Names and Abbreviations 19 Have you ever seen a great balloon big enough to carry men as passengers? How are the passengers carried? What is an aëroplane? Pronounce á-e-ro-plane, not á-r-ě-o-plane. Have you seen one? What is the difference between a balloon and an aeroplane? What is an aviator? Avis is the Latin word meaning bird. An aviator is a bird-man or a flier. Let one pupil tell everything he can see in the picture. Another may tell what the children will do with their balloons and pin wheels. Another may tell all he can about balloons, great and small. 23. WRITTEN LESSON Describe what you see in the picture. Tell (1) where the scene is, (2) the time of year, (3) something about the balloon man, and (4) something about the children. Select a title for your description and write it on the first line of your sheet, as in Lesson 14. You should now be able to write much more correctly than in the earlier lessons. Be sure to write nothing wrong. When necessary, ask the teacher for help in regard to spelling, capitals, or punctuation. So far as there is time, read the stories aloud and criticise them for the following points: Is the story well told? Is anything important omitted? Would you change anything in the story? Which stories are told best? 24. LANGUAGE LESSON Write the names of Robert Louis Stevenson, Edmund Clarence Stedman, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, John Greenleaf Whittier, William Cullen Bryant. Rewrite their names, using initials for the first two names of each. These abbreviations are in common use: Mr., Mrs., Rev. for Reverend; Dr., for Doctor; St., for Street; Ave., for Avenue; R.R., for Railroad; Jr., for Junior. What abbreviation is used for the name of your state? Write the following sentences from dictation : Mrs. James H. Brown called this afternoon. 25. ORAL LESSON THE PICNIC This picture looks as if it had a story. What is the story? Ask your teacher to divide the class into two sides. The first pupil on one side must ask a fair and sensible question about the picture, and the first pupil on the other side must give an answer, and so on, all round the class. If a silly question is asked, it counts one against the side that asks it, but a good question counts one for the side. In the same way a good answer adds one to the score of the other side, and a poor answer subtracts one. The teacher is the umpire. After every one has had a chance for a question or answer, the score will be counted and you can see which side has won. But while you are playing the game, do not forget the story. Have you learned all that you can about it from the picture? The side that has the low score might have another chance. more about the picture? After they have finished, several pupils may tell the story in turn. Each should tell it from beginning to end without hesitating or stammering. Can any of them tell anything 26. WRITTEN LESSON Think over carefully a story about the picture in Lesson 25. Never mind if your idea of the story is different from that told in the class. But be sure that you know your story, how it is to begin, what is to come in the middle, and how it is to end. What is the title of your story? Write the story care How and where should it be written? fully. Several of the stories are to be read aloud in the class. Which are the most interesting? In some schools they have a class story book in which the best stories written by pupils are kept to show to visitors. Are any of your stories about the picnic good enough to be filed in such a book? 27. LANGUAGE LESSON The compositions written in Lesson 26 are to be criticised aloud by the teacher for mistakes in spelling, capitals, punctuation, and sentences. Every bad sentence that she reads is to be written correctly by the class. Are these new sentences correct? If not, they must be rewritten correctly on the board. 28. ORAL LESSON FABLE OF THE FROG AND THE OX SCENE: Two frogs, a big and a little one, are sitting on the bank of a pool. An ox is grazing in the meadow near by. The Little Frog. O father, father. I've just seen such a terrible creature. The Big Frog. Where, my son? Little Frog. Over there in the meadow. Big Frog. The Frog and the Ox What did it look like? 23 Little Frog. It was red, it stood on four legs, it had big eyes, and Big Frog. Big Frog. two curved sticks standing out on its head. And, oh! it was so big. Tut, tut! how big? As big as I? O, bigger, much bigger. That cannot be. But I can make myself bigger. (Puffs himself up.) Was it as big as this? Little Frog. O yes, much bigger. Big Frog. (Puffing himself up still more.) Pooh! I don't be lieve it. Was he as big as this? Little Frog. O yes, bigger, bigger! Big Frog. (Puffing himself still more.) As big as this? Little Frog. Yes, yes, very much bigger. Big Frog. (Puffs a little more, and then flies into pieces, with a noise like a pop-gun.) Little Frog. Oh! father! This drama is to be read aloud, one pupil taking the part of the Little Frog, another that of the Big Frog. It may be read several times, and the reading criticised for expression and dramatic interest. Let the class dramatize the fable, "The Danger of Talking Too Much" (Lesson 13). The parts to be taken by the pupils are: (1) The Turtle; (2) The First Wild Goose; (3) The Second Wild Goose: (4) The People in the Village. This should be repeated, with different children taking the parts, until the little play is well acted. 29. WRITTEN LESSON The teacher will dictate a list of words that have been misspelled or used incorrectly by the class. The pupils will write sentences using and spelling these words correctly. |