Today is World Bee Day and we have been reading It Starts With A Bea.

This is a beautifully written, stunningly illustrated narrative non fiction book. Through the lyrical text little readers learn about bees and pollination as the story unfolds.

We see bees at the end of their winter hibernation, we watch them as they wake and begin to search for food among the snowdrops, daffodils, crocuses and daisies. We learn about nectar and pollen, saddlebags and colonies, we learn about the waggle dance and how bees communicate.

We learn about the process of pollination and how bees help flowers and our food to grow. We learn that bees are hard workers and so so much for all the others in their ecosystem.

“Thanks to diligent bees
Working hard in a bunch
Fruits swell and ripen
To end up in our lunch!”

The book ends with a glorious richly coloured fold out garden filled with fruits and flowers, raised veg beds and hives, adults and children working together to plant and nurture and harvest, working together alongside the bees.

On the reverse of the fold out garden we find information about different types of bees and have a more detailed look at the process of pollination.

This is a gentle rhyming story with wonderful illustrations filled with detail and colour. So much can be learned about bees as we “watch nature’s hardest workers transform a winter garden into a wildlife wonderland.”

A brilliant and beautiful book with words by Aimee Gallagher and illustrations by Jennie Webber