Sally Derby

A boy tries to convince his teacher that the reason he is late for school is that, over and over, he had to undo the damage being caused by the wind, from tearing laundry off the line to blowing away street signs.

When Mr. Wuerst, the substitute kindergarten teacher at Merryvale School, drops his glasses into the frying pan one morning, he ends up wearing a dish towel to school instead of his scarf and he mistakes the class gerbils for fur caps.

A young girl who is tired of eating mush for breakfast every day seeks solace with her grandmother, but comes to realize that she misses her family after all.

"Did you know that Paul Laurence Dunbar originated such famous lines as "I know why the caged bird sings" and "We wear the mask that grins and lies"? From his childhood in poverty and his early promise as a poet through his struggles to find acceptance as a writer and his tumultuous romance with his wife, to his immense fame and his untimely death, Dunbar's story is one of triumph and tragedy. But his legacy remains in his much-beloved poetry--told...