Teaching... Is a Learning Experience!: A for Better or for Worse Collectionvolume 32

I have always been a huge fan of For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston and, this book is no exception. This one focuses on Elizabeth and her teaching in the North Country. She sure has grown up since we first saw her as a toddler! She is a talented and extremely capable young woman.

I know it's a cartoon, but Lynn Johnston captures home life so well that I feel I've known this family intimately for years. I'm fascinated by Elizabeth's choice to teach in such a remote area. I learn so much from her experiences there. I've got all the books from the first and frequently reread them from start to finish. This latest is in perfect keeping with the others. As Lynn takes us further from home base, we become involved with those extended people in the lives of Ellie's children. There's a whole world there that we will miss when Lynn decides it's time to pack it in.

Lynn Johnston has done it again. What a great treasury of her cartoons - we can see the entire family growing through their own thing - at the same time we can feel the family sticking together. I was a bit surprised at the arrival of the "attack" Elizabeth storyline - as I always find that Lynn's world is a little sugary, but it was well done and is obviously a ploy to bring Anthony back into the fold. Great series.

As a teacher, I have found this particular volume of Lynn Johnson's to touch a particular chord with me. But then again, I have been using her cartoon strips to teach with, for years. Her gentle yet penetrating way of looking at life with children, from babyhood through the teen years with its peer pressure, to adulthood, make me laugh out loud and cry as well. Long may she put out her strip, well into great grandmotherhood!

Another Great book to visit the Patterson's with. "For Better / For Worse" has to be one of the best comic strips of all time. It really makes you think, "They are just like my family", and if you do not have kids, read the books so you know what to prepare for.