Fish in a Tree: Chapter 29 Summary & Analysis

Ally's class gets off the bus to visit the Noah Webster House. Ally thinks it'll be a silver dollar day as Albert starts filling his pockets with acorns. Oliver and Max throw acorns at a tree, Ally picks one up too, and Shay laughs at Albert when Mr. Daniels isn't looking. Ally tells her not to, so Shay says she'll laugh at Ally instead. Ally and Keisha encourage Albert to stand up for himself, but he says that doing so will only let Shay know it bothers him. He says that he's more worried about the acorns right now, as he believes the trees might be in danger of fungus.

Ally ends up in a group with Albert and Shay and the guide takes them through the house. They see a bedroom and Albert can recite where the origins of the phrase "sleep tight" comes from, though Shay makes fun of him for it. Then, they tour the kitchen. Ally latches on when the guide says that girls didn't go to school as much as boys did, and she asks Albert if time travel is possible and how she'd look in a bonnet. Albert is just puzzled.

Then, they go to a colonial schoolroom with the rest of the class. A lady talks about how Noah Webster developed the first American dictionaries and helped to standardize English. Ally thinks Webster was a jerk for doing so. The lady passes out slates and Ally draws a picture of her acorn. Then, the lady pulls out a dunce cap and explains that bad students used to wear them and stand in corners. As Shay giggles and shows her friends her slate, Ally catches sight of it—she drew a head in a dunce cap and labeled it "Ally." The lady sees and tells Shay to erase it, but Ally runs out of the room in tears.

Ally runs until she finds a swing set that reminds her of Grandpa. Before too long, she notices Mr. Daniels's feet in front of her. He asks if she'll tell him what happened, but Ally just wants to be left alone. Mr. Daniels is quiet for a moment and then picks up a stick and writes in the dirt, saying that he and his brother used to write on the beach. He invites Ally to write something, but she wants to get away from words. Mr. Daniels asks Ally to let him help her.

Finally, Ally says that nobody's going to be able to help her because she's dumb. Mr. Daniels seems shocked to hear that she believes this, and says Ally isn't dumb. When Ally asks why she can't read, Mr. Daniels says she might have dyslexia, which just means that her brain figures things out differently. He tells her she's brave for continuing to come back to school, despite the bullying and difficulties. And, he says, she can do amazing things like draw, do math, and come up with good one-liners.

Finally, Mr. Daniels says that he's spoken to Mrs. Silver and Miss Kessler, and they'd like to give Ally some tests. The results will help them help her. Ally looks Mr. Daniels in the eye as he says that she is smart, and she will learn to read. Ally feels she has no choice to believe him; she's tired of feeling miserable. As they head back to the museum, Mr. Daniels says that once, someone said that if a person judges a fish on its ability to climb a tree, it'll believe it's stupid. Ally sees mind movies of animals doing absurd things and wonders if it's really that simple.