Tracy Kidder's 'Among The Schoolchildren'

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Looking at the American educational system today, it can seem incredibly discouraging. Between reports of failing test scores, increase in dropout rates, and unmotivated teachers, it often seems as if our educational system is breaking down. Whether it be due to the terrible social circumstance that we had been placed in or the lack of effort to fix it, the future of many schools do not seem very bright. In the novel, Among the Schoolchildren, Tracy Kidder tries to offer a image of a broken system and how one good teacher can make a small but significant difference.
''Among Schoolchildren'' follows a year in the life of Chris Zajac, an elementary-school teacher in Holyoke, Massachusetts. Holyoke is a small town whom many would call the “ghetto” district due to its large proportion of relatively recent Puerto …show more content…

Chris Zajac works as a fifth grade teacher at Kelly Elementary School, which contain many students from the same ethical background. This school may not seem like much but it is a very close representation of the problems within in the American schooling system. And even though Chris may not seen to be fit, in the task of fixing such a problem, her determination to her students shows otherwise.
Throughout the year, Chris was able to help improve quite a few of her student’s life. One of these students is Claude. Claude had been described as a very promising students with potential but suffers in the classroom due to distraction (p35). In the chapter September, it was indicated that Chris did not know of Claude's inability to focus on a task and so she moved him to the wing furthest from her desk(p14). By doing this she will not be able to focus on him individually as much due to the space and so he would not work. But later on in the novel, she notice

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