The Magic School Bus Inside a Beehive by Joanna Cole

Today, Scholastic said, more than 93 million copies of the “Magic School Bus” tales are in print in 13 countries. Calmenson wrote, “and has given children and families so much, from knowledge to belly laughs.” “She’s been a forerunner on many fronts,” Ms. Cole on several books, posted a tribute on the website of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. Stephanie Calmenson, who collaborated with Ms. So I thought, Why not? Plus, I had ample time to study that creature in my low-budget New York apartment!” “I discovered that there had never been a children’s book written about cockroaches before. “An article in The Wall Street Journal inspired me to do some research,” she said in an autobiographical blurb on the Scholastic website. With her love of science, she thought a children’s book about an insect might be a good starting point. She was working at Newsweek in New York, answering letters to the editor that weren’t going to be published, when she decided to try writing something of her own. “I said, ‘I can’t do this I’ve got to find something easier.’”

“It’s the hardest job in the world,” she told The Ottawa Citizen in 1999. She taught elementary school, but not for long. Cole attended the University of Massachusetts and Indiana University before graduating from City College of New York with a bachelor’s degree in psychology in 1967, two years after marrying Philip A. Cole often said, though that character’s look - frizzy hair, colorful outfits - owed more to one of Mr.

An influential science teacher she had as a child was part of the inspiration for Ms. Her father, Mario, was a house painter, and her mother, Elizabeth, was a homemaker.

The Magic School Bus Inside a Beehive by Joanna Cole