It is the first day of school in Chad, Africa. Children are filling the road. ＂Will they give us a notebook?＂ Thomas asks. ＂Will they give us a pencil? Will I learn to read?＂But when he and the other children arrive at the schoolyard, they find no classroom, no desks. Just a teacher. ＂We will build our school,＂ she says. ＂This is our first lesson.＂James Rumford, who lived in Chad as a Peace Corps volunteer, fills these pages with vibrant ink-and-pastel colors of Africa and the spare words of a poet to show how important learning is in a country where only a few children are able to go to school.