Leslie has trouble relating to her mother and turns instead to her new journalism advisor at school, until a moment of crisis puts a different perspective on things.
When he decides to turn his fifth-grade teacher's love of the dictionary around on her, clever Nick Allen invents a new word and begins a chain of events that quickly moves beyond his control.
Four students, with their own individual stories, develop a special bond and attract the attention of their teacher, a paraplegic, who chooses them to represent their sixth-grade class in the Academic Bowl competition.
When Mr. Lincoln, "the coolest principal in the whole world," discovers that Eugene, the school bully, knows a lot about birds, he uses this interest to help Eugene overcome his intolerance.
Jackie, who has always had trouble in school, begins to develop more self-confidence under the guidance of her fourth-grade teacher and is crushed when Ms. Sugarman is promoted to principal in the middle of the school year.
Helen fears that lack of improvement in her reading may leave her stuck in the sixth grade forever, until a good teacher recognizes her reading problem.
