McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader, Revised Edition · Lesson XII · Part 2: The good reader and the gentle hand
18. It Snows, by Mrs. S. J. Hale
Goal: Your child reads a poem in which different people greet the snow, giving each voice its own feeling.
You'll need
- The book, open to this lesson
- A notebook and pencil
What's in the book
A poem in five stanzas showing how a schoolboy, an invalid, a traveler, a belle and a poor widow each feel when it snows. A note about Sarah Josepha Hale opens it; definitions and a reading remark follow.
The lesson, step by step
Words and meanings
Read some definitions:
Trow, to think, to believe.
Trappings, ornaments.
Musing, thinking in an absent-minded way.
Stifled, choked, suppressed.
About the author
The book says Sarah Josepha Hale was born in Newport, New Hampshire. Her husband died in 1822, leaving her with five children, and she turned to writing. She edited the "Ladies' Magazine" and then "Godey's Lady's Book" for more than forty years.
Read the remark first
The book gives a reading tip:
Try to express the actual feeling of each quotation; and enter into the descriptions with spirit.
SayHow would a schoolboy say "It snows"? How would a sick person say it?
Read aloud
Read stanza by stanza, changing your voice for each speaker.
"It snows!" cries the School-boy, "Hurrah!" and his shout
'T is a most bitter lot to be poor, when it snows!
Talk about it
SayWho is glad of the snow, and who dreads it? Why?
SayWhy does the poet put the poor widow near the end?
SayWhat does the last stanza ask us to think about?
Tell it back
Your child describes each person in the poem and how they feel.
Memorize
Learn the first stanza, the schoolboy's, which begins:
"It snows!" cries the School-boy, "Hurrah!" and his shout
Write (optional)
Write how you feel when it snows, and how someone very different might feel.