Free reading
Classic stories
61 classic stories in the U.S. public domain, free to read with no sign-in. The short stories open in the Focus-In reader, which has read-aloud, a reading ruler, adjustable text, a glossary and questions at the end.
Titles marked Illuminated include pictures. All story texts are printed as first published.
Genre
Sensitive subjects: teacher approval needed
This genre holds important books and stories that deal with subjects such as slavery, racism and violence. Each one opens with an academic foreword that explains its sensitive subjects.
These titles are part of Trailpost Plus. A teacher needs to assign them to students in the teacher portal, either one title at a time or the whole genre at once. They stay off when a teacher opens everything else.
Sensitive subjects
Elementary
Grades 1–5 · 13 titles
- Aesop's Fables IlluminatedAesop, c. 600 BCEFifteen short fables, each ending with a lesson.
- The Tale of Peter Rabbit IlluminatedBeatrix Potter, 1902Peter Rabbit goes into Mr. McGregor's garden after his mother tells him not to.
- The Elephant's Child IlluminatedRudyard Kipling, 1902A very curious young elephant goes to the Limpopo River to learn what the Crocodile has for dinner.
- Hansel and Gretel IlluminatedJacob and Wilhelm Grimm, 1812Two children left in the forest find a house made of bread and cake, and the witch who lives in it.
- Jack and the Beanstalk IlluminatedJoseph Jacobs, 1890Jack trades the family cow for beans and climbs to an ogre's house in the sky.
- The Velveteen Rabbit IlluminatedMargery Williams, 1922A stuffed rabbit learns from an old toy horse what it means to become Real.
- The Emperor's New Clothes IlluminatedHans Christian Andersen, 1837
- The Happy Prince IlluminatedOscar Wilde, 1888
- The Selfish Giant IlluminatedOscar Wilde, 1888A giant walls children out of his garden, and spring refuses to come back.
- The Steadfast Tin Soldier IlluminatedHans Christian Andersen, 1838A one-legged tin soldier stays brave through a long, strange journey to return to the paper dancer he loves.
- The Ugly Duckling IlluminatedHans Christian Andersen, 1843A young bird who is mocked for looking different lives through a hard winter and finds out what he really is.
- The Wonderful Wizard of OzL. Frank Baum, 1900Dorothy is carried by a cyclone to the Land of Oz and sets out to find the Wizard.
- The Golden Touch IlluminatedNathaniel Hawthorne, 1852King Midas is granted his wish that everything he touches will turn to gold.
Middle school
Grades 6–8 · 23 titles
- Rikki-Tikki-Tavi IlluminatedRudyard Kipling, 1894
- The White Seal IlluminatedRudyard Kipling, 1894
- A White HeronSarah Orne Jewett, 1886A girl in the Maine woods has to decide whether to show a hunter where a rare bird nests.
- The Adventure of the Speckled Band IlluminatedArthur Conan Doyle, 1892Sherlock Holmes investigates a woman's strange death and the dying words "the speckled band."
- After Twenty YearsO. Henry, 1906Two friends promised to meet in the same New York doorway twenty years later.
- The Canterville Ghost IlluminatedOscar Wilde, 1887An American family moves into a haunted English house and refuses to be frightened by its ghost.
- The Gift of the Magi IlluminatedO. Henry, 1905
- The Last LeafO. Henry, 1907A young artist with pneumonia believes she will die when the last ivy leaf falls.
- The Lumber-RoomSaki, 1914A boy left behind as a punishment finds a better way to spend the day than the trip he missed.
- Mowgli's Brothers IlluminatedRudyard Kipling, 1894A human baby is taken in by a family of wolves, and the tiger who hunted him wants him back.
- The Open Window IlluminatedSaki (H. H. Munro), 1911
- The Ransom of Red Chief IlluminatedO. Henry, 1910
- The Red-Headed League IlluminatedArthur Conan Doyle, 1891A pawnbroker is paid to copy an encyclopedia because of his red hair, and Sherlock Holmes wants to know why.
- Rip Van Winkle IlluminatedWashington Irving, 1819
- A Scandal in Bohemia IlluminatedArthur Conan Doyle, 1891
- The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County IlluminatedMark Twain, 1865
- The Lady, or the Tiger? IlluminatedFrank R. Stockton, 1882
- The Legend of Sleepy Hollow IlluminatedWashington Irving, 1820
- The Man Without a CountryEdward Everett Hale, 1863A young army officer who curses his country in court is sentenced never to hear its name again.
- The Necklace IlluminatedGuy de Maupassant, 1884
- The £1,000,000 Bank-NoteMark Twain, 1893A penniless American in London is handed a million-pound note as part of a bet between two rich brothers.
- The Most Dangerous Game IlluminatedRichard Connell, 1924
- The Tell-Tale Heart IlluminatedEdgar Allan Poe, 1843
High school
Grades 9–12 · 25 titles
- The Monkey's Paw IlluminatedW. W. Jacobs, 1902
- A Jury of Her Peers IlluminatedSusan Glaspell, 1917
- An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge IlluminatedAmbrose Bierce, 1890
- The Bet IlluminatedAnton Chekhov, 1889
- The Cask of Amontillado IlluminatedEdgar Allan Poe, 1846
- The Country of the Blind IlluminatedH. G. Wells, 1904
- The Curious Case of Benjamin Button IlluminatedF. Scott Fitzgerald, 1922
- The Fall of the House of UsherEdgar Allan Poe, 1839A man visits his sick childhood friend in a decaying mansion, where something is wrong with the friend's sister.
- The Invisible Man IlluminatedG. K. Chesterton, 1911
- The Masque of the Red Death IlluminatedEdgar Allan Poe, 1842
- The Minister's Black VeilNathaniel Hawthorne, 1836A Puritan minister puts on a black veil one Sunday and never takes it off.
- The Revolt of "Mother"Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, 1890A farm wife who has waited forty years for a new house moves her family into her husband's new barn.
- The Signal-ManCharles Dickens, 1866A lonely railway signal-man is haunted by a figure that appears before each disaster on his line.
- The Story of an Hour IlluminatedKate Chopin, 1894
- To Build a Fire IlluminatedJack London, 1908
- ArabyJames Joyce, 1914A boy in Dublin promises to bring a gift from a bazaar to the girl he admires.
- The Garden PartyKatherine Mansfield, 1922On the day of her family's party, a young woman learns that a working man has been killed near their house.
- The Open Boat IlluminatedStephen Crane, 1897
- The Overcoat IlluminatedNikolai Gogol, 1842
- The Queen of Spades IlluminatedAlexander Pushkin, 1834
- The Wife of His YouthCharles W. Chesnutt, 1898A respected man plans to propose at a ball until a woman from his past arrives at his door.
- Young Goodman Brown IlluminatedNathaniel Hawthorne, 1835
- Bartleby, the Scrivener IlluminatedHerman Melville, 1853
- The Dream of a Ridiculous Man IlluminatedFyodor Dostoevsky, 1877
- The Yellow Wallpaper IlluminatedCharlotte Perkins Gilman, 1892