How I Feel About My School : A Story to Identify and Reflect on Children?s Emotions

Beautifully illustrated, this important storybook encourages young school children to understand and talk openly about their feelings.

Let’s join Jessie, Hanna, Akira, and Hassan for a day at school! They wriggle through show-and-tell. Cartwheel at break time. Draw in the classroom. But even a good day at school can have tricky moments, and sometimes the children get upset. Based on the Ready or Not research project, which collected different viewpoints on school readiness, this book helps children identify and reflect on their emotions and manage difficult feelings.

Representing neurodiversity in the classroom, this storybook is a creative tool to foster hope and resilience for children starting school and will be invaluable for parents, teachers and carers supporting this important transition, and those wanting to facilitate conversations about the emotional highs and lows of a day at school.

For effective use, this book should be purchased alongside the accompanying professional guide, The Psychology of Starting School: An Evidence-Based Guide for Parents and Teachers [9781032211497].

Anita Lehmann is a versatile, award-winning author of fiction and non-fiction for both children and adults. Born and raised in Bern, Switzerland, and with an MA in Economic and Social History from the University of Geneva, Anita has lived, studied and worked in many different places before making Cambridge, UK, home for herself and her family. She usually writes in a shed at the back of her garden, drinking English tea and missing Swiss chocolate, with her black spaniel snoring at her feet.

Karin Eklund is an artist and illustrator living and working in Cambridge, UK. Her studio is in Milton Country Park, where she works daily. Her main commissions are for children’s books, but she also works with academic book titles, museum educational material and collaborations with researchers.

Professor Claire Hughes is a developmental psychologist at the University of Cambridge, UK, where she is a Fellow at Newnham College, and Deputy Head at the Psychology Department. She was the lead researcher on the ESRC-funded Ready or Not study, which aimed to bring together different viewpoints on school readiness, and highlighted the difficulties that many parents face in getting a clear picture of their young child’s life at school.

Dr Elian Fink is based at the School of Psychology, University of Sussex, UK. Her work focuses on how best to support children’s social skills and peer relationships at the transition to school and was a Co-Investigator of the ESRC-funded Ready or Not study, alongside Dr Rory Devine at the University of Birmingham, and Dr Hana D’Souza at Cardiff University.