The Best School Year Ever (The Best Ever)

The six Herdmans are back in this hilarious sequel of Best Christmas Pageant ever.

The main characters, Beth Bradley (the narrator) and Imogene Herdman (second oldest Herdman) are both in sixth grade. The class is given an yearlong assignment "compliments for Classmates" and Beth begins to worry immediatedly. How can she possibly compliment the second-meanest girl she knows (Gladys is meaner)?

Each chapter is about a little "crime" the Herdmans do this school year, and those "crimes", oddly enough, help Beth to understand that there is far more in Imogene than meanness and mischieve, she is in fact very intelligent and probably has a very loving heart underneath her tough-girl attitude. Readers learn that there's good in everyone, even in bullies.

Barbara Robinson does a fine job writing this story. Kids see a funny story, the older ones see a funny story with a serious undertone. Everyone has let the Herdmans down: their father abandoning them, their mother neglecting them, social workers not doing their job, teachers letting them pass grades even though they don't learn anything, adults in town who are too uptight to realize the real reason behind the childrens' bad behaviour. They've practically raised each other since their parents seem to be pretty useless, and feel insecure in the company of well-bred, neat children with a stay-at-home mom etc. They bully the other children to protect themselves and each other, and figure negative attention is better than no attention.

You can only hope something og someone will help them put of their misery, but not until after a few more sequels ;)

Have you ever met a real outlaw? This book introduces you to the Herdman kids, known at Woodrow Wilson Elementary as the outlaws. Pick up a copy of The Best Worst School Year Ever to discover why the term “outlaw” applies to the Herdman kids.
Woodrow Wilson Elementary School is the featured setting for the story of the Herdman kids. Lots of mischief happens at Woodrow Wilson Elementary when the Herdman kids show up for school. Things like cigar smoking, fires starting and lies being told are all part of their mode of operation. The Herdman children are known for disruption and throughout the story they can be counted on to create trouble. There are six Herdman children and there is one Herdman child in each grade.
The story gives you the idea that the Herdman home is not kept up well and that their yard is like a trash dump. The children are from a single parent family. Their Mom works three shifts at the shoe factory to make money. As the school year begins, this year’s assignment is to compose three compliments for the schoolmate that you have been assigned. Throughout the story many examples of non-complimentary behaviors are shared about the Herdman kids. The last day of school finds the students at Woodrow Wilson Elementary sharing their compliments with one another and a surprising compliment about the oldest Herdman, Imogene, emerges.
Imogene is the oldest of the Herdman crew. She is in sixth grade at Woodrow Wilson Elementary. As the oldest child, she is the ring leader in the Herdman mischief. She does not set a good example for her brothers and sisters. The end of the story finds Imogene hearing kind words spoken by a classmate named Beth.
Beth is the narrator of the story. Most of what we learn about the Herdman family is from Beth’s perspective. She and Imogene have been in school together each year. Beth is from a two parent family and she has a brother named, Charlie, who also has a Herdman child in his classroom.
Alice is another classmate of Imogene’s and is not fond of the Hermdan children. She is bossy and often wants to set limits on what the Herdman children cannot do at school, especially if the task is a fun activity. She is a brat.
The book theme is to be cautious judging others based on their appearance and actions. Beth, one of the main characters, shares many examples of how and why the Herdman children are “bad”, “disrespectful”, and the kind of kids you don’t want around in your classroom. She knows much of the mischief that Ralph, Imogene, Leroy, Claude, Ollie and Gladys can get into declares them the worst kids in the history of the world. The chapters reveal the mischief that this family causes the school. One example of the mischief is that the Herdman’s ordered so many pizzas one day that the owner of the pizza restaurant hurried to fill their order and as a result a fire began. This was just one example of how they terrorized the community and school.
Beth comes to understand why they have this kind of behavior and in the end of the story she offers a compliment to Imogene. Beth’s effort to give an honest compliment is received with appreciation from Imogene. The word resourceful describes how Imogene has matured over the school year and because she has limited resources she figures out how to be leader for her family.
The Best Worst School Year Ever is a book I would recommend. The story is funny and I kept reading it because I wondered what would the Herdman’s do next? Their outrageous behavior is hard to believe but entertaining. I also liked that the story reminded me to not make judgements about others. Everyone has something that they can offer.

This follows THE BEST CHRISTMAS PAGEANT EVER, again told by Beth and focusing on the Herdman clan. Beth is now in the 6th grade at Woodrow Wilson Elementary and of course, once again Imogene Herdman is a classmate. There is a Herdman for each grade, 6 in all, and even though they never do assignments or seem to learn anything they are always promoted to the next grade. Beth's father offers a theory that the faculty at Woodrow Wilson have a clause in their contracts assuring that there will be only one Herdman per class.

There Herdmans hold the school and perhaps even the community in terror with their misdeeds. Beth relates their adventures for the year including kidnapping someone's little brother, 'tattoing' his bald head with magic marker, destroying a school assembly, taking over a school bus, and probably causing an epidemic of chicken pox to name but a few. Hanging over Beth's head is the year long assignment given the first day of school - to find a compliment for each classmate and several for one classmate in particular. Beth's special assignment is Imogene. As Beth struggles to find honest nice things to say about Imogene she begins to see new qualities in her classmate and by the end of the year has begun to develop insights far beyond her years.

This book is hysterically funny. Not funny in the sense that it causes the reader to smile or chuckle but rather funny as in laughing out loud to the point of tears. Beth's matter-of-fact descriptions of the Herdman capers are delivered with a delightfully wry sense of humor.

The reading level for this book is listed as 3-6 but the interest level is much greater. A younger child would be able to follow and enjoy being read this short novel and an adult (like this one) would find this hilarious. Buy this to encourage a reluctant read, buy this to become somebody's favorite aunt or uncle, buy this distract a sick child or - well whatever excuse you can come up with buy this book but remember to get it far enough in advance to allow yourself time to read it first.

Barbara RobinsonÕs The Best Christmas Pageant Ever is one of my top ten favorite childrenÕs novels of all time. ItÕs one of the funniest and at the same time most moving books ever written.
Unfortunately, the magic that was in the first book just doesnÕt carry over to this sequel. The same characters are here. The Herdmans are still the kind of uncivilized kids that make parents and teachers (and even less rowdy kids) squirm. Beth, the narrator, is still the kind of sweet, observant girl who fits in with others but is open enough to find the good in those who donÕt fit in. But it just doesnÕt come together here. The HerdmansÕ antics arenÕt as funny as they were in the first book (a few, in fact, are simply recycled from the first book). And if youÕve read The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, where Beth comes to see the good in the seemingly irredeemable Imogene Herdman, it seems odd that in the new book sheÕs back to viewing Imogene as a monster. What happened to the insight she gained at the end of the last book?
The book has a few funny moments. ItÕs not dreadful. But after The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, it is certainly a disappointment.

First and perhaps foremost this book isn't a successful plotline, it is simply a stream of consciousness that twists and jerks the reader back and forth through different tangents. You never get a true sense of any of the characters besides the trite on sentence expkainations of her classmates.

Secondly, if the underlying theme of this novel is to compliment, why does Beth, the narrator, unen dlessly criticize her classmates? Alice is too perfect, Leroy is too timid, and then we get to Imogen.

From Beth's perspective, she never actually witnessed any of the Herdmans wrong doing. It was always told past tense, or from a second hand account. Just because they are poor and smell, do we really have outlaw them from the town hall, the laundromat, the library? And no one cares confront them of their said wrongdoings. Not even the police will take them in. Does Beth's explaination for that really make sense? Ask yourself.

I get the message the author so horribly failed at conveying, but please don't shroud this whole negative third party account as a viable children's book. In all honesty, take a step back, and I swear i just read a story of a disenfranchised family whose children attend a school named after a wildly racist president and get accused but never convicted of crimes they may be innocent of.

After reading The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, we were anxious to read anything by this author. And while she will probably never write a book that can equal her first, at least she's still trying. (Note,Harper Lee!)
Even though this book won't be the classic her Christmas book is, it is a delightful story with realistic, funny situations with which every elementary school kid can identify. My grand children liked it.

So I bought this book in Puerto Rico in a book sale. DON’T BUY THIS BOOK. It has really bad grammar and sometimes it doesn’t make it really clear who is talking. It really bothers me.

If you have never read The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, you should. It's one of the funniest books you'll ever find. If you have read it, you will want to read the sequel The Best School Year Ever. The horrible Herdmans are back, and their return will be celebrated by everyone except their classmates, teachers, principal, neighbors, storekeepers, firemen, policemen, custodians, families of their schoolmates, and all those who come in contact with them. The Herdmans are a family of six children who do everything children shouldn't do. They lie, steal, smoke, hit, bite, start fires, break things, and threaten their classmates with all sorts of horrors. In this book, a class was given a year-long assignment of looking for good qualities in others and writing them down to share on the last day of school. When Beth, the narrator, drew the name of Imogene Herdman to praise at the end of the year, she had to find positive things to say about someone who appeared to have no favorable qualities at all. This book is not as good as its predecessor, but it's still a lot of fun and it shouldn't be missed.

I had my son who was entering 3rd grade read the book for summer reading and he liked it.

The Herdmans – Gladys, Ralph, Leroy, Claude, Ollie, and Imogene - return in the hilarious sequel to “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever”, “The Best School Year Ever” and they are still up to their old, heinous, shifty “crimes”. The Herdmans do all sorts of mischievous antics such as smoking cigars, telling lies, setting things to fire, swearing, hardly ever learning anything at school, hit and bully other kids, and not being honest, cheerful, industrious, hygienic, or cooperative.
Beth Bradley, the narrator, and Imogene Herdman are both in 6th grade at Woodrow Wilson Elementary School and have the same teacher, Miss Kemp. Miss Kemps yearly assignment for the class is to come up with one compliment for each student in the class and you also get to pull a name out of a hat and you have to come up with even more compliments just for that one student. Beth is having a difficult time coming up with nice compliments for Imogene, but, as the story goes on, Beth founds out Imogene isn’t all bad and actually has a good side when she’s not found committing “crimes” and setting fire to things.
This story is great and I would recommend everybody who enjoyed “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever” to read it. The tone of the book is humorous so almost anybody can enjoy its 9 chapters of hysterical stories. Barbara Robinson does a brilliant job describing the characters and making sure you get a good visual in your head about the stories. If I could, I would give this book 4 ½ stars. Have a happy time reading!!!