What If the Bus Doesn't Come?

Dave Jenkinson is Associate Dean of the Faculty of Education at the
University of Manitoba.

The bus in the title’s question is the school bus, and the answer to
that question is what twins Mark and Melanie worry about the day before
they first begin school. As the pair contemplate the possibility that
the school bus driver could forget to bring them home for lunch, they
decide to make some food to tide them over. When Mark and Melanie
consider that the driver might further forget them so that their stay at
school could stretch into days, weeks, and even months, the pile of
things they’ll need to sustain them grows. The next morning finds
Mark, and Melanie, and their mother standing at the curb beside a large
pile of food, clothing, and toys. The closing page shows the children
looking through the rear window of the bus as their mother starts to
carry everything back into the house, for Mark and Melanie have overcome
their fear (though they do “take the sandwiches anyway”).

A full-color, detailed illustration faces each page of text, with some
element of the illustration repeated on the text page in black and
white. Ouellet’s realistic illustrations take readers through the
rooms of the children’s home, plus the garage and yard, as the pair
collect the items they believe they will require.

Co-authors Lamont-Clarke, an experienced French-immersion nursery and
kindergarten teacher, and Stevens, an authority in children’s
language-acquisition skills and a professor at Concordia University,
have produced a humorous title for preschoolers and Grade 1 students.
Also available in French as Et si l’autobus nous oublie?