Ellen Tebbits

We didn't like this one as well as we liked the Henry Huggins series, but it was fun. We listened to it on audiobook, and I wasn't really thrilled with the voice Andrea Martin used for Austine. She made an eight-year-old girl sound like a middle-aged smoker. But we enjoyed it anyway.

I cringed along with poor Ellen through her mistakes and embarrassments. I wish I knew what "winter underwear" looked like, though. I might start having my kids wear it (and perhaps wear it myself...it's not even November, and I'm already shivering and dreading the New England winter).

Ellen is probably not as alluring as rambunctious silly Ramona to most people, but she was my first Cleary book and I never forgot her. Upon rereading I found that Cleary can still make me remember the joy of skipping through huge empty elementary school halls while others were in class. (I was probably on my way to the principal's office, but the hallway time was still fun.)

This book was written about 20 years earlier than most of the Ramona books, and it shows. Ellen's mother makes all her clothes for her and worries about her clean floor. (I'm not even sure I *have* a clean floor - or, some days, a floor at all!) The girls wear only dresses to school (and most everyplace else). Otis has a full cowboy outfit (with spurs) and we're told that MOST of the children in the school have a cowboy hat, or even a neckerchief. (When's the last time you saw that sort of cowboy mania? Oh right - back in the 50s, when this was published.) And let's not forget the infamous woolen undies. If it was old-fashioned back in the 50s, and this was the first I'd ever heard of it in the 90s, just think how foreign it must seem show more to today's third-graders! (And let's put a little note for the names. When is the last time you saw a class full of Ellens and Austines, Otises and Lindas? Ramona is a name that passes the test of time. Otis... not so much.)

But you know what? It doesn't matter. The kids still seem as real as when they were written. They bake brownies, they worry about their teacher not liking them, and they get into a whopper of a fight when Ellen slaps her friend. Everything that happens has a ring of truth to it, even if the details aren't quite like they would be today. show less

One of the first chapter books I read by myself as a child, I thought is was hilarious. I remember running in to tell my mom how funny it was when Ellen's winter underwear started falling down in ballet class, to Ellen's horror. As with all her books Beverly Cleary nails the childhood experience, the confusion and misunderstanding, as well as the warmth of friendship and understanding. A perennial favorite.

When I think about my own friendships that went awry in my long-ago youth (age 8 or 9), I find it very hard to figure out what the misunderstandings were about. Beverly Cleary has a gift for showing us the awkward pitfalls of friendship and the joy of discovering your best friend really is your best friend. Genius!

Ellen Tebbits doesn't have a close friend in her neighborhood. No one to play with. But then she meets Austine, who has moved to town from California. At first, Ellen doesn't care for Austine, but soon they become best friends. The two girls behave like real 4th graders... occasionally being mean, even to their best friend. They have spats. They make up. And both have to deal with Otis Spofford, whose goal in life seems to be to irritate girls his age.
Originally published in 1951, I thought this book aged remarkably well. Apart from the girls all wearing dresses to school, and the presence of a Maypole dance, the story fits just fine with the world today. A good light read for elementary school kids.

Third-grader Ellen Tebbits has a secret none of the other girls at school can know: her mother makes her wear winter underwear. During ballet class with Valerie Todd Spofford, Ellen and the new girl, Austine, realize that they share the same secret - and that makes it not so bad. The two become best friends, but when they ask their mothers to make them matching dresses, something goes awry (Otis Spofford has something to do with it) and the girls have a fight. Can they fix their misunderstanding and make up?