“The Lesson”: What was Miss Moore’s point of taking the kids to FAO Schwartz? Compare her method of teaching to the more conventional methods. How effective was her lesson?
Miss Moore from “The Lesson” by Toni Cade Bambara is a genuine person, who truly cares about everyone. She believes in her own mind that she is designated to do this for the children, to make them better people, and smarter. So, instead of boring them in a class room she decided to take them to FAO Schwartz which is one of the biggest toy store in this world, and she didn’t take them to them to buy them things, but to teach a big lesson. She was wanting to get the kids to understand that money is only a value, and there are better things that money could purchase, instead of toys, and that your surroundings aren’t who you are. ““Where we are is who we are”. (Bambara 4)
…show more content…
At first, they do not understand why they have to go to a Toy Store to just look, and want but Miss Moore knew that it wasn’t just to go look; it was to understand. They slowly begin to understand, but they all just want the expensive toys, the students started to compare the price of the toy to the amount it costs to feed a family. They begin to understand the value of money for themselves. Miss Moore is knowing that she has made a great choice and that she took them and that it is not something she could teach them; it is something they had to see, feel, and take to heart. She always wanted them to understand that there are people who don’t have things, and that the toy is not that important. “35 dollars could buy new Bunk Beds for Junior.” (Bambara
Second, in Bambara’s original, we revisit everyday life lessons multiple times. Cartwright summarizes one lesson as follows, “When Big Butt expresses his yearning for the microscope the children see at F.A.O. Schwarz, Miss Moore seizes the occasion to teach science and launched into a lecture on the invisible world around us” (61). He also wants us to consider the monetary lessons Sylvia is learning by keeping the change from the taxi ride as well. He uses her internal debate on the cost of a $35 clown and $1000 sailboat to indicate this additional
In order for her to make thousands of dollars she has to persuade a family about adopting a homeless nine year old boy. In the process she succeeds and successfully delivers the boy into his new family. She is then later on told about how the boy was too old to be adopted and will be killed for organ transplantation. As a consequence, Dora decides to take the boy back. Singer then explains, “In fact, an average family in the United states spends almost one-third of its income on things that are no more necessary to them than Dora’s new TV was to her” (2). Singer elaborates on the fact that we indeed spend so much of our money on things not essential to us. Singer also states, “Going out to nice restaurants, buying new clothes because the old ones are no longer stylish, vacationing at beach resorts - so much of our income is spent on things not essential to the preservation of our lives and health” (2). One might agree to Singer because he does state an important point on how most of us do spend our money on unnecessary things and instead should be given to charitable agencies. He believes that the money will save the life of children in need between life and
In Toni Cade Bambara's, "The Lesson", the story seems kind of linear when you start reading it. At first, it is just about a girl named Sylvia and her childish, rebellious nature toward Miss Moore. But you later discover that there is much more to this story than you initially expected. The seemingly insignificant quarrels that Sylvia has with Miss Moore have a deeper meaning to it. The resolution of the conflict between Sylvia and Miss Moore shows the struggle Sylvia has regarding whether she should not learn things because it appears like a weakness to her or to learn and accept what Miss Moore is trying to teach her.
The short story “The Lesson” by Toni Cade Bambara is about Sylvia and her friends. Sylvia is the narrator in the story; Sylvia is a black girl who grows up in Harlem. She talks about how a women name miss Moore moves down on her block. Miss Moore is an educated woman who always dresses up properly and she’s “black as hell.” She always volunteers to take Sylvia and her cousin Sugar to educational events. People in the neighborhood thought that Miss Moore was weird but saw the opportunities for their kids. So they let their kids go with her, but Sylvia weren’t learning, on the opposite she was taking advantage of Miss Moore. One day while Miss Moore was taking caring of the kids, she started to quiz them on arithmetic. Kids started begging her
Toni Cade Bambara was a native of New York City who devoted her life to her writing and her social activism. Throughout her career, Bambara used her writings to convey social and political messages about the welfare of the African-American community and of African-American women especially. According to Alice A. Deck in the Dictionary of Literary Biography, the author was "one of the best representatives of the group of Afro-American writers who, during the 1960s, became directly involved in the cultural activities in urban communities across the country." Deck also pointed out that "Bambara is one of the who continued to work within the black urban communities (filming, lecturing, organizing, and reading from her works at rallies and conferences). In addition, Bambara established herself over the years as an educator, teaching in colleges and independent community schools in various cities on the East Coast." Bambara's influence derived from the combination of her duties such as writer and social activist. "It's a tremendous responsibility and honor to be a writer, artist, a cultural worker...whatever you call this vocation," she explained in an interview in Black Women Writers. Bambara showed the world from a different perspective through the eyes of a factory worker or welfare children. Her objective was to describe the urban black community without resorting to stereotype.
Child had some arguments against the education system for girls. As the class learned, girls would go to school and dip their toes into many of the sciences rather than focus their education on the classics to prepare for college entrance exams like their male counterparts. Child also argued that once young women graduated, they got caught up in going to balls and parties to live out their youth while they still could. The author thought that young people should be taught about frugality and industry in case they became impoverished at some point in their lives, like the struggles that she faced with David’s debts. Within the text, Child visited with the mother of an impoverished family. The mother hired a seamstress to sew and patch their clothing because the sixteen year old daughter did not have enough sewing skill. Child was taken aback by the statement because she thought that the young woman would have been able to sew to bring in money for her family. But, the mother replied that school, music, and dance took up too much of the daughter’s time during the school year and during winter break she would be spending time with her friends. “Now is her time to enjoy herself, you know. Let her take all the comfort she can, while she is single!,” stated the mother. Since young women did not learn domestic tasks in school, they did not enjoy them later in life. The arts
Ordinarily, colloquialism is used with words such as “breadwinners” and “whatever” to again compensate for the base of society so that she may reach to all intellectual standpoints. As for the tone of the speech, it seems that she uses an optimistic speech in a cautionary tone in order to glorify her argument so that it may promote an ethical justification to her purpose. In her 13th paragraph of her speech, she references many pieces of an outfit as “artificial” and then later lists how children have been forced to abandon all aspects of normal childhood so that these accessories may be made. This would have been spoken to a well to do audience more than likely dressed in proper attire with multiple accessories now associated with child labor. Her hope would be that many in the crowd would analyze themselves and would have felt a sense of guilt and shame with a revelation of how those small trinkets came to be. She dissects the issue through the expository action of listing the status of the states for the reader and their position on the
One of Miss Moore's defining qualities is her intelligence. Her academic skills and self-presentation is noticeable through her college degree and use of “proper speech” (Bambara, 385). Miss Moore also makes her intelligence evident from the methods she uses to teach Sylvia and the other children. Unlike planting them in classrooms, she takes them out on trips to show them the real world. Despite all the insults she receives from th...
Toni Cade Bambara’s short story “The Lesson” is a story about a group of children living in the slums of New York City around the 1960s and 1970s. They seem to be content living in poverty in some very unsanitary conditions. Miss Moore, the children’s self-appointed mentor takes it upon herself to further their education during the summer months. She feels this is her civic duty because she is educated. She used F.A.O. Schwarz, a very expensive toy store, to teach them a lesson and inspire them to strive for success and attempt to better themselves and their situations. Although the use of language tells the reader a great deal about Sylvia’s background and environment, what is important is the use of foul language which takes us deeper and
Miss Moore has been to college and she feels responsible for the teaching of the important issues to the young people in her community. However, the fact that she resides in the same neighborhood as the children displays that she too has missed some opportunities in life to advance herself as far as living situations and finances although she ha This sentence sounds a little weird. You might want to say "despite having" instead of "although she has" s a college degree. Mercedes shows that she is most well off financially when she expresses how she wishes to revisit the toy store, F.A.O. Schwartz when she receives her birthday money. The other characters including Sylvia, Sugar, Flyboy, Big Butt, Q.T., Junebug and Rosie Giraffe are more categorized into a low class society which satisfies the reason that they reacted the way that they did What is the reason they acted the way they did? Include a little more context clues. when they were outside of the toy store. Because of the social economic status, the children, especially Sylvia and Sugar felt very uncomfortable to enter into the expensive toy
These kids feel out of place and do not know how to act because they are out of their element. Sylvia could hardly walk through the front door when she got there and once they were all in there Sylvia says they all were “walkin on tiptoe and hardly touchin the games and puzzles and things” (Bambara 59). This “geographical separation of the poor from the rest of an area” is an example of residential segregation within “The Lesson.” The segregation of neighborhoods usually carries a “racial connotation as well” (Ferris and Stein 206), keeping black neighborhoods separated from white ones in the nineteenth century. Sylvia’s chance to demand her “share of the pie” (Bambara 59) is now harder just because of the separation and lack of equality that surrounds
Toni Cade Bambara’s "The Lesson" revolves around a young black girl’s struggle to come to terms with the role that economic injustice, and the larger social injustice that it constitutes, plays in her life. Sylvia, the story’s protagonist, initially is reluctant to acknowledge that she is a victim of poverty. Far from being oblivious of the disparity between the rich and the poor, however, one might say that on some subconscious level, she is in fact aware of the inequity that permeates society and which contributes to her inexorably disadvantaged economic situation. That she relates poverty to shame—"But I feel funny, shame. But what I got to be shamed about? Got as much right to go in as anybody" (Bambara 604)—offers an indication as to why she is so hard-pressed to concede her substandard socioeconomic standing in the larger scheme of things. Sylvia is forced to finally address the true state of her place in society, however, when she observes firsthand the stark contrast between the rich and the poor at a fancy toy store in Manhattan. Initially furious about the blinding disparity, her emotionally charged reaction ultimately culminates in her acceptance of the real state of things, and this acceptance in turn cultivates her resolve to take action against the socioeconomic inequality that verily afflicts her, ensuring that "ain’t nobody gonna beat me at nuthin" (606). "The Lesson" posits that far from being insurmountable, economic and social injustice can be risen above, but it is necessary that we first acknowledge the role that it plays in our lives, and then determine to take action against it; indifference, and the inaction that it breeds, can only serve to perpetuate such injustices.
The main point of the story, in my opinion, is to be happy with what you have just like the girls were. The story says, “But that’s all we can afford, besides one extra outfit a piece.” (576) It is clear throughout the story that the girls were not very well off. In one instance, the narrator talks about not having a Ken doll for the Barbies to fight over because they would rather spend their money on a new outfit next Christmas for their Barbies. (576) Another instance shows that the girls knew they were less fortunate than other people, the story states, “We have to make do with your mean-eyed Barbie and my bubble-head Barbie and our one outfit a piece not including the sock dress.” (576) The narrator refers to the Barbies as “mean-eyed” and “bubble head” in this sentence, which shows the narrator realized that she did not have the best of things but she was still satisfied.
There are varying degrees of the impact a lesson can have on a child. Some lessons are taught easily using a textbook in a classroom, while other lessons are taught utilizing real world examples. Rather than learning valuable life lessons in the classroom, the children in Toni Cade Bambara's "The Lesson" learn the harsh economic inequality of their society. Lead by Miss Moore, the children are shown how they are personally affected by the economic inequality. Using the "show don't tell" teaching method, the naivety the children had diminishes, and the narrator explains the progress by illustrating how the children are affcted by the lesson.
The message to value more important things in order to have a wisely spent life is demonstrated very well through literary devices in “The Necklace”, by Guy de Maupassant. Madame undergoes an ironic moment in life as she learns what is worth valuing. She is a very greedy woman who only cares about herself. The reader would never think of her as the person to do work, but that thought changes as she misplaces what she thinks of as a valuable item. If Madame just learned how to live life in a way that will not make her upset and to value things that are valuable towards life instead of expenses, she will be better off. But this is how Madame views her life, while others take notice of the significance in their lives. Values are different towards people across the world, and Guy de Maupassant defines that in his short story, “The Necklace”.