The fourth reader begins with exercises in marks and pauses (punctuation and editor's marks), articulation, accent, and inflection. These exercises are followed by 80 lessons-51 in prose and 29 in poetry. Complexity and vocabulary level has increased dramatically since the first reader, and you will see increasing evidence that the language usage in these McGuffey Readers is helpful to your students in all the subjects they are studying.

By the end of the fourth reader, your student will be reading words such as bayonet, lingering, matted, delicate, wandering enshrined, wafted, and yearning. They will have studied poems, dramatic dialogues, essays, stories, and passages from classic literature, including a few classic stories from the Bible. The student will read about "How a Fly Walks on the Ceiling," find a botany and herbal medicine lesson wrapped in the story of a nettle, and other nature tales. There are stories about animals, including a story about elephants that uses words such as quadruped, sagacious, stratagem, and proboscis.

New introduction with instructions for use with Charlotte Mason methods
Charlotte Mason's language arts methods of copywork, recitation, and narration can easily be used for these lessons. Instructions for each of these methods is found in the 18-page introduction that has been added to this edition. Like Miss Mason, Mr. McGuffey believed in short lessons, learned well, so the readers provide a convenient source for material to use with Miss Mason's methods.