Toni Cade Bambara’s short story The Lesson is an insightful and down-to-Earth look into the lives of the urban poor. Told through the eyes of Sylvia, a young black girl living in the inner city, it chronicles a trip with a teacher, Ms. Moore, to the world-famous (and expensive) F.A.O. Schwartz Toy Store. Upon witnessing the vast display of wealth at the store, some of the students begin to recognize the wide economic gap separating them from the rest of society (says Sugar on page 410, “I don’t think…that this is not much of a democracy…equal chance to pursue happiness means equal crack at the dough, don’t it?”) but others go on in blissful ignorance of the poverty in which they live.