"Heckedy Peg" and "One Monday Morning"

Heckedy Peg
By Audrey Wood
Illustrated by Don Wood
Heckedy Peg is a richly illustrated story about a mother and her seven children, named after the days of the week, and an old hag who turns out to be a witch. When their mother goes to market one day, she promises each child his or her special request. While she is gone, the children are persuaded by a witch to disregard their mother's warnings not to let strangers into the house or to touch fire. The witch turns the children into various types of food and takes it home with her. When the mother confronts the witch, the witch sets up an impossible task: only when the mother can figure out which food was which child will they be freed. She matches the requests that the children made to her to each kind of food and gets her children back. The illustrations are beautifully detailed and extremely effective. The names of the children, Sunday through Saturday, are repeated often enough to make this a good story to introduce, practice or review the names of the days of the week. Characters in this book are the mother, the seven children, and the witch, who looks like an old woman.

One Monday Morning
By Uri Shulivetz
On a gloomy rainy Monday, a queen and a prince drop by to visit a young boy, but he isn't home. Each day they visit again with another member of the royal party then leave when they don't find him at home. Finally, on Sunday the boy opens the door to the queen, prince and their entourage, and they come in for a lovely visit. The royal party are drawn in bright colors like playing cards. They contrast with the backdrop of a dark and drab city scene, illustrated in much detail. This book lends itself to learning story sequence and the days of the week. Characters are the boy, the queen, the prince, the king, a knight, a guard, a cook, a barber, a jester and a dog.

Story Props for "Heckedy Peg" and "One Monday Morning"