Join India Mouse, Willow Star and Daddy on an extraordinary Christmas journey around the world as they discover that sometimes taking the other way into town can lead to a much bigger adventure than expected!
 
Christmas is nearly here, and Daddy is taking India Mouse and Willow Star into town to buy presents for the family. But when they reach the usual hill into town, India Mouse decides she wants to try the other way instead. What begins as a simple change of route quickly becomes an incredible journey. They travel across the sea, arrive in a colourful city filled with music and flowers, cross a mysterious desert, climb aboard a pirate ship, find themselves surrounded by Christmas trees and lights on a beach, receive some unexpected help from two enormous birds, travel over snowy mountains and finally make their way home. 
 
The story provides a rich context for developing French vocabulary and phrases around travel, Christmas, places, landscapes, movement and the wider world. Children hear and practise language such as le monde, la mer, la ville, la montagne, le lac, la colline, le chemin, le ciel, monter, descendre, se réveiller, dormir and pousser. The module also introduces Christmas vocabulary including l’étoile, le renne, le traîneau, le sapin de Noël, les lumières de Noël, le bonhomme de neige, le cadeau de Noël and le Père Noël. 
 
The accompanying Christmas song / La chanson de Noël de Les Puces gives children another opportunity to hear, repeat and sing familiar language. The song introduces the excitement of Christmas through vocabulary including the star, Christmas tree, reindeer, Father Christmas and Christmas presents, with lyrics provided in both English and French. 
 
But The Other Way into Town is much more than a vocabulary workbook. India Mouse and Willow Star’s unexpected adventure introduces children to travel, geography and the wider world, encouraging them to think about different countries, landscapes and cultures. The story moves through dramatically different environments — from the sea and a bustling city to desert, beach, mountains, ice and snow — providing lots of opportunities for conversation and discovery.
 
The workbook even includes a world map showing the different places visited during their adventure. 
The Around the World in 80 Days! section takes this idea further by introducing different ways of travelling around the world. Children discover examples including walking, cycling, travelling by balloon, boat, aeroplane and even space travel, along with remarkable facts about how long different journeys around the world have taken. 
 
The workbook also encourages children to use their imagination beyond the story. Willow Star’s Unusual Christmas Present Ideas invites children to think creatively about gifts, from finding and decorating a special stone to making art, creating a board game, writing a poem or story, giving promises or designing something themselves. 
 
Inside the workbook:
📖 The complete The Other Way into Town / L’autre chemin pour aller en ville story in English and French
🎵 Bilingual Les Puces Christmas Song / La chanson de Noël de Les Puces lyrics
🌍 French vocabulary activities linked to travel, places, landscapes and the story
🎄 Christmas vocabulary including Christmas tree, Christmas lights, Father Christmas, reindeer, sleigh, snowman, star and Christmas present
🌊 Learn words for the natural world and different places, including the sea, mountain, lake, hill, sky, town and world
🚶 Practise useful French action words including to go up, to come down, to wake up, to sleep, to paddle and to push
🗺️ Follow India Mouse, Willow Star and Daddy’s journey around the world
🏜️ Explore different landscapes, from seas and deserts to beaches, mountains, ice and snow
🌎 Discover countries and places around the world through map activities
✏️ 10 worksheets, providing progressive language-learning activities 
🎨 Drawing and colouring activities to introduce and reinforce vocabulary
🔢 Practise French numbers through a colourful counting activity
🎲 A travel-themed game taking children on a journey from home, down the hill and around the world
🧩 Let’s go!, Challenging and Tricky! activities offering different levels of challenge 
🔤 A French crossword and word-search activities
🗺️ A world map activity encouraging children to identify different countries and destinations
🎅 Christmas language and writing activities
💭 Dive Deeper activities for language, research, creativity and discovery
🚲 Around the World in 80 Days! — discover fascinating ways people have travelled around the world 
🎁 Willow Star’s Unusual Christmas Present Ideas, encouraging children to create thoughtful and imaginative presents of their own 
🎨 A creative Christmas project with Badger, making a festive 3D lantern using LED candle lights and Christmas decorations 
🇫🇷 Explore French language and sentence structure through the story, song and activities
👩‍🏫 A suggested 7-week lesson plan
📈 A progress card to help track learning 
 
The workbook is designed to be used alongside the Les Puces videos and online resources, allowing children to hear spoken French, follow India Mouse and Willow Star on their extraordinary journey, sing the Christmas song and then reinforce what they have learned through the workbook activities. The suggested lesson plan brings together the bilingual story, song, vocabulary, worksheets and project over seven weeks, with regular repetition to help children build confidence in their new language. 
 
A complete Les Puces learning journey — combining story, song, French vocabulary, Christmas, travel, geography, worksheets, creativity and discovery to help children learn French naturally while joining India Mouse and Willow Star on an unforgettable adventure around the world.