Ruth Beckermann spent three years following a class of pupils, from the ages of seven to ten, and their devoted teacher at a large, ‘at risk’ primary school in an ethnically diverse, traditionally working-class district in Vienna. We get to know the children as individuals as we experience their daily adventures, struggles, defeats and victories in this microcosm of contemporary western European society: a society struggling with issues of identity and migration. But above all, this is an ode to childhood and education that builds on Beckermann’s trademark style of asking probing, important questions in an observational way.