Badger's Parting Gifts: A picture book to help children deal with death

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The illustrations are are enchanting and the moment of Badgers death beautifully handled as he runs down the last tunnel, throwing his stick away. Each of them have a special memory of Badger as he taught them different things to do such as skate and they see it as a parting gift or treasure. Furthermore the use of animals as the characters can be comforting to children rather than the characters being human.

The characters reflect upon their memories with Badger, the guidance and kindness that he gave them.When one of her students came to say farewell that night, she sat by her bedside and told us that she had brought a book that my mother loved and often read to bereaved children. He was greatly missed when he passed and the other animals all met together to discuss all the fantastic memories they had of Badger, which helped them to cope with the sadness. Once the story has been read to a group of children this would then enable the themes to be explored as a vehicle for questioning, communication and discussion. When he finally passes away, they are grief-stricken, but one by one they remember the special things he taught them during his life.

It would be more suitable for KS2 and I feel for year 3 upwards due to the themes it explores which younger children may find difficult to deal with. The way in which the story is written is key to suit the age range of children that I’ve suggested it’s suitable for. The tk_lr is a referral cookie set by the JetPack plugin on sites using WooCommerce, which analyzes referrer behaviour for Jetpack.This book written by Susan Varley is an exceptional book because of the kinds of themes that it explores. Badger’s Parting Gifts offers the simple consolation that “Each of the animals had a special memory of badger – something he had taught them that they could now do extremely well. I would recommend this as a great book to use if you find you have to deal with the subject of death in class. The publisher, Andersen, has also produced these resources in association with the charity Child Bereavement UK [PDF], which are aimed at helping to use the book with bereaved children. Badger’s Parting Gifts not only shows us that our deceased loved ones live on through warm and loving memories of them but also when we share with others the things they’ve taught us when they were still alive.