Rules of the Heart

Like many elementary school teachers, Elaine Moore started each day with “circle time,” a period when students could share anything they wanted with the class and respond to each other’s observations. But in December 1992, the tightknit circle of students in her 4th grade class at the Ravenwood School in Eagle River, Alaska, was unexpectedly shattered by the illness of Seamus Farrell, who was soon diagnosed with terminal brain cancer. Moore, then in her 15th year of teaching, was determined to keep the lively 10-year-old a part of her class for as long as possible, ultimately organizing her students into small groups that visited Seamus every day at home through the rest of the school year.

Based on interviews with Moore, her colleagues, and Seamus’ classmates, now college age, journalist and author Bob Katz tells in Elaine’s Circle (Marlowe & Company) the story of the extraordinary outpouring of support for Seamus, who died shortly after starting 5th grade the following fall. But before the class visits began, Elaine had to break the news to her students, their parents, and her administrator, and Katz shows that in doing so, she relied on equal measures of compassion and intuition.

Circle Time was the emotional centerpiece of Elaine’s teaching style. Each morning, immediately after attendance was taken and Ravenwood's principal had wrapped up his announcements over the PA system, Elaine would move to the center of the room. Like a camp counselor urging everyone into the...