May day comes I will sell them, and with the money I'll buy a lovely new dress to wear to the fair. All the young men will look at me. They will come and try to make love to me,—but I shall very quickly send them about their business!"

As she thought of how she would settle that matter, she tossed her head scornfully, and down fell the pail of milk to the ground. And all the milk flowed out, and with it vanished butter and eggs and chicks and new dress and all the milkmaid's pride.

Do not count your chickens before they are hatched.


[Illustration]