Week 1: Amos and Boris
Vocabulary
- savage: untamed, fierce
- luminous: emitting a glowing light
- frazzled: extremely fatigued
- plankton: very small plant and animal life living in water
- mote: speck
- Candlelight is luminous when it’s very dark out.
- My chihuahua is a mote of a dog compared to your English mastiff.
- Dustin lifted that heavy lot with savage strength.
- After teaching back to back swimming lessons, the coach felt frazzled.
- Great big humpback whales strain tiny plankton from saltwater.
Comprehension Questions
- Amos builds his boat by day and studies navigation by night.
- Amos fills his boat with all kinds of things including bandages and iodine.
- The sea glowed with phosphorescent color as Amos watched the whales spouting.
- Amos left in the middle of an immense sea after falling from his boat.
- Amos tells Boris that he’s not a fish but a mammal, the highest form of life.
- Boris the whale went swimming along with Amos the mouse on his back.
- Amos was very mad at Boris until he remembered he owed his life to the whale so he quietly climbs back onto his back.
- Amos admires the power and purpose, voice and friendliness of the whale.
- When Boris and Amos came to shore at last, the time came to say goodbye.
- Hurricane Yetta flings Boris ashore right where Amos happens to make his home.
- When Amos finds Boris on the beach, he looks at Boris with an agony of pity.
- Just when Boris thinks he is going to die, Amos comes back with two of the biggest elephants he could find.
- After Amos and Boris said goodbye, and Boris disappeared in the waves, they knew they might never meet again, they knew they would never forget each other.
Week 2: The Amazing Bone
Vocabulary
- crullers: a small sweet cakes
- rheumatism: pain in bone joints
- villain: a criminal character
- miserable: distressed or very unhappy
- minuscule: very, very small
- Old Mr. Edwards complains about the rheumatism in his stiff knees all the time.
- A wet cat is a miserable cat!
- Delights Bakery features delicate sweet crullers every Friday.
- The villain in my favorite movie wears all black.
- My portion of dessert seems minuscule compared to my brother’s.
Comprehension Questions
- One day instead of going straight home from school, Pearl dawdles.
- In the forest as Pearl is thinking about flowers, her dress feels like petals.
- The bone tells Pearl that it can imitate</b/> any sound there is.
- Pearl wants to tell her parents about the bone, and have the bone flabbergast them both.
- Pearl can’t tell what breed of animal the robbers are because they are wearing cloaks and masks.
- When the robber asks what is in Peral’s purse, the bone hisses like a snake.
- The fox tells Pearl, she is young and tender, and that she will be his dinner tonight.
- As the bone roars and rants, the fox pushes Pearl to his hideaway.
- Pearl hears sounds coming from the kitchen and the bone says it sounds like wood getting put into a stove.
- When the bone says, “Jibrakken sibibble digray!,” fox grows several inches smaller.
- After fox becomes the size of a rabbit, including his clothes, he then becomes the size of a mouse.
- When Pearl holds up the bone to her mother and says it can talk, her mother says, “Why Pearl, it’s only your imagination.”
- In bed at night, sometimes the bone puts Pearl to sleep by imitating soft harp music.
Week 3: Dr. De Soto
Vocabulary
- dainty: delicate and small
- pitiful: arousing sympathy
- bicuspid: a type of tooth
- woozy: unsteady, giddy
- formula: a list of ingredients for something
- The patient’s bicuspid is cracked and will need to be removed.
- Ella’s grandmother makes very dainty lace on a loom.
- My sister has a secret formula for making giant bubbles.
- Sally felt woozy after she fell down and hit her head.
- We found a cold, pitiful kitty in our backyard.
Comprehension Questions
- Doctor De Soto’s assistant hoists him high up to help the extra large animals.
- Being a mouse dentist, Doctor De Soto refuses to treat animals dangerous to mice.
- A well dressed fox with a flannel bandage comes to their door for help.
- Mrs. De Soto decides to risk helping the pitiful fox so she presses the buzzer and lets him in.
- Fox comes up the stairs in a flash and begs for help.
- Even though the fox is miserable, he tastes Doctor De Soto in his mouth, so his jaw began to quiver.
- Clever Mrs. De Soto hands her husband a pole to keep the fox’s mouth open.
- The tooth makes a loud sucking sound and hangs swaying in the air.
- Hearing what fox said about “Raw with salt,” Doctor De Soto says, “How foolish to trust a fox!”
- After fox plays his joke, the dentist sharply says, “Be serious. We have work to do.”
- Doctor De Soto holds up a jug while explaining his preparation saying, “With just one application, you can be rid of toothaches forever.”
- Fox has decided to eat them with the help of his brand new tooth.
- After telling fox to keep his jaws closed for a minute and fox does as he is told, his teeth are stuck together.
Week 4: Yellow and Pink
Vocabulary
- eons: very long periods of time
- gimlet eye: a piercing stare
- preposterous: utterly ridiculous
- sake: for the purpose of
- symmetrical: made up of exactly similar parts facing each other
- The hike across the city, with all the twists and turns, seemed to take eons.
- The woman’s facial features were perfectly symmetrical and striking.
- The black lab, Theo, demands your attention when he looks at you with his gimlet eye.
- Planting large green lawns in the middle of a drought is a preposterous idea.
- For the sake of our friendship, let’s just agree to disagree about which dogs are the best.
Comprehension Questions
- Two wooden figures are lying in the sun while it is hot and quiet.
- There are chickens and dreamy cows in the field where Pink and Yellow are sitting.
- Pink finds Yellow’s whole form to be admirable.
- Yellow decides that he and Pink must be accidents because he sees no explanation for how they are made.
- Pink thinks it’s impossible that they’re accidents and that it’s absolutely, preposterous.
- Yellow says that winter comes and freezes the wood and the ice splits the mouth open.
- Yellow explains that sand blowing might have helped with the smoothing.
- Yellow tells Pink that their eyes could have been made by insects, woodpeckers or even hailstones.
- Pink asks Yellow if he thinks all those odd things happened not only once, but twice.
- Yellow explains to Pink that a million years is a very long time and that winds are always blowing.
- After Yellow tells Pink that “It’s all accidental!” Pink is not satisfied with these explanations.
- After the man looks over Pink and Yellow he says, “Nice and dry.”
Week 5: Sylvester and the Magic Pebble
Vocabulary
- shiver: a trembling sensation
- gnats: small biting flies
- soothe: to bring comfort
- bent: no longer straight
- compote: a dessert of cooked fruit
- Cloe used a medicinal cream to soothe her burn.
- At Thanksgiving time we serve berry compote for dessert.
- The gnats bit my legs while hiking by the river.
- When the door creeps open, it sends a shiver up John’s spine.
- The dry grasses bent down in the strong winds.
Comprehension Questions
- During vacation Sylvester finds a shiny, round red marble.
- After Sylvester wishes the sunshine back, he wishes a wart will disappear on his hind leg.
- After the lion sniffs the rock, he goes away puzzled and bewildered.
- Imagining all the possibilities, Sylvester realizes his only hope is for someone to find the red pebble and wish it will become a donkey.
- Sylvester’s parents are very worried and they think Sylvester will surely turn up by morning.
- They talk to children and all the animals, then they went to the police.
- The dogs sniff every rock, even the one on Strawberry Hill, but it smells like a rock, not Sylvester.
- Sylvester’s parents try to be happy, but they are always miserable.
- A wolf sits on Sylvester and howls because he is hungry.
- In May, Mr. and Mrs. Duncan go on a picnic trying to be happy, even though Sylvester is no longer with them.
- Mrs. Duncan has a feeling that her son is alive and not very far away.
- After Mr. Duncan puts the magic pebble in a safe place the family realizes they all have everything they want.