Milly-Molly-Mandy’s School Days

Milly-Molly-Mandy's School Days by Joyce Lankester Brisley is a set of five cosy village school stories for 5 year olds, with a strict teacher, a runaway duck and one very big puddle.

What happens

Milly-Molly-Mandy walks to the little village school every day with little-friend-Susan. Billy Blunt, whose dad keeps the corn-shop, is never far away. Each story stands on its own, so it works beautifully as a story a night.

In the first one, the strict new head-mistress, Miss Edwards, comes to stay at Milly-Molly-Mandy's house for a few nights. Is there anything stranger, when you're small, than your teacher sitting at your supper table? Milly-Molly-Mandy keeps waiting to be told to keep her elbows off the desk.

Instead Teacher laughs, cuts out a whole row of paper sailor-girls and ends up with flour on her cheek learning to make apple turn-overs. It's a lovely one for any child who's a bit wary of a strict teacher.

Then there's Dum-Dum, a lonely drake at the Big House. Milly-Molly-Mandy cheers him up with worms after school every day. One morning he waddles into the classroom behind Billy Blunt (and the whole class is out of their seats laughing).

The other three are just as homely. On a wet day the three friends mend a huge puddle by the school gate with bricks and a lump of old paving-stone. Billy digs up an "ancient" coin and they go hunting for buried treasure in his garden, which doesn't turn out quite how they hope. And a snowy morning brings Billy's new sledge and a ride to school for a little girl called Bunchy.

Nothing rushes, in the best way. Billy Blunt says very little ("Huh!" covers most things), Susan squeals and Milly-Molly-Mandy wants to try everything. The school day starts with a hymn and the register, and some children walk home for their dinner.

Before the first story there's a drawing of the whole village, so your reader can trace the way from the nice white cottage to the school gate.

What to read next

If your reader warms to Billy Blunt's quiet kindness, he's back in Milly-Molly-Mandy's Adventures. He hands over his own bus fare when Susan loses hers, and pitches his tent in the meadow for a night under the stars.