As if cannibalism isn’t enough (e.g. cobra devouring python or king cobra consuming another of its own kind - both of which happened in my sunny island), I have to read about Australian social spiderlings eating their mums. In fact, this freak act of nature is called Matriphagy, or mother-eating.

Horrid Henry is a popular character among primary school kids, so I picked this book up to see if it would stimulate them to like Science better. You know, love by association.

It could work. The way Henry draws connections between the bugs and the characters in the book should elicit chuckles from ardent fans and increase the likelihood of them remembering these fun facts.

But since I’m an ex-Science teacher, I don’t need the appeal of Henry for me to be motivated to memorise these facts. I can visualise myself regaling my children with stuff like cockroaches living up to 9 days when their heads have been chopped off or mosquitoes killing one million people yearly or ladybirds releasing poisonous blood from their bodies. Yucky and gruesome, just the way kids like it.

You must be wondering why the focus on insects. That’s because out of the 7 animals whose life cycles our young are expected to be familiar with, 4 are insects, namely the beetle, butterfly, cockroach and mosquito. Rattling off these facts can potentially bring the topic of life cycles to life.

Which is admittedly a little sad, especially now that I know about mother-eating behaviour. I wish our curriculum has the space to devote to a thought-provoking discussion on the significance of ensuring the survival of one’s species. Why has Australian social spiders evolved such that the females routinely sacrifice themselves? Why does the female octopus eat herself alive to safeguard her young? What does being a parent entail, anyway? But I guess with the availability of this book, I can go explore such existential questions with my kids in the future.