This is the kind of stuff he talks about. I don’t really know what to say, I just listen. And catch the ball and shoot and track it down again; pass and shoot and move and shoot again.

In social studies, we’re learning about the siege of the Alamo, one of the battles of the Texas Revolution. “It all happened a long time ago,” Mr. Tomski says. “And after it happened, everybody started telling stories about it, so it got to be pretty hard to tell what happened and what didn’t.”

Mr. Tomski has brought an old musket to school, a brown Bess, he calls it, which is what many of the soldiers used. He passes it around the room—I get a good look at it.

“This is a flintlock gun,” Mr. Tomski says when the gun comes back to him. He walks around the room, pointing out the different parts. “You got your hammer. You got the jaws of the hammer. And what they’re holding is a piece of flint, which comes down against something they call the frizzen—a piece of steel. The idea is, the flint hits the frizzen and makes a spark, and the hammer pushes the frizzen out of the way. Because underneath the frizzen, you got the pan. That’s where the gunpowder is. One spark and bang! You can see the pan right here.” He holds up the gun and points it at the blackboard and presses the trigger. There’s a click but nothing else.

“Now this may look like an old stick,” Mr. Tomski says. “The flint is dull and there isn’t any powder in the pan or bullet in the muzzle. But this is still a very dangerous instrument in the wrong hands—accurate to about seventy yards. Does anybody know how far seventy yards is?”

“A little shorter than a football field,” somebody says.

“That’s right. And that’s where we’re going right now.”

It’s the middle of March, nice and sunny, and the whole class troops through the hallways and out the double doors into the picnic area. Then we straggle over to the football field, about thirty kids walking and talking in little groups of friends. I’m on my own, but I don’t mind. It feels good to be outside.

Mr. Tomski gathers us all together in one of the end zones, and then he marches by himself seventy yards down the field and turns around. I can see him looking at us, shading his eyes with his hand. “All right, class,” he calls out, sounding small and far away. “I want you to run to me. All of you. As fast as you can. Starting . . . now!” And he claps his hands; they make a noise like a gunshot.

Some of the kids run hard, but most of them just kind of giggle and jog at the same time. I try to end up in the middle of the pack—I don’t want to come last, but I don’t want to be first either. And it’s warm enough to make me sweat. The field is muddy, with patchy grass left over from the winter. Lots of little green seeds have been scattered over the dirt. It’s easy to slip.