Thank You, Teacher!

In a snappy volume sure to land on many a teacher’s year-end gift pile, an adoring classroom of lively students bids a gratitude-filled farewell to their intrepid leader. As the teary-eyed teacher, portrayed with brown skin, sits in the classroom’s circle-time chair, their students prepare to literally sing their praises, offering a rhyming remembrance of time spent together (“Thanks for catching Mr. Furr./ We didn’t know how fast you were,” Berry writes). Varon’s candid mixed-media images form a yearbook-like montage, spotlighting the teacher alongside smiling classmates of varying skin tones at the lunch table, doing art projects, performing a school play, even arguing. After the children bid farewell, a parting page reveals how the teacher—and the classroom pet—might truly enjoy some summer downtime. Ages 4–8. (Mar.)