38 pages • 1 hour read
Annie BarrowsIvy and Bean
Fiction | Novel | Early Reader Picture Book | Published in 2010A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 4-6Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 4 Summary: “Bean Meets Ivy”
Bean thinks she can scare Nancy if she stays committed to acting like a ghost, but Nancy isn’t frightened. She spots the money and realizes Bean stole it from her. Nancy plans to tell their mother, so Bean pretends she sprained her ankle. Hesitantly, Nancy bends down to examine it, and Bean runs away. In front of Ivy’s house, Bean sticks out her tongue and shakes her “behind” at her sister. Nancy calls Bean by her full name, “Bernice Blue,” signaling that Bean is in significant trouble.
For a moment, Bean is pleased with herself for provoking Nancy. Soon, Bean realizes the severity of her conduct. She’s committed multiple wrongs: lying about her ankle, leaving the yard without permission, shaking her “behind,” and acting like a ghost. Bean’s mom will likely dole out a harsh punishment.
Ivy thinks Bean should hide, and Bean thinks if she stays away until night, her parents will go from angry to worried, so when she comes home, they’ll be relieved to see her and discard her punishment. Ivy tells Bean to close her eyes, and she leads Bean to a secret place. Due to Ivy’s diction, Bean concludes that Ivy isn’t a “wimp.”
Chapter 5 Summary: “Ivy Hatches a Plan”
When Bean opens her eyes, she realizes she’s in a corner of Ivy’s backyard, where there’s a small tree, a large rock, and a puddle. Bean can stay here for as long as she needs, but Bean only plans on staying until dinner.
Bean believes Ivy never gets into trouble, but Ivy says the future holds ample trouble for her. Ivy plans to be a witch and concoct harmful potions. Ivy informs Bean that people aren’t always born witches, and humans like Ivy can learn to be witches. Ivy recently learned an invisible spell, but she needs a dead frog, which is why she made the pond.
Bean realizes Ivy’s bathrobe is supposed to be a witch’s robe. She thinks the cutout stars and moons make it look silly but, to be considerate, she tells Ivy she likes it. Bean is less polite about Ivy’s “wand.” When Bean downgrades it to a “stick,” Ivy threatens to use it on Bean for the “dancing spell,” causing Bean to dance indefinitely.
Ivy claims she was going to test the dancing spell on Bean before the “stick” comment, so Ivy apologizes. Bean accepts her apology, and the girls reveal that both their moms wanted them to play with each other, believing each girl was “nice.” Neither girl thinks the other is “nice.”
Bean tells Ivy about her problems with Nancy. As Ivy doesn’t have a spell that can turn back time and change what happened, the girls plan to use the dancing spell on Nancy.
Chapter 6 Summary: “Beware”
Before Ivy puts the spell on Nancy, Bean wants to make Ivy look more witchy. Ivy doesn’t care if other people think she looks like a witch, but Bean believes it will make the spells more powerful. It’ll also be fun.
Ivy’s mother is working from home. Worried that Ivy’s mother will tell Bean’s mother if she sees Bean, the girls sneak in. Ivy’s mother is on the phone, and to create an extra layer of diversion, Ivy asks her mother for a banana. Her mother is on the phone and tells Ivy to get the banana herself.
Ivy’s door features a “beware” sign. Inside, she used chalk to divide her space into five sections. One section has a tiny sofa, a rug, and an overflowing bookcase. Another section features a table with paper, pens, paint, and glittery glue. The third section has Ivy’s canopy bed, and the fourth section has a dresser and a screen with clouds painted on it. The fifth section features a variety of dolls surrounding a Barbie wrapped in toilet paper. Once Ivy learns how to construct a pyramid, she’ll bury the mummified Barbie in it.
The girls decorate the wand with silver pipe cleaners and glitter, and they use sparkly markers to draw moons and stars on the robe. Bean suggests putting green dots on Ivy’s face, but Ivy informs Bean that green witches only exist in movies, so Bean paints Ivy’s face white, adding black around her eyes and red (for blood) on her cheeks. As neither girl likes the typical witches’ hat, they wrap a black scarf that they took from Ivy’s mother around Ivy’s head.
Chapters 4-6 Analysis
Barrows develops the theme of Judging a Person Versus Knowing Them further as Ivy advises Bean to “hide,” and Bean thinks, “Maybe Boring Ivy was right” (34). Ivy’s recommendation reveals that she and Bean are on the same wavelength. In Chapters 1-3, the girls look different and seem unalike, but in Chapters 4-6, when they’re in the same physical space and interacting, they get along and understand each other’s needs. Ivy provides Bean with a safe space, telling her, “You can stay for as long as you want. I'll bring you food" (41). Ivy quickly becomes an ally. Through the main characters’ newfound collaboration, Barrows demonstrates that initial judgments are often inaccurate. Additionally, she shows that a person doesn’t have to know someone for very long to feel an immediate rapport. However, to connect with someone, people must share the same physical space and communicate with each other, as interacting is what allows preconceived judgments to disappear.
Bean’s characterization supports the theme when she admits, “Ivy looked like a wimp, but she didn't talk like one” (37). As Ivy shows Bean the hiding place and, later, her room, Bean realizes that Ivy is as tough and “cool” as her. The relationship is reciprocal. Ivy helps Bean escape her sister, and Bean helps Ivy look more like a witch and gives her a person, Nancy, to practice her spells on. Ivy is confident and doesn’t care if people can identify her as a witch. Nevertheless, the girls have fun reworking Ivy’s outfit and accessories, and the makeover has a notable impact, with the narrator observing, “[The wand] looked much, much more magic than it had before” (43). As it turns out, Bean likes playing witches as much as Ivy, upending the judgment that she and Ivy are opposites.
In the book, nice symbolizes boring, so in Chapter 1, when Bean's mother tells Bean that Ivy appears to be a "nice" person, Bean immediately thinks of the term "boring." In Chapter 5, the symbolism furthers the girls' commonality. Bean tells Ivy, "[Y]ou're not nice at all! You're a witch!" and Ivy replies, "You're not very nice either. You were doing that ghost thing in the bush" (49). Believing “nice” to be an insult, neither of them applies the term to the other. Affirming the other is not nice is a compliment and form of praise that shows how they’re exciting and bold—imbuing “nice” with its unique symbolism in the book.
The makeover for Ivy reinforces Barrows’s thematic exploration of The Drama of Preparation. As Bean helps Ivy look more like a witch, Bean helps Ivy get into the role of a witch, explaining, “It'll make your spells better” (54). She’s readying Ivy to put her theory (she’s a witch) into practice (use her spells and potions on real people). The alterations to the outfit and the wand add to the suspense, creating a transformation scene before Ivy can turn Nancy into an indefinitely dancing figure.
Barrows links the themes of The Drama of Preparation and Judging a Person Versus Knowing Them to The Benefits of Cooperation. As Bean stops thinking unfavorably about Ivy and starts openly interacting with her, she immediately benefits. Ivy takes her in and gives her a way to retaliate against Nancy. Ivy benefits from the newfound friendship too, acquiring a developed look and a target for her witchcraft. By working together, the girls fulfill each other's needs. Here, Barrows cements The Benefits of Cooperation, underscoring that true friendship occurs when two people realize the inaccuracy of their preconceived judgments and partner up to have fun and help each other achieve their aims.
In Chapters 4-6, the humor is physical and continues to center on irony. Ivy informs Bean, “Witches are only green in movies. Real witches are just regular-colored” (45). Movies often misrepresent people, and the twist lies in Ivy’s belief that films also distort the true identities of witches. In real life, witches aren’t green, which implies that witches are as much a part of reality as any other demographic. Physical humor occurs when Bean sticks “her tongue out” at Nancy before she turns “around and wiggle[s] her behind” (32). The exaggerated movements are comedic, and Blackall reinforces the silliness with a drawing of Bean sticking out her tongue and shaking her “behind.”
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By Annie Barrows
