Fish in a Tree

Keisha invites Ally and Albert to her house for a surprise. When they arrive, Keisha announces that they’re going to bake cupcakes with cookie dough letters inside, as she wants to test different bake times for different kinds of dough.

Keisha assigns Ally the task of reading the recipe and Albert the task of rolling the dough. Albert recognizes that Ally has difficulty reading, and he volunteers to switch tasks. Ally spells “cow” in her cupcake because it’s the first three-letter word she thinks of (and each cupcake only has room for three dough letters).

The oven starts to smoke because the cookie dough oozes out of the cupcakes. Ally feels as though every time she tries to write something, “it turns into a big mess” (144).

Mr. Daniels calls Ally to his desk and tells her he’s impressed with her intelligence, citing her definitions of “alone” versus “lonely,” her Roy G. Biv presentation, her artistic ability, and her many other skills. Ally protests, still believing she is not intelligent.

Mr. Daniels then asks if she gets headaches while reading and if the words on the page seem to move. When Ally confirms that this happens, he asks her to stay after school to play a game of chess.

Ally recognizes the game from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, but she is wary about spending extra time in school. Mr. Daniels entices her by offering to excuse her from homework on the days she stays. Ally enthusiastically agrees to this arrangement.

The class goes on a field trip to the Noah Webster House. On the way there, Ally asks Albert why he doesn’t fight back when Shay makes fun of him. Albert tells her that fighting back would only let them know that their words bother him. Ally then realizes that Shay’s teasing does bother Albert; he just wants to minimize the power of her words by refusing to acknowledge them.

At the Noah Webster House, a guide leads them through old rooms and describes how people used to live. The tour ends in a colonial schoolroom. In the schoolroom, the guide calls Noah Webster a “visionary” (153), explaining that he created the first American spellers and dictionaries. In short, he helped develop American English as a standardized language. Ally resents Noah Webster because he essentially helped to develop the language (and schoolroom practices) she struggles with as a dyslexic student.

The guide shows the students an old dunce cap and explains that in Webster’s time, misbehaving students were forced to wear the cap and stand in the corner. Shay makes fun of Ally, drawing a picture of her with a dunce cap on an old schoolroom slate. Upset by this teasing, Ally leaves the schoolroom.

Mr. Daniels comes to comfort Ally. He tells her she is not dumb and explains the many ways she demonstrates her intelligence in class, including her inventive strategies for solving difficult math problems. He believes she struggles with reading because she might have dyslexia. He explains that this means her brain “figures things out differently from other people” (157). He also commends her bravery, suggesting that the determination she demonstrates in getting through each day will serve her well as she solves future problems in her life.

Mr. Daniels tells Ally he’s scheduled tests with a reading consultant named Mrs. Kessler. These tests will determine if Ally has dyslexia and help them provide the assistance she needs to overcome her reading difficulties. He advises her not to be hard on herself, quoting Albert Einstein: “‘Everyone is smart in different ways. But if you judge a fish on its ability to climb a tree, it will spend its whole life thinking that it’s stupid’” (159). Ally plays a “mind movie” wherein “an angry fish at the bottom of a tree” bangs its fins on the trunk, “complaining that it can’t climb it” (159).

Mrs. Kessler begins her tests with Ally, and Ally is relieved to find that the tests are fun puzzles rather than “those awful bubble tests” (160) that involve filling in circles with the correct answers. After school, she meets with Mr. Daniels for a game of chess. He explains the rules of the game, detailing how each chess piece moves across the board. Ally responds to the visual nature of chess and finds that she doesn’t “have trouble with this game” (163). As they continue to play, her skills improve and her self-confidence grows.