McGuffey's Third Eclectic Reader, Revised Edition · Lesson XXXI · Part 4: Thinking hard and speaking kindly

31. Weighing an Elephant

Goal: Your child reads a story about solving a hard problem and explains how the elephant was weighed.

⏱ About 25 minutes · 7 steps

Open it at the Internet Archive ↗

You'll need

  • The book, open to this lesson
  • A notebook or lined paper and a pencil
  • A bowl or sink of water, a small plastic tub, a toy and some coins (for the boat experiment)

What's in the book

A long list of words and a story: a king wants to weigh his elephant, no one knows how, and a child at home works out the poor old sailor's clever answer with a boat.

The lesson, step by step

  1. Warm up

    SayHow could you weigh something too big for any scale, like an elephant?

    Let your child guess before reading.

  2. Words and meanings

    Point to the list of words at the top of the lesson:

    eastern sailor expense opening deliverance enormous elephant difficulty weight court stroked favorite quantity machine relieved clever subject leaning empty

    Read them together a few at a time. Clap the syllables of the long ones. The book prints these words without meanings.

    Explain a few: enormous means very big; a quantity is an amount; deliverance means being saved.

  3. Read it aloud

    Your child reads. Take turns by paragraph; this is a longer lesson.

    Here is a line from it:

    At last, a poor old sailor found safe and simple means by which to weigh the enormous beast.

    Then let your child reread a favorite part, more smoothly.

  4. Talk about it

    SayWhy did the king want to know how much his elephant weighed?

    SayHow did the boat help to weigh the elephant?

    SayWhat did the child do before being told the answer?

    Then talk about the lesson of the reading:

    Thinking hard for yourself can solve a problem that seems impossible.

    Let your child look back at the page to find answers.

  5. Tell it back

    Close the book.

    SayExplain to me, step by step, how to weigh an elephant with a boat.

  6. Copywork

    Your child copies this from the book in their best handwriting:

    At last, a poor old sailor found safe and simple means by which to weigh the enormous beast.

    Check capitals and marks together.

  7. Spelling

    Say each word, use it in a sentence, and have your child spell it aloud, then write it: sailor, weight, elephant, empty, clever.

    Check together and fix any mistakes right away. Keep missed words for tomorrow's warm-up.

Afterwards

Reread the lesson aloud tomorrow before starting the next one, and review any missed spelling words.

Tip

Try it: float a plastic tub in the sink, put a toy in it, mark the waterline, then take the toy out and add coins until the tub sinks to the same line.

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