The life and education of poor children in Alex Kotlowitz's book is mostly different from what I have experienced. However, that is not to say that I do not see similarities between Pharaoh and Lafayette's experience with education and my own. I attended school for about eight years in Nepal. Although my parents are not extremely wealthy, they could afford to send me to a school where English was taught side by side with Nepali while many others attended public schools which did not teach English until the fourth grade. To add onto my privilege, my mother's uncle owned the school. I did not have to fear corporal punishment and suspension. More than that, I had more freedom than all of my peers. The freedom that I got directly contributed my …show more content…
They attend a public school that fails to provide grief counseling and proper instruction which I believed to be normal in schools in America. Ignoring the problem of violence that plagues Horner, the causes for dropping out of school mirror those of Nepal, a third world country. According to the study Primary School Repetition and Dropout in Nepal: A search for Solutions published by the USAID Project some of the causes are high student to teacher ratio, lack of facilities, children supporting households, parents not being able to support school or child's learning, etc. In the book, Ms. Barron has to educate thirty four children by herself with extremely limited resources. Kotlowitz uses imagery to show the longing for education the children feel when she comes back to work after a strike. The students "fluttered around her like baby robins angling for a worm". He uses diction to describe the school itself is described as "unimposing" and "more utilitarian than esthetic". Kotlowitz writes that the school board actively discouraged parental involvement but not listing the school's phone number on a phonebook. LaJoe is so overwhelmed taking care of the triplets that she has no time to supervise Lafayette and Pharaoh's education. Lafayette has to step up to the plate every time there is need for a dependable adult in their life because there is no one else, which jeopardizes his education tremendously by causing him to miss