Text Leveling System

Miss Rumphius

RDQ:	598	Max Word/Sent	35	Total Words	1254		Diff Words	417
Lex	660	Ave Word/.Sent	11	Hi Freq occurs	887	70.7%	Hi freq	184	44.1%
AR	2.9	Long Sentences	14.2	Low Freq occurs	60	4.8%	Low freq	39	9.4%

The Lupine Lady lives in a small house
overlooking the sea. In between the rocks around
her house grow blue and purple and rose-colored
flowers. The Lupine Lady is little and old. But
she has not always been that way. I know. She is
my great-aunt, and she told me so.
Once upon a time she was a little girl named
Alice, who lived in a city by the sea. From the
front stoop she could see the wharves and the
bristling masts of tall ships. Many years ago her
grandfather had come to America on a large
sailing ship.]]
Now he worked in the shop at the bottom of the house, making figureheads
for the prows of ships, and carving Indians out of wood to put in front of cigar
stores. For Alice's grandfather was an artist. He painted pictures, too, of
sailing ships and places across the sea. When he was very busy, Alice helped
him put in the skies.]]
In the evening Alice sat on her grandfather's knee and listened to his
stories of faraway places. When he had finished, Alice would say, "When I
grow up, I too will go to faraway places, and when I grow old, I too will live
beside the sea."
"That is all very well, little Alice," said her grandfather, "but there is a third
thing you must do."
"What is that?" asked Alice.
"You must do something to make the world more beautiful," said her
grandfather.
"All right," said Alice. But she did not know what that could be.
In the meantime Alice got up and washed her face and ate porridge for
breakfast. She went to school and came home and did her homework.
And pretty soon she was grown up.]]
Then my Great-aunt Alice set out to do the three things she had told her
grandfather she was going to do. She left home and went to live in another
city far from the sea and the salt air. There she worked in a library, dusting
books and keeping them from getting mixed up, and helping people find the
ones they wanted. Some of the books told her about faraway places.
People called her Miss Rumphius now.]]
Sometimes she went to the conservatory in the middle of the park. When
she stepped inside on a wintry day, the warm moist air wrapped itself around
her, and the sweet smell of jasmine filled her nose.
"This is almost like a tropical isle," said Miss Rumphius. "But not quite."]]
So Miss Rumphius went to a real tropical island, where people kept
cockatoos and monkeys as pets. She walked on long beaches, picking up
beautiful shells. One day she met the Bapa Raja, king of a fishing village.
"You must be tired, " he said . "Come into my house and rest. "
So Miss Rumphius went in and met the Bapa Raja's wife. The Bapa Raja
himself fetched a green coconut and cut a slice off the top so that Miss
Rumphius could drink the coconut water inside. Before she left, the Bapa
Raja gave her a beautiful mother-of-pearl shell on which he had painted a
bird of paradise and the words, "You will always remain in my heart."
"You will always remain in mine too," said Miss Rumphius.]]
My great-aunt Miss Alice Rumphius climbed tall mountains where the
snow never melted. She went through jungles and across deserts. She saw
lions playing and kangaroos jumping. And everywhere she made friends she
would never forget. Finally she came to the Land of the Lotus-Eaters, and
there, getting off a camel, she hurt her back.
"What a foolish thing to do," said Miss Rumphius. "Well, I have certainly
seen faraway places. Maybe it is time to find my place by the sea."
And it was, and she did.]]
From the porch of her new house Miss
Rumphius watched the sun come up; she watched
it cross the heavens and sparkle on the water; and
she saw it set in glory in the evening. She started
a little garden among the rocks that surrounded
her house, and she planted a few flower seeds in
the stony ground. Miss Rumphius was almost
perfectly happy.
"But there is still one more thing I have to do,"
she said. "I have to do something to make the
world more beautiful."
But what? "The world already is pretty nice,"
she thought, looking out over the ocean.]]
The next spring Miss Rumphius was not very well. Her back was bothering
her again, and she had to stay in bed most of the time.
The flowers she had planted the summer before had come up and bloomed
in spite of the stony ground. She could see them from her bedroom window,
blue and purple and rose-colored.
"Lupines," said Miss Rumphius with satisfaction. "I have always loved
lupines the best. I wish I could plant more seeds this summer so that I could
have still more flowers next year."
But she was not able to.]]
After a hard winter spring came. Miss Rumphius was feeling much better.
Now she could take walks again. One afternoon she started to go up and over
the hill, where she had not been in a long time.
"I don't believe my eyes!" she cried when she got to the top. For there on
the other side of the hill was a large patch of blue and purple and rose-colored
lupines!
"It was the wind," she said as she knelt in delight. "It was the wind that
brought the seeds from my garden here! And the birds must have helped!"
Then Miss Rumphius had a wonderful idea!]]
She hurried home and got out her seed
catalogues. She sent off to the very best seed
house for five bushels of lupine seed.
All that summer Miss Rumphius, her pockets
full of seeds, wandered over fields and headlands,
sowing lupines. She scattered seeds along the
highways and down the country lanes. She flung
handfuls of them around the schoolhouse and
back of the church. She tossed them into hollows
and along stone walls.
Her back didn't hurt her any more at all.
Now some people called her That Crazy Old
Lady.]]
The next spring there were lupines everywhere. Fields and hillsides were
covered with blue and purple and rose-colored flowers. They bloomed along
the highways and down the lanes. Bright patches lay around the schoolhouse]]
and back of the church. Down in the hollows and along the stone walls grew
the beautiful flowers.
Miss Rumphius had done the third, the most difficult thing of all!]]
My Great-aunt Alice, Miss Rumphius, is very old now. Her hair is very
white. Every year there are more and more lupines. Now they call her the
Lupine Lady. Sometimes my friends stand with me outside her gate, curious to
see the old, old lady who planted the fields of lupines. When she invites us in,
they come slowly. They think she is the oldest woman in the world. Often she
tells us stories of faraway places.
"When I grow up," I tell her, "I too will go to faraway places and come
home to live by the sea."
"That is all very well, little Alice," says my aunt, "but there is a third thing
you must do."
"What is that?" I ask.
"You must do something to make the world more beautiful."
"All right," I say.]]
But I do not know yet what that can be.]]

Subjective Criteria

Illustrations: Little support

Dialog: Two speakers

Dialog: Broken dialogue

Vocabulary: Few decoding/definition issues

Language: Few descriptive words

Sentences: Some Long/Complex

Text structure: Blend of written/oral

Features

Clear cause/effect

Topic

Seeds

Travel/Traveling

Flowers

Goals

*Feelings, Behaviors

Low Frequency Words

bapa	bristling	bushels	cigar	cockatoos
curious	faraway	fetched	figureheads	flung
glory	headlands	isle	jungles	knelt
lotus	lupine	lupines	masts	meantime
paradise	patches	pearl	pockets	prows
raja's	rumphius	satisfaction	schoolhouse	skies
sowing	spite	stony	stoop	surrounded
tropical	wandered	wharves	wintry