School Days (Owl at School - Helen Nicoll)

Member Name: tb4ms

Product:	Owl at School - Helen Nicoll
Date:	09/02/07 (94 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Bright illustrations and popular characters.

Disadvantages: Too many speech bubbles.

This book is coming up to it's 25th anniversary but you would never be able to tell it's age, unlike some of us humans!!

It is yet another one of Helen Nicoll's books in the Meg and Mog series which are a big hit with children from about 3 upwards.

~ Who is Owl? ~
Owl is a good friend of Meg (the witch) and Mog (the witch's cat). Owl normally takes the back seat in this series of books but in this particular one heis the star of the show.

Not being an owl expert, I'm unsure of the type of owl, but he is a rather rotund white owl who is a good friend of Meg and Mog. In that case he must be a snowy owl, please correct me if I'm wrong!!

Meg is a very skinny witch with a hooked nose, a cauldron, a broomstick and the necessary cat, named Mog. Mog is a wiry black and white stripy cat who is always getting in to scrapes.

~ Owl at School ~

The story begins with Meg deciding that it's about time that Owl goes to school. She packs him off with a lunchbox and tells him to be good.

On arriving at school, Owl is greeted by 4 other 'owl' class members.

Lessons ensue with different teachers: Mr Winko and Bat in order to teach night flying with lots of soaring, hovering.

For lunch the owls partake in such things as 'rat pasty', 'stuffed toad' etc..

As sports night approaches Meg conjures up spidery web hat which manages to distract the other owls so much that Owl manages to win the night flight race, much to his delight!

He asks all of his friends to tea and much to his classmates delight, Meg rustles up a magnificent 'mouse jelly'.

So did Owl end up as the most popular member of the class??


~ Illustrations / Illustrator ~

Jan Pienkowski was born in Warsaw in 1936 and eventually got to England just after WW2.

Jan has illustrated for a number of authors and was a pioneer of the modern pop-up book.

He has collaborated with Helen Nicoll on all of the Meg and Mog series of books and has his own website at www.janpienkowski.com

The backdrops in this book are NEVER white, Jan Pienkowski uses rich, vibrant colours as backgrounds which really appeals to young children.

Another appealing aspect of the drawings are their simplicity, easy enough for children to re-create their own versions of Owl, Meg and Mog.

~ Style and Format ~

The text is very simple and what I particularly like is the simple font that is used, i.e. no 'squiggly' a's or loopy lettering which is great for emergent readers to decipher.

The text font and size also changes to show loudness e.g when the owls are in their swooping and pouncing lesson they 'WHOOSH' and 'ATTACK' so that the reader knows when to raise their voice and children can be taught that when text grows larger it emphasises volume etc...

The text and illustrations are formatted in different ways on a lot of the pages, e.g. some of the illustrations are on a double page, whereas on some double pages the 2 pages are divided in to 4 sections to demonstrate the velocity in which the owls swoop and dive to catch their prey!

A lot of the text is in speech bubbles, e.g when the owl 'pupils' and teachers are talking to each other.

The text and the illustrations work hand in hand with each other, e.g. 'WHOOSH' is depicted in a curved format to signify the curvaceous nature of a 'Whoosh'!

There is also opportunity for identifying different types of owls such as Tawny, Barny and Snowy, although Big Ears and Titch aren't typical types of owls!

~ The Meg and Mog series ~

Meg and Mog is also available on audio book cassette

Meg and Mog had an animated tv show and in series 1 there were 19 episodes.

Volume 1 and Volume 2 can be bought from amazon on DVD and VHS tape.

There is also a Meg and Mog copy colouring book full of pictures of their TV adventures designed for colouring in.

Following the huge success of this, the first book in the series, Helen Nicoll and Jan Pienkowski have collaborated on a number of other Meg and Mog books:

* Meg's eggs
* Meg at sea
* Meg on the moon
* Meg's car
* Meg's castle
* Meg's veg
* Mog's mumps
* Mog at the zoo
* Mog in the fog
* Meg and Mog

David Wood has written a professional stage play, 'The Meg and Mog Show' based on the characters in the series. He has written a series of 4 short plays for children to read and act out. The book includes simple staging and costumes. (This is infact the book that ciao show in their photo, hence the fact that I have added my own photos).

~ Price ~

Paperback copies of this book can be purchased from amazon at a lower price of £1.41.

It has to be said that I wouldn't sit down and read this myself but the huge popularity of the book two decades later with children from 3 upwards, says it all!

In comparison to some of the othe Helen Nicoll Meg and Mog books this is certainly not my favourite but children seem to be drawn to them.

I've based my star rating on the other books in the series of books which in my humble opinion are a lot better, this has very little humour and educational elements in comparison to the others.

Summary: An enjoyable children's book.