In the short story “Miss Awful,” the main character Roger starts off as a carefree child who tries to get out of doing work, and likes to play. His behavior is also supported by his teacher, who not only allowed this behavior but also joined in on these acts, such as lying on the floor. Eventually the teacher leaves for a while, and a substitute teacher replaces her. This teacher, named Miss Orville, is on the other side of the spectrum, as she is very strict, and does not tolerate any nonsense. All the children are not used to having this kind of teacher, and hate her. Over the course of a week, she talks to parents about how inadequate the children are, and ends up embarrassing both parents and children. Eventually, she leaves, and stresses how important education is. Throughout the the book, Roger goes through a change in character.
As we first see Roger, he talks playfully with his father, saying that he does not need to finish his homework and that he would rather got to the park. The next morning, instead of bringing pencils and school supplies to school, he instead fills his backpack with a water pistol, many baseball cards, and a variety of other toys. This shows that he does not take anything seriously, and that he is more into play than learning. When he gets to class, he is very surprised at the way Miss. Orville treats the class, and hates her. To make matters worse, he didn’t finish his homework, and also knocked over his backpack, which showed the teachers all the toys he brought. This causes the Roger to get in trouble. On the way home from school, he loudly complains about how Miss Orville confiscated his toys, and goes home straight away. He decides to get revenge by doing all his homework perfectly, thus giving the teacher nothing to discipline him with. Roger has not really started to develop yet, as he still does not like doing homework, but as time passes, he becomes more fixated on doing it perfectly, so that his original reason does not even matter to him anymore
As the week progresses, Roger learns that Miss Orville had to get evicted from her living space because the building was going to get torn down, which started to make him fell bad for her. On Friday, Miss Orville reveals that the old teacher would be returning on Friday, and when all the other students get back at her by killing her plant, she does not punish them and just stresses how important education is. Roger realizes at this moment that Miss Orville really cares about the children, and that her strict teaching methods were for his own benefit. At the end of the story, Roger is no longer playful, but rather more mature, and more aware of what being a good citizen is.