How Turtle Cracked His Shell (Learn English with Stories)

One autumn day, Turtle was talking with the birds. They said, “Winter is coming. Soon it’s going to be very cold here. We’re getting ready to fly south where it is warm.”

“Can I come with you?” asked Turtle. At first, the birds said, “No!” Turtle pleaded, “There must be some way I can go with you!” Finally, the birds agreed.

“Use your mouth to hold on tightly to this stick,” the birds explained. Turtle did just that.

Then the two big birds grabbed the ends of the stick. Soon they were all high in the sky— including Turtle.

Turtle had never been so high off the ground before. He could look down and see how small everything looked. He wondered how far they had come, and how far they had to go.

Turtle tried to get the birds’ attention. He rolled his eyes at them, but they did not notice. He waved his legs too.

Frustrated, Turtle opened his mouth to speak. At that moment he let go of the stick and began to fall! He fell down from the sky and hit the ground hard.

Turtle’s body ached. He ached so much he did not notice that his shell had cracked all over. He crawled into a pond and swam down to the bottom.

There he dug a hole in the mud and slept all winter long.

In the spring, Turtle woke up. He was very proud of the cracks on his shell.

Ever since then, every turtle’s shell looks like it has cracks all over it.