First Grade Read Aloud Banquet

Songs for April

If All the World Were Paper



The Little Cock Sparrow



Ye Song of Sixpence



My Lady's Garden

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 47 The Lion Becomes the King of Beasts from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum
The Country of the Quadlings from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum 		A Wonderful Woman from Stories of Great Americans for Little Americans by Edward Eggleston The Discontented Guinea Hen from Among the Farmyard People by Clara Dillingham Pierson The Little Jackals and the Lion from Fairy Tales Too Good To Miss—Up the Stairs by Lisa M. Ripperton The End of Carthage from On the Shores of the Great Sea by M. B. Synge The Secret Meeting (Part 1 of 2) from The Mexican Twins by Lucy Fitch Perkins The Story of Job from Hurlbut's Story of the Bible by Jesse Lyman Hurlbut
Moon, So Round and Yellow by Matthias Barr 		Jonathan Jo by A. A. Milne
Thanksgiving Day by Lydia Maria Child
The Rain by Robert Louis Stevenson 		Little Things, Anonymous Calico Pie by Edward Lear Mix a Pancake by Christina Georgina Rossetti
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The Aesop for Children  by Milo Winter

The North Wind and the Sun

The North Wind and the Sun had a quarrel about which of them was the stronger. While they were disputing with much heat and bluster, a Traveler passed along the road wrapped in a cloak.

"Let us agree," said the Sun, "that he is the stronger who can strip that Traveler of his cloak."

"Very well," growled the North Wind, and at once sent a cold, howling blast against the Traveler.


[Illustration]

With the first gust of wind the ends of the cloak whipped about the Traveler's body. But he immediately wrapped it closely around him, and the harder the Wind blew, the tighter he held it to him. The North Wind tore angrily at the cloak, but all his efforts were in vain.

Then the Sun began to shine. At first his beams were gentle, and in the pleasant warmth after the bitter cold of the North Wind, the Traveler unfastened his cloak and let it hang loosely from his shoulders. The Sun's rays grew warmer and warmer. The man took off his cap and mopped his brow. At last he became so heated that he pulled off his cloak, and, to escape the blazing sunshine, threw himself down in the welcome shade of a tree by the roadside.

Gentleness and kind persuasion win where force and bluster fail.


[Illustration]