Miss Nelson has a Field Day

I know yesterday was a sad, sad day for the Bay Area.  Fortunately or unfortunately, the existence of two preschoolers in your home means that you generally do not watch hours of televised sports… unless you want to incite additional leaping and tackling and new and exciting methods of head injury.

So I caught the last few minutes of the playoff game between the Niners and the Seahawks as I was waiting for my soccer game to start.  And in honor of America’s favorite contact sport, we have a review of the second book in the Miss Nelson trio (which was previously missing but has now been found), Miss Nelson has a Field Day, by Harry Allard and James Marshall.

In a nutshell: The story starts with a depressed school of students moping around all day.  Why are they depressed?  Their beloved Forty Niners, I mean Tornadoes, are losing.  And it appears this book takes place in Texas, so you know… things are bad.  The football coach has a nervous breakdown and everyone begins succession planning.  Miss Viola Swamp’s name is bandied about and fortunately, Miss Nelson overhears the discussion.

The team decides they’re going to really give their new coach “the business,” which is clearly why the Tornadoes are so bad to begin with.  But of course Miss Swamp shows-up in a black sweatsuit and whips those whippersnappers into shape.  Mr. Blandsworth, the school principal, tries to do some digging as to why this witch shows-up every time he has a problem, but Miss Nelson doesn’t have any answers.  On page 27, the plot takes a dramatic turn when we catch a picture of the school building with Miss Nelson in an upstairs window, and Miss Swamp in the window below… dun DUN dun.

Thanks to Coach Swamp, on Thanksgiving the Tornadoes clobber the Werewolves and Miss Nelson returns home.  We finally figure out the mystery as the story closes with Miss Nelson relaxing in her bed.  Over a cup of tea and some light reading, Miss Nelson thanks her identical twin sister, Barbara, for helping her out.

Families can talk about: What does it mean to give someone the business?  Is that respectful?  Why did Coach Armstrong “crack up”?  Does that mean he cracked his arm?  What is eavesdropping?  And what is laughing someone off the field?  How did Coach Swamp get the team to work hard and work together?  Did it pay off?  Do you think Miss Nelson is the Swamp and Barbara is Miss Nelson?  Or is Barbara the Swamp and Miss Nelson is Miss Nelson?  Are you still following?