Daisy and the Trouble with School Trips

Kes Gray's Daisy and the Trouble with School Trips is a very funny school story for 5 year olds about a class who swear a secret pact to find a secret passage.

What happens

Daisy's class are off to Bobbington Hall for the day, a very old house (built in Henry the Eighth's time, Mrs Peters says). Mrs Peters is thrilled about the local history. The class are thrilled about a whole day off lessons and the back seats on the coach.

Then Jack Beechwhistle announces that every old house has secret passages. Some have about ten. They might be stuffed with Spanish doubloons, jewels or a secret stash of olden bananas (Jack is very sure about the bananas). Clever Barry Morely keeps trying to put him right, and nobody listens.

So the whole class huddles up in the playground and swears to hunt for secret passages without Mrs Peters ever finding out. Anyone who blabs, their tongue will drop off. And so will their head.

Before the trip even happens, Daisy turns her own house upside down looking for one. Wardrobe, sock drawer, knicker drawer, the shed... She only stops when her mum catches her trying to unscrew the bathroom cabinet.

Daisy tells the story herself, and she's fabulous company. She's chatty and cheeky and has something to say about the trouble with pretty much everything. Right at the start she tells you the trip got half her class into trouble, and that it definitely WASN'T her fault. So you know something is going to go wrong. The fun is waiting to find out what.

Did your child ever tap the back of a wardrobe, just in case? They'll be right there with Daisy.

It's also a lovely one to share before a real school trip. There are packed-lunch negotiations (Daisy asks for eleven Scotch eggs), a best friend with matching cheese sandwiches and a teacher who wants them all to be school ambassadors.

What to read next

Jack Beechwhistle has books of his own too. In Attack of the Giant Slugs he tells the story himself, and Colin and Harry are his trainee agents.