Mrs. Kim Reads Presidents' Day (READ-ALOUD)

presidents

day by anne rockwell photographs by lizzie rockwell

presidents

day is when we celebrate the birthdays of george washington and abraham lincoln both were born in february many years ago both were great presidents of our country the united states of america adults vote every four years to elect the president of the united states each person votes for the person they think will be the best leader not everyone agrees so whoever gets the most votes becomes president we decided to organize an assembly program for the day of the president telling the rest of our school some things we learned about some of our presidents we worked hard preparing to paint and cut stirring and cooking flour paste and tearing strips of newspaper to make paper mache sam evan sarah and michiko used the paper mache mountain what did we do hello we are all mount rushmore they said all together the faces of presidents george washington thomas jefferson theodore roosevelt and abraham lincoln are carved 60 feet high on our hard granite cliff now each of these presidents will tell you about himself i was george washington that's because it's my birthday it's the same as yours i was born on february 22 six years ago but george washington was born more than 200 years ago good morning i said in a deep voice i let the american people when they fought to free themselves from the king of england we won so i was elected the first president of a new country called the united states of america abraham lincoln was very, very tall and charlie is the tallest kid in our class i am the sixteenth president of the united states he said i kept the united states united when It was divided in two I said a house divided against itself cannot stand and I meant it we fought a long war to keep our nation together that's why it's called the United States of America United means many stand together as one Nicholas is a good writer I can always think of the right word when he came on stage wearing a red wig with a short ponytail in the back he just sat at a desk set up with a pen made from a quill everyone waited patiently while he frowned and he scratched his head crumpled pieces of paper and threw them in the trash can finally he shouted finally that's it he stood up he bowed to the audience and said good morning my name is thomas jefferson third president of the united states i wrote something called the declaration of independence that said why we wanted to be free of england um, it's pretty good if I do say so myself he started

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ing what he wrote but suddenly jessica appeared galloping on a toy horse good morning he shouted my name is theodore roosevelt but you can call me teddy I am the 26th president of the United States, when I was a child I was very sick and couldn't go out to play, but when I grew up I was healthy and strong and loved the outdoors.

She wanted to have much of this great and beautiful land forever. being wild is why we set aside more land to be national parks where plants and animals could always be wild pablo and evelyn came out on stage carrying the long mural we had painted of giant sequoias, the grand canyon, squirting old faithfuls and animals in the Everglades. the rest of us joined them mount rushmore george washington abraham lincoln thomas jefferson and teddy roosevelt on his horse we bowed while everyone in the audience applauded for a long time back in the classroom we had an election everyone wrote down someone's name What would a good leader do on a piece of paper?

I wrote Pablo's name because he's smart and he never wants to say that we put each sheet of paper in a box. Mrs. Madoff counted the votes. The person whose name appeared most often would win the election. Guess what. that I won just like george washington thomas jefferson abraham lincoln teddy roosevelt and the current president of the United States now I am the president of Mrs. Madoff's class when I grow up I want to be the first female president of the United States of America, right? Would it be great after all? I have the same birthday as George Washington and you.