1. Children as artists
2. Children as authors
3. Children, Aboriginal Australian
4. Kangaroos
5. Porpoises

This story is simply told by Agnes Lippo to the children of Belyuen School (NT) and begins with context for the reader: ‘My grandfather told me this story one day when we were sitting under a shady tree.’

Kangaroo and Porpoise (who lives on land at this time) look after each other’s babies while the other hunts for bush tucker. Kangaroo falls in love with Porpoise’s baby and won’t give her back. They fight, which results in a hole in Porpoise’s head and Kangaroo breaking both her arms. In grief and rage Porpoise takes to the ocean and transforms Kangaroo’s baby into a white tree frog.

This book is enlivened by the quality of the children’s paintings, which use scratch art as additional detail. The babies are particularly endearing. Few words and dramatic pictures are the format for all of the books compiled by Pamela Lofts for this Scholastic series, and these have been many school children’s first introduction to Aboriginal culture in published story form.

Series: Aboriginal story

1. Mary G reads The Kangaroo and the Porpoise https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mRFoIIDm4U
2. Belyuen School community https://www.facebook.com/belyuenschool/
3. The difference between dolphins and porpoises https://au.whales.org/whales-dolphins/what-are-the-differences-between-whales-dolphins-and-porpoises/