- Mr. Keating's class is beginning. He asks Cameron to read from the first page of their book.
- It's all about how to rate a poem's "greatness score."
- The rest of the students seem terribly bored already; they look on incredulously or gaze out the window.
- Mr. Keating lets Cameron finish, then tells the students to rip out the introduction of the book. They seem worried that he is tricking them, but soon respond to his commands with glee.
- An instructor, Mr. McAllister, hears the commotion and briefly peeks into the classroom, worriedly.
- Mr. Keating tells the boys that they will learn to think for themselves, to savor words and language. He tells them that language and ideas can change the world.
- Poetry, he says, and beauty, love, and romance are what we stay alive for.
- As the boys contemplate this, he quotes Whitman (again) and he asks them what their contributions (to life) will be.
- Yikes. Heavy questions.