Miss Nelson Is Missing!

Miss Nelson is Missing! by Harry Allard and James Marshall is a children's picture book AbOUT a teacher, Miss Nelson, and her rowdy class of grade schoolers. The book describes a day when the sweet Miss Nelson is absent from class and in her place is a mean substitute teacher, Miss Viola Swamp.

The book was published by the Houghton Mifflin Company in 1977. It was followed by two sequels: Miss Nelson is Back and Miss Nelson Has a Field Day.

Plot

After an especially rowdy day in Miss Nelson's class, her students discover that Miss Nelson is not coming to school the next day. "Now we can really act up," yells one of the students (Allard, 8). However, before they get the chance to make mischief, Miss Nelson's substitute, Miss Viola Swamp, shows up. Swamp is a strict disciplinarian and gives the students significantly more school work than Miss Nelson ever did. The contrast between the two teachers is so great that the students actively go looking for Miss Nelson and make unlikely conjectures about what may have happened to her. The following day, Miss Nelson returns to class and the children rejoice. At the end of the book, it is implied that Miss Viola Swamp was Miss Nelson in disguise.