You are probably already familiar with the animal stories written by Thornton Burgess in the early 1900s. These go by titles such as "The Adventures of Johnny Chuck" and "Old Mother West Wind" and are sold by Dover Press for only $1. Each book tells about the life and adventures of various animals in such a way that the child easily learns about animal habitat and woodland lessons. In "Old Mother West Wind" the book starts off telling about her children, "The Merry Breezes," who carry scents of animals as they fly along ruffling (tickling) the fur of different animals. Later in the book we read about a bird who, one night, almost loses her eggs to a skunk without a stripe. Now we have an idea of why God gave skunks stripes. My daughter silently reads a chapter from these books each day and narrates them at dinner. These are written at the second grade level and contain just a few illustrations (line drawings).

Update April 2024: This particular boxed-set is no longer available, but the individual titles still are. Today, they run about $5 each, new.