School Library Journal Review
K-Gr 2-As the school year comes to a close, Pearl, a rabbit, and Wagner, a mouse, are thinking ahead and curious about Ms. Bean, who will be their teacher in the fall. While walking down the hall, Pearl peers inside Ms. Bean's classroom, and it is quiet-too quiet. Her imagination runs wild as she conjures up horrible things that youngsters might be forced to do in Ms. Bean's class, frightening herself and the others when she tells them. When the teacher and her current class visit with Pearl and Wagner's, bringing snacks from their garden, the children have an opportunity to ask questions. Soon their worries are alleviated. (No, they will not be made to count backward from 100 by sevens.) The pen-and-ink, watercolor, and colored-pencil illustrations feature characters' emotions that are easy to interpret, and they will draw readers in. Children who worry about what the next school year might hold for them will find this book reassuring.-Janene Corbin, Rosebank Elementary School, Nashville, TN (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Horn Book Review
"No more homework, no more books, no more teacher's dirty looks" may be chanted on every elementary school playground as school ends, but its jubilation often masks some insecurity. What will next year be like? Who will be in my class? Will I like my new teacher? In this latest entry in the Pearl and Wagner series, McMullan perfectly captures that uncertainty when Pearl gets a glimpse of her future teacher, Ms. Bean. "She looks like a bean," she tells Wagner. "A mean green bean." How bad can it be? Pearl figures they're in for hard spelling tests (with words like stupendous and astonishing); counting backward from one hundred -- by sevens; and even a missed lunch period or two. Alley nicely (and appropriately) varies the placement of illustrations, with some foreshadowing the action and others replicating it, all the while capturing the myriad expressions on all the characters' faces. The language (natural rather than phonetically regular vocabulary, and with varied sentence structure) begins to bridge that territory between easy readers and chapter books, but the real beauty of this book is its own connection from one school year to the next. betty carter (c) Copyright 2012. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Booklist Review
In the latest installment from the Geisel Honor-winning creators of Pearl and Wagner: One Funny Day (2009), the last days of school are filled with emotional tension about next year's teachers: will they be nice or mean nice or mean? Pearl, who shares the independent spirit of Kevin Henkes' Lilly, decides early, on slim evidence, that next year's teacher is mean. In contrast to Mo Willems' Elephant and Piggie books, where only two characters work through issues, here a whole classroom of voices are heard throughout the three easily accessible short chapters.--Russell, Mary Copyright 2010 Booklist
