Being bullied or made fun of is one of the worst parts about being a kid. I would be that everyone has been made fun of AND has made fun of someone else. I regret some of the teasing I did as a kid, but I also know I was teased a ton for a lot of things. All of us want to feel safe and loved.
Chrysanthemum, the title character in Kevin Henkes' book Chrysanthemum, definitely feels the love. Her parents want to give her a name that she will love and be proud of, and she DOES love her name. She loves her name right up to the point when she enters school for the first time. Three of her classmates, who seem to already know each other, tease her because of the length of her name and because she's named after a flower (unlike Victoria, who constantly points out that she is named after her grandmother). Victoria also points out that flowers grow in the dirt with worms in class. Before school, the girls say they are going to pick and smell Chrysanthemum. Mrs. Chud, the teacher, tells Victoria to sit down and be quiet whenever she makes pronouncements about Chrysanthemum, but doesn't do a lot to stop the girls.
At home, Chrysanthemum shares how unhappy she is, and her parents do what they can to shower her with love. One picture even shows her father reading a book about kids' identities. They give her favorite foods, play games with her, and give her lots of hugs and kisses. This helps before she goes to sleep, but Chrysanthemum has different dreams. In one, she is happy that her name is Jane. Another is a nightmare where Chrysanthemum is a flower that Victoria has picked and is plucking. Chrysanthemum is not longer joyous about her name or about going to school.
Everything changes the day that Mrs. Twinkle, the extremely pregnant music teacher, comes to class. All of the students think she is amazing! Mrs. Twinkle, not knowing anything about how Chrysanthemum is being teased, assigns Chrysanthemum the part of "daisy" in the class musical, while Victoria and the other two girls are given named parts like Queen, Princess, and Pixie. The girls start to tease Chrysanthemum when Mrs. Twinkle intervenes with a very interesting fact: Mrs. Twinkle herself has a long name and is also named after a flower. Mrs. Twinkle reveals that her name is Delphinium and that she is considering naming her baby girl Chrysanthemum. The girls immediately assign themselves flower names and look adoringly at Chrysanthemum. Chrysanthemum is able to feel the joy and pride in her name again! All is well in her world.
The Epilogue tells us that Chrysanthemum hasn't completely forgiven Victoria: she giggles when Victoria forgets her lines in the musical! We also find out that Mrs. Twinkle named her baby Chrysanthemum.
My only quibble with this book is that Chrysanthemum does not solve her own problem. I am glad, being an educator, that a teacher swoops in and saves the day, but I wish there had been scenes of Chrysanthemum trying to push back against the way she is being treated. Overall, though, Chrysanthemum is a great book for teaching empathy. Students connect deeply to Chrysanthemum being teased because of her name because most students have been teased for something arbitrary. This book's illustrations also convey the depth of Chrysanthemum's feelings in a very real way. It's a great book.