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"At my old school, we never got baked, except for that time the air conditioning went."
—Phoebe in Gets Ready, Set, Dough

Phoebe Terese is one of the students in Mr. Seedplot's class at an unnamed school in Walkerville. She is voiced by Maia Filar.

In The Magic School Bus, she temporarily transferred to Walkerville Elementary School, where she attended Professor Frizzle's class for the third and fourth grades.

In the main book series, she is a student in Ms. Frizzle's class at Walkerville Elementary School.

Physical Appearance and Attire

Phoebe has shoulder-length auburn hair in a ‘60s flip, which she keeps parted behind a yellow hairband and two bangs. She wears a yellow long-sleeved collared blouse, red shortalls, yellow knee-high socks and brown loafers or Mary Janes depending on the series. Her signature colors are red and yellow.

For winter wear, she wears a violet jacket, red shortalls, light yellow mittens, light yellow trousers and red boots.

For beachwear, she wears a 2 piece red and yellow bikini. In The Magic School Bus Explores the Ocean she wears a 2 piece red and yellow bathing suit with a miniskirt.

For rain wear in “Gets Swamped,” she wears a light red rain hat, a red raincoat, and yellow gumboots. The raincoat features the Magic School Bus logo at the top right.

For her field trip suit in “Revving Up”, she wore a red fireproof suit with dark red boots and gloves.

For formal wear, she wears a gold hairband with gold beads, a red long sleeve shirt with a red ribbon, a green pleated skirt, white stockings and black Mary Janes.

For basketball wear, she wears a red basketball shirt, yellow shorts, yellow socks, and light red converse sneakers.

Personality

Phoebe is a transfer student to the class, and because of this, she tends to be more shy than the others. She is also the caring soul of the class. She is very kind-hearted, sweet, caring, shy, patient, humble, optimistic, educated, brainy and encouraging. She has stage fright as seen in the episode "Gets Planted". She also seems to be very close to her father as seen in "Going Batty" when she thinks the Friz turned him into a vampire she says "I love you anyway, daddy. I'll love you forever!" She also seems to be a bit of an animal activist as she genuinely cares about their safety and wants to do what seems right and fair.

Background

As a third grader during the 2015-2016 school year[1], Phoebe was the new student in Ms. Frizzle's class, always comparing to how things were at her school. The caring soul of the class, she also seemed to be a little bit shy, as her biggest fear is stage fright. She's shown to love all animals, including bugs, and she supports recycling, once proposing that they build a recycling center on the empty lot in Wanda's neighborhood, Decay-tur. Despite her love of nature, she doesn't have much of a green thumb, as she can't grow a bean plant, doesn't grow her plant herself for the garden, and thinks there's a rock inside of the flower she grew at her school.

Storyline

Season One

Phoebe was introduced in "Gets Lost in Space" but she doesn't mention her old school or make any indication she's new until "For Lunch." She has and shows her caring side and love for animals in "All Dried Up" when she creates Students Against Desert Scarcity ("S.A.D.S.") after Carlos goes on about the ones suffering in the desert. She learns the hard way that they don't need her. The class visits her old school in "Goes to Seed" to get her flower so their garden isn't incomplete when they're showcased on the cover of Plant It! magazine, much to her dismay as she doesn't want weird stuff happening at her old school, especially when Mr. Seedplot is at the garden which makes her feel embarrassed. In "Gets Ants in Its Pants" she teams up with Keesha in making a movie about ants for the science fair. She even makes Keesha realize that there isn't just one star for the movie.

Season Two

MSB S2 E12 022

Phoebe helps Arnold chase down a dinosaur that stole his borrowed fossilized egg in "The Busasaurus." It's implied in this episode that she has developed a crush on him. In "Butterfly and the Bog Beast," the class is trying to come up with a new mascot for the school's soccer team, and everyone (especially Ralphie) dismisses her idea: The Butterflies. All but Arnold turn on her when Janet points out that the rival team, the Bulldogs, is Phoebe's old school's team, which hurts her feelings. She chides her friends for turning on her and dismissing her idea. She even chides Ralphie for being selfish. Eventually, they all compromise and name the team the Bog Beast Butterflies. In "Cold Feet," it's her turn to take Liz home for the weekend, but Liz is gone. When they track her down to a place called Herp Haven, Phoebe is sent to infiltrate the place with Valerie, her "pet alligator" (which is really an alter-ego of the Bus)

Season Three

Ok

Phoebe is against taking honey from bees in "In a Beehive," and she's stuck on an ice flow with Liz, Ralphie, and the bus in "In the Arctic." She feels bad for a giant praying mantis in a 1950s sci-fi movie in "Spins a Web," wishing the military in the film would trap it instead. Ms. Frizzle takes the class into the film where Phoebe tries to make this happen. Her fear of being on stage is revealed in "Gets Planted," but despite it, she's turned into a bean plant to play the beanstalk in the class play, Jack and the Beanstalk.

Season Four

Wave

When Arnold's skin is orange in "Goes Cellular," he wants to know the difference between his skin and Phoebe's. She's picked to represent the school in a Slam Dunk-a-Thon in "Gains Weight," despite the fact she can't do a slam dunk. She's a fox along with Arnold and Tim in "In the City," and she's partners with Arnold in "Takes a Dive."

Relatives

  • Her father makes an appearance in "Going Batty." He's blind and, like her, mentions how things were at her old school, implying it runs in the family. Her mother has never been shown or mentioned. Mr. Terese has expressed to Ms. Frizzle that he's glad that they transferred Phoebe to Walkerville Elementary.
  • In the original books, she lives with her grandparents. Her parents are not mentioned.
  • In Penguin Puzzle, one of the books in the Magic School Bus Science Chapter Book series, her uncle is named Cecil Byrd, an Australian ornithologist.

Producer Says segments

As the producer

  • All Dried Up/Producer Says

Name in other languages

Ms. Frizzle Международной язык "Международый язык./International language."
This page contains special characters in Greek.
Are you able to view these characters on your computer? If you see square boxes or other stuff, be sure to install a font that supports this language!
Localization Phoebe's name Latinization Origin
Spanish (Latinx) Andrea (original series)

Phoebe (Mentioned in Frizzle of the Future)

Phoebe Yeh, editor of the book series (in Rides Again)
Castilian Spanish Phoebe Phoebe Yeh, editor of the book series
European French Ophélie (in original series and mentioned in Frizzle of the Future) Ophelia
German Paulina The name Paulina

Trivia

  • Her first appearance was in the 1987 book The Magic School Bus Inside the Earth where she is "the new kid."
    • Despite being the newest student at Walkerville in the books, her classmates Carlos and Keesha were introduced in the later book The Magic School Bus in the Time of the Dinosaurs that was published in 1994, though it was in production at the same time as the TV series that was a novelty at the time.
  • Being on stage in front of people is her biggest fear. ("Gets Planted")
  • Jyoti does her reports in the remakes of the Young Scientist Club science kits.
  • In the early-readers, she is called Phoebe Cox [2].
  • She weighs 65 pounds. [3]
  • Her eyes are hazel in "Goes Cellular" but they are green on the cover of the 2002 issue of the home-video compilation, Creepy, Crawly Fun!.
  • Phoebe knows the metric system. [4]
  • She is the most caring especially, when it comes to animal welfare. That trait was passed on to fifth-grade Wanda.
  • Phoebe plays the saxophone. [5]
  • Phoebe is left-handed. [6]
  • Her school is actually called "Phoebe's Old School." ("Goes to Seed"). Its mascot is a bulldog.
  • She answers the phone in All Dried Up's Producer Says segment, making her the first Frizzle student at the time to answer a Producer call. The other students who have been featured in segments (as callers) were Arnold [7], [8] and Jyoti [9].
  • She is the only student in her class to have on short-legged attire and overalls as casual attire – these are shortalls. This is actually a variant of her regular book outfit, and made its debut in The Magic School Bus on the Ocean Floor.
  • Phoebe's scuba suit while going on aquatic field trips has always been depicted yellow with red accents up until the original TV series' finale where her scuba suit's colors were swapped.
  • Phoebe's surname, Terese (which is an Anglicized spelling of Thérèse) reveals she is of either French or Québécois origin. Mr. Ruhle pronounces her surname as in French. Further hints are dropped in her general politeness and her translation of imperial measurements to metric in a couple of Season 1 episodes that she's more likely Québécois.
  • Her name is derived from Phoebe (Φοίβη, romanized Phoébē) the Greek Titaness of the Earth's Moon, and also a moon of Saturn.
  • In "Going Batty," she is very close to her father as she remarks: "I'll love you anyway, daddy! I'll love you, forever!"
  • In the Scholastic Reader book "The Magic School Bus Gets Recycled", it is revealed that Phoebe has been given a necklace from her grandmother, showing that Phoebe is close to her grandmother in the canon of the Scholastic Reader series as well as the classic series.
  • Phoebe's voice actress, Maia Filar, also played Carol in Deceived, Tasha in Goosebumps, Melissa in Are You Afraid of the Dark?, the voice of Cassie in The Busy World of Richard Scarry, and Abbie in Flash Forward, the first Disney Channel original series.
  • Phoebe turned into a fox in "In the City." It is coincidental that Maia Filar's brother, Gil (he has been a caller in a Producer Says segment) would later go on to play the character Fox (who happens to be a fox) in another Nelvana series, Franklin.
  • She is the only original kid not to appear in the sequel series. She returned to her old school and was replaced by Jyoti and she is only mentioned by Arnold. [10]
  • In the episode "The Busasaurus," it's implied that Phoebe has a crush on Arnold.
  • Phoebe is one of the students that made a pun, other than Tim, Ralphie, Carlos and Arnold and is one of only two female students who has made a pun, the other being Keesha.
  • She is the only female student who has never cross-dressed as another gender for school plays.
  • Phoebe takes karate lessons after school. [11]
  • Her favorite music genre is rock and roll. [12] [13]
  • Phoebe is one of 3 females to fall subject to the "Carlos!" gag. The others being Keesha and Ms Frizzle. [14]
    • She is the first female to fall subject to the "Carlos" gag.
  • Phoebe is still yet to meet Jyoti (if she ever appears in Rides Again in some form)
  • Phoebe is one of few characters to have her grandparents revealed. They made an appearance in The Electric Field Trip. The others are Arnold, Ralphie, Tim, Keesha, Jyoti and Carlos.
  • Phoebe's favorite color is yellow. [15]
  • She is the third character to cry. [16]
  • She is likely named after Phoebe Yeh, editor of the book series. [17]
  • Phoebe could possibly be the first female student in Miss Frizzle to have her body explored if her forehead in Goes Cellular counts, as well as her plant body in Gets Planted.
    • However, if not, her successor Jyoti will be the first.
  • She is one of only three major characters to have worn a tutu, along with Professor Frizzle and Goldie. In each case, it was in the context of a circus act. [18]

References


* Débuted | ** Briefly | --- Formerly
Terese Family
Phoebe TereseMr. Terese
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