“A great spiritual efficiency lies in story-telling”.–Froebel. Christmas Day, you know, dear children, is Christ’s day, Christ’s birthday, and I want to tell you why we love it so much, and why we try to make every one happy when it comes each year. A long, long time ago–more than eighteen hundred years–the baby Christ […]

“Story-telling is a real strengthening spirit-bath.”–Froebel. Piccola lived in Italy, where the oranges grow, and where all the year the sun shines warm and bright. I suppose you think Piccola a very strange name for a little girl; but in her country it was not strange at all, and her mother thought it the sweetest […]

“Nature and life speak very early to man.”–FROEBEL. A great many years ago three little girls lived in an old-fashioned house in the East. They had a very lovely home, and a kind father and mother, who tried to make them happy. All through the summer they used to roam over the hills and fields, […]

Adapted from Ouida. “We tell too few stories to children, and those we tell are stories whose heroes are automata and stuffed dolls,”–Froebel. Lolo and Moufflou lived far away from here, in a sunny country called Italy. Lolo was not as strong as you are, and could never run about and play, for he was […]

“The story brings forward other people, other relations, other times and places, other and even quite different forms; notwithstanding this fact, the auditor seeks his image there.”–FROEBEL Nearly three hundred years ago, a great many of the people in England were very unhappy because their king would not let them pray to God as they […]

“The whole future efficiency of man is seen in the child as a germ.”–FROEBEL. On this day, children, the twenty-first of April, we always rememberour dear Froebel; for it was his birthday. We bring flowers and vines to hang about his picture, we sing thesongs and play the games he loved the best, and we […]

Suggested by One of Mrs. Celia Thaxter’s Poems. “Story-telling is a real strengthening spirit-bath.”–Froebel. Piccola lived in Italy, where the oranges grow, and where all the year the sun shines warm and bright. I suppose you think Piccola a very strange name for a little girl; but in her country it was not strange at […]

“It is not the gay forms he meets in the fairy-tale which charm the child, hut a spiritual, invisible truth lying far deeper.”–Froebel. Far away, in the depths of a great green rustling wood, there lived a Fir-tree. She was tall and dark and fragrant; so tall that her topmost plumes seemed waving about in […]

“Story-telling must please children, so that it will influence, strengthen, and elevate their lives.”–FROEBEL The Maple-tree lived on the edge of the wood. Beside and behind her the trees grew so thick and tall that there was plenty of shade at her roots; but as no one stood in front, she could always look across […]

PART I. “The child takes each story as a conquest, grasps each as a treasure, and inserts into his own life, for his own advancement and instruction, what each story teaches and shows.”–Froebel. Every one of my little children has seen a picture of George Washington, I am sure. Perhaps you may remember his likeness […]

Deep in the shelter of the cave, The ass with drooping head Stood weary in the shadow, where His master’s hand had led. About the manger oxen lay, Bending a wide-eyed gaze Upon the little new-born Babe, Half worship, half amaze. High in the roof the doves were set, And cooed there, soft and mild, […]