By Julie Danneberg
Mrs. Hartwell's class is sure their teacher will be lonely and bored all summer without them, so they plan a big goodbye surprise, and the last page shows you what she's really counting down to.
School's almost out, and Mrs. Hartwell's class has talked itself into a real worry: what is their teacher going to do all summer without them? She'll be bored. She'll be lonely. Somebody has to do something. So the children start scheming a big send-off, whispering behind their hands, gluing and painting, guarding the secret right up to the last bell. The joke, of course, is one the children can't see and one your child may catch a beat before the grown-ups do. While the class frets over their poor sad teacher, the last page opens onto Mrs. Hartwell's own summer, and she is not planning to spend June crying at her empty desk. It's the perfect last-week read, a companion to First Day Jitters, and it turns the whole teary goodbye into a laugh.
This is the one I'd pull out for the last week of school. It names that funny, mixed-up feeling of a year ending, part sad and part can't-wait, without getting mushy about it. Being in on the joke is a big part of the fun for a lot of children, and there's a gentle nudge in it too: the grown-ups are as ready for summer as they are. It gives you an easy way into talking about the year that's closing, and it lets a whole class laugh together on a day that can feel wobbly. For a child who dreads goodbyes, it lets the last day feel like the beginning of summer.