Teaching Mrs. Muddle

Teaching Mrs. Muddle depicts a not-so-typical introduction to kindergarten for protagonist Kayla who has a case of the first-day jitters. The Kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Muddle, welcomes young Kayla to her classroom and proceeds to make a series of intentional and pedagogically purposeful mistakes to keep the children on their toes, from leading them to the gym (really, the library), to a classroom instead of the bathroom. As Kayla remarks, “Even on my first day, I didn’t think I’d get more lost than Mrs. Muddle!” Kayla becomes the de-facto leader of the classroom, guiding even Mrs. Muddle on the tour. As the day progresses, Mrs. Muddle continues to make more mistakes, but this approach appears to encourage and comfort the children as Kayla admits that she “hadn’t missed Mom at all.”

The illustrations are incredibly detailed (note especially the world map on the classroom wall). Alice Carter captures a variety of character expressions, from the sheepish and confused face of Mrs. Muddle to Kayla’s happy and helpful one. As is expected in current Canadian children’s literature, the children are obviously from multicultural backgrounds.

The story, itself, flows evenly and presents a predictable series of events for the first day of school, from the parent handoff, to a school tour, and other traditional activities, such as recess, snack time, and art instruction. The extent to which these events are handled in a fresh light, despite the saturation of the children’s book market in first-day-of-school titles, is open to question. Before using in a classroom setting, adults may want to decide for themselves whether or not they agree with the technique of pretended ignorance and confusion employed by the teacher character, a technique which recurs as a steady theme throughout the story. Some may view this as a disrespectful infantilization of the teaching profession. Canadian professionals should note the use of American educational terms, such as “fifth grade,” along with American spelling, as in “favorite” and “center.” Finally, it should be noted that stereotypes of the female kindergarten teacher and male gym teacher are reinforced.

Librarians may consider this title for children’s collections that include books aimed at a kindergarten audience.