Summary

In Chapter XXII, Williams describes working conditions at the Carden School, a conservative school where she taught for the first time. She decorated her classroom before leaving for a two-week trip to Alaska. She returned to find that all of her decorations, including a bee hive and other articles she had hoped would spark her students’ interest in nature, were gone. When she asked Mrs. Jeffs ( a school administrator) about the missing items, she learned that they were no longer there because the decorations cluttered the room and distracted the students. Mrs. Jeffs asked Williams not to refer to the subject she was teaching as biology. Her job was to teach science. Williams almost lost her job when she encouraged her students to swim on the floor while listening to the mating calls of whales. During the time Mr. and Mrs. Jeffs questioned...