en
EnglishEspañolFrançaisDeutschItalianoPortuguêsTagalogРусскийУкраїнськаहिन्दीతెలుగుالعربيةفارسی中文
Join free as a teacher
Lesson plansWorksheetsLibraryPrint packsBedtimeSign in

Library / The Labourer and the Nightingale

Lesson plan

The Labourer and the Nightingale

Grades
2–4
Time
45 min
Reading level
1
PDFPrint the worksheetRead the story

Lesson flow

5 min

Listen in the Dark

Dim the lights and play a recording of a nightingale, or whistle a tune that rises and falls. Pupils shut their eyes. Ask, "If this song came through your window every night, what would you wish?" Teach the five words.

10 min

Read to the Open Hands

Read the story aloud for Grades 2 and 3, and have Grade 4 read with a partner. Stop at "my poor little body." Each pupil cups their hands around a ball of scrap paper for the bird and votes: open your hands, or keep them shut? Take a few reasons, then read "The labourer opened his hands."

10 min

Trap and Talk

Pairs act out the talk. One is the labourer holding the paper-ball bird, and one is the nightingale. They use the lines from "Now I have caught you" to "my poor little body," then swap parts. Ask, "What does the labourer want now? How does the bird change his mind?"

10 min

Three Fingers

Read to the end. Pupils hold up one finger for each thing the bird says. Write the three on the board: "Never believe a prisoner's promise," "Keep what you have" and "Do not cry over what is gone for good." Pairs say when the labourer broke each one: he believed a prisoner's promise when he opened his hands, he did not keep what he had when the bird flew off, and now he must not cry over it.

10 min

What Else Could He Do?

Ask, "What did the labourer already have before he set the trap?" Pairs list three ways he could have kept hearing the song without a trap, such as lying awake and listening each warm night. Each pair tells another pair which of the bird's three things their idea follows.

STORY OVERVIEW

  • Title and Moral: The Labourer and the Nightingale - "Keep what you have, and let go of what is lost."
  • Plot Summary: A labourer traps a nightingale so that it will sing to him for always, but the bird talks his way out with a promise of three things worth far more than his body. Once he is free on a branch, the bird tells the three things and flies away, and his song goes with him.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

  • Retell how the labourer catches the nightingale and how the nightingale gets free.
  • Identify the three things the nightingale tells the labourer.
  • Explain how the nightingale's words get the labourer to open his hands.

WORDS TO TEACH FIRST

  • labourer: a person who does hard work with their hands.
  • trap: a thing made to catch an animal.
  • cage: a box of bars that keeps a bird or animal in.
  • prisoner: someone who is held and cannot leave.
  • promise: words that say you will surely do something.

TEXT QUESTIONS

  1. Why does the labourer set a trap? Sample answer: He wants the song to go on, and he says, "you will sing to me for always."
  2. How does the nightingale stop the labourer from eating him? Sample answer: He offers "three things worth far more than my poor little body" if the labourer lets him go.
  3. Why is the first thing the bird says funny? Sample answer: The labourer has just trusted a prisoner by opening his hands, and now the bird tells him, "Never believe a prisoner's promise."

EXIT TICKET

On a slip of paper: The nightingale's three things are ____, ____ and ____. The one the labourer needs most now is ____ because ____. Pupils finish the sentences and hand in the slip.

SUPPORT AND STRETCH

  • Support: Read the Easier version with a small group. Pupils hold up fingers at "One," "Two" and "Three," then retell the story by moving a paper-ball bird from a cupped hand up to a branch drawn on paper.
  • On level: Pairs list their ideas for the labourer, and each pupil finishes the exit ticket.
  • Stretch: Pupils write what the labourer says to himself on the next warm night, when there is no song. They use at least two of the nightingale's three things.

ENGLISH LEARNERS

Act out "opened his hands" with the paper-ball bird, and draw a cage on the board with the bird inside and then outside. Give this frame: "The bird said, ____." Pupils use it with each of the three sayings on the board.

Answer key

Comprehension

  1. He wishes it would never end.
  2. He says, "We nightingales never sing in a cage."
  3. He says he will eat the bird, because nightingale on toast is a tasty treat.
  4. He flies up to a branch, just out of reach.
  5. Never believe a prisoner's promise. Keep what you have. Do not cry over what is gone for good.

Vocabulary

  1. B
  2. A
  3. D
  4. E
  5. C

Writing Task

A good answer tells the labourer not to cry over the lost bird and uses at least one of the nightingale's three things.

Original text available on the story page.