Lizzy's Ups and Downs: NOT An Ordinary School Day

by Jessica Harper, Lindsay Harper duPont (Illustrator)

Lizzie goes about her crazy day at school and experiences different things, both good and bad, along the way, such as not being able to sit in her usual seat on the bus to reciting her special poem to her entire class.

Genres: Picture Books, Childrens, Emotion

32 pages, Hardcover

First published June 1, 2004

Reviews

[Y.Poston]

cute exploration of "How was your day?"
for children.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was a girls’ retelling to her mother of all the up and down emotions she felt throughout a single school day, done in rhyme. It’s definitely worth a read. It inspired me to ask my kids more questions about their school days, and to post a list of emotions by our dinner table in order to make it a regular dinner-time topic.

List of Emotion Books I Reviewed:
“The Way I Feel…Sometimes” by Beatrice Schenk de Regniers (5 stars)
“Today I Feel Silly” by Jamie Lee Curtis (4 stars)
“Lizzy’s Ups and Downs” by Jessica Harper (4 stars)
“Sometimes I Feel Like a Storm Cloud” by Lezlie Evans (4 stars)
“The Way I Feel” by Janan Cain (3 stars)
“When I Feel Angry” by Cornelia Spelman (3 stars)

[Candice · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lizzy's mom wants to hear all about her day. In rhyming text and cheerful, colorful illustrations, Lizzy tells her mother all about her day at school - her good friend Claire who is moving, that pest Ray, mismatched sox, a snake during music class, sharing at lunch, and jelly beans in math class. It shows the warmth and caring of a parent who inivites a child to talk about her experiences and her feelings and may just encourage a bit of sharing as certain passages will serve as reminders of "what I did in school today."

[Sharon]

This text is about a girl telling her mother about her school day. Throughout the day, Lizzy experiences many different emotions based on what is happening. This story contains a decent amount of text, but the rhyming format makes it attractive for young children to sit through. The text also capitalizes each emotion as it is mentioned; highlighting all of the various feelings that Lizzy goes through in this one day.

[Mandy J. Hoffman · Rating 2 out of 5]

While there is nothing really bad or wrong with this book, I still didn't like the story line. It was focused all about feelings. Not that I have anything against feelings, I'm a very emotional person, I think there are better ways to address them in a much more Biblical way with children. So you choose: read or not to read?

[Crystal · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great book about a girl's day at school. It starts out with her mother asking about her day, and then Lizzy talks about all the things that happened and how they made her feel. Wonderful for helping kids understand there are ups and downs in every day, and we ALL have them. My 7 year old really enjoys this book.

We are currently looking to add it to our permanent collection.

[Uriah · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good book that talks about kids feelings and gives kids an opportunity to name what they might feel during a day.

[Kimberly · Rating 3 out of 5]

Oh, to be six and have six-year-old ups and downs! Although, no matter how old you are, it's still pretty terrible when your best friend moves away. :(

[Tatum Edwards]

This would be a good mentor text to use to talk about transitional words. She goes through her day and uses transitional words as she's doing it.