Childhood Education In Barbara Kingsolver's The Bean Trees

In Barbara Kingsolver’s novel The Bean Trees, Taylor buys a picture book-about a farmer planting carrots under his rug-for Turtle, her adopted daughter, "who had managed to get through her whole life without a book”(Kingsolver 82). Although Taylor feels very proud of herself for providing educational resources for Turtle, Taylor admits that she has no money to buy more than two books, and her friend Mattie, who knows well about how childhood education influences children's lives, is "concerned that Turtle would grow up thinking carrots grew under the rug"(97). Mattie is correct that quality of early education is important-research shows that children start falling behind their peers before the age seven if they do not get the education and