Just So Stories

Walker Books Australia

June 2025

ISBN13:9781760657611

Australia RRP:$25.99

New Zealand RRP:$27.99

Continuing on today’s theme of ‘sky high’, this is not only a good book for teaming with those units of HASS/Science but there is plenty of scope for vocabulary and phonics/phonemic awareness, no matter which program your school is following for that -especially useful for beginning readers. As the fashions for teaching reading and letter-sound relationships ebb and flow, and backtrack, and repeatead nauseum, those of us who’ve been doing this for a while know that not one single approach works for every child. But that’s another matter altogether.

Kiddos love to learn unusual words – and when it comes to weather and sky-related vocabulary there’s plenty. The names of different types of clouds etc (refer to my reviews of the atlases some time ago) are just one example. My lot have, including The Kid, have always loved knowing the magic of the word ‘petrichor’ and now they can add susurrus to their store of vocab to impress and amaze. As well, there is plenty of onomatopaeia to discover and enjoy in this one.

Frankie hears the sound of the wind and when her Gran refers to the susurrus, she mistakenly thinks the sound must be made by …. something tangible, but obviously not a platypus, or an octopus or any kind of ‘saurus. As she goes through her day at school with imagination working overtime, various suggestions are deemed not the answer. In the afternoon, Grandma helps her to figure it out all by herself – much the best and most memorable way to learn something new [and that’s what us Grans do best I think]. The only thing I wasn’t much keen on in this one, was the librarian who gave off a not-amused, even grumpy vibe, whether or not the class was supposed to be ‘learning about volcanoes’ or not [clearly, not by inquiry or interactive learning I might add – so NOT my style but one I’ve observed at various times].

But aside from that it’s an excellent choice to add to that store of resources for your relevant UoI and it gets a 4 💨💨💨💨rating for kiddos from Prep to around Year 3/4.

EDIT (1/12/25) – As soon as I’d read this, I wanted to re-read The Wee Free Man with Tiffany Aching’s love of the word susurrus! Finally after a fortnight on reserve, my audio is in and I’m listening to it -all over again!