First Day at Bug School

Sam Lloyd

Bloomsbury, 2016

32pp., pbk., RRP $A14.99

9781408868805

 

At the bottom of the garden
where no one really sees,
a secret school is hidden
amongst the grass and weeds.

And it is the first day of school for all the little bugs that live in the garden.  Spiders have to learn the pitfalls to avoid like climbing up waterspouts, crickets need to know their new song for the summer, ladybirds have to learn to count spots and all of the other things that go with the first day of school, under the watchful, caring eye of Miss Bumblebee.

With a new school year just over the horizon for many of our pre-schoolers this is a delightful story in rhyme that will help them allay their nerves and they start the what-ifs  and their anxiety begins to build.  The illustrations show each bug as a friendly individual (even the spiders) and the idea that school is fun threads its way through helping to quell questions and nerves.

One to add to your preschool collection to be shared as the term moves on – the children might even like to think of a favourite bug and decide what it is they would have to learn.  Would a centipede have to know how to tie shoelaces?