Changing school demographics, coupled with a teaching force that is predominantly white and female, has created a growing discrepancy between teachers and the students they teach. Many children and children in poverty do not display the behaviors or experience the type or degree of success in school as white or middle-class students do. Consequently, they create challenges for the teacher. They may pose disciplinary problems, and so teachers may under teach these students as they focus on addressing the behavior. In this article, the author shares her experiences teaching in a 4th-grade class of predominantly African American children for a year.