Bert Breen's Barn Theme of Education

Quit school, and you'll get rich! Wait, forget you read that. Especially today, that idea sounds counterintuitive, since our society places a high value on education. But that's the message Tom gets when Widow Breen reads his cards.

Let's think about this for another minute before you pack up your locker. Education is actually extremely important to Tom's success, but the novel emphasizes that education can come through nontraditional means, too. The method that works for one person might not necessarily work for another. Also, in 1900, you could do a lot more without an education than you can today.

So, Tom leaves traditional school behind and gets his education in a hands-on, elbow-grease kind of way. He's guided by the men around him, including Birdy, Ox, and Mr. Hook, and also gets a lot of support from Polly Ann. Tom observes all these folks very closely and takes the lessons they offer him to heart. So, he's studious in his own way. He's gunning to be more like the Ben Franklin, Albert Einstein, Bill Gates kind of dropout than the sit-at-home-in-the-basement-eating-Oreos-and-watching-TV kind of dropout.

So before you tell your parents Shmoop said it's okay to quit school, also tell them we said this: if you're going to quit school, have a practical plan for earning money and be prepared to work your tail off. And also realize that the twenty-first century doesn't work the same way as the early twentieth.

And we've got statistics to back it up: in 1900, only 51% of children ages 5 to 19 were enrolled in school. In 2013, over 90% of children ages 5 to 17 were enrolled in school. So, there's that, too.

1. Does the novel ignore the value of traditional education?
2. From whom does Tom get his education?
3. What lessons does Tom learn in life that he might not necessarily have learned from school?
4. Are attitudes toward education different in this novel than they would be in contemporary novels?

The most valuable lessons in life come from experience.

In the novel, school is a luxury for the wealthy rather than a necessary path to a better life.