Back to School: Hands Off, Harry by Rosemary Wells

GUESS WHAT HAPPENED AT SCHOOL TODAY?

HARRY RAN ALL THE WAY DOWN THE HALL AND INTO SCHOOL BACKWARDS!

HE KNOCKED BABETTE, TINA, AND BENJAMIN OUT OF FRIENDLY CIRCLE AND ONTO THE FLOOR.

HARRY LAUGHED, BUT NO ONE ELSE DID!

Harry is obviously challenged in the personal-boundaries department, the one kid in Miss Harmony's class who seems to careen around the classroom causing mess and mayhem wherever he goes. He spills poster paints all over Benjamin's back-to-school outfit and pokes Miracle in the ribs, making her spill glue in her new shoes.

"IT WAS AN ACCIDENT," SAID HARRY.

Harry is an accident waiting to happen, a bull in the china shop, and a candidate for a time-out in the thinking chair. But "thinking time" away from the others and frequent "re-directions" from Miss Harmony seem to go unheeded. Something must be done!

The Kindergators come to a conclusion that Harry needs a way to be reminded to keep a proper distance between himself and others, and in a Friendly Circle intervention Babette comes up with a great solution--an inflated rubber tube to pop around his waist to make sure that he can't possibly invade anyone's personal space! Harry thinks it's a hoot and by the end of the day finds out that people like him a lot better when he's got his own perimeter under control.

"I WANT TO SAY I'M SORRY," SAID HARRY!

I THINK HE MEANS IT!" SAID MISS HARMONY.

Rosemary Wells (of Max & Ruby fame) shows she knows the ways of Kindergartners in her introductory title in her new Kindergators series, Kindergators: Hands Off, Harry! (Katherine Tegen Books, 2011), which promises to be a fun way to explore the early days of Kindergarten. Wells' illustrations offer a bit of a change from her usual style in her mixed-media (collage) art and her story line offers a new cast of characters for the preschool set.