The Bean Trees deals with the Marietta Greer's, one of the main characters, development and learning about the outside world. This is done in several ways, the most significant is Turtle, whose name is later found out to be April.
Marietta's first major growth about the outside world is when she begins to work for the local hospital, as a x-ray technician assistant and lab technician assistant. Her main development in the hospital is learning about science and realizing that she can be more than a wife to make babies for her husband, which is what most women in Pittman County do. In learning this she realizes that her main goal of not becoming pregnant is realistic, so she so decides to drive across country and figure out some where else to live.
In driving across the country she changes her name to Taylor, the first town she stopped in. Then in Oklahoma she gets her next major learning experience, Turtle. Turtle creates exactly what she doesn't want to have, a child that is dependent on her. Turtle is literally just dropped on her. Turtle rises to the challenge and she takes care of Turtle. She begins to feel responsible for Turtle immediately and although she is a very bad mother at first, doesn't care about Turtle's or her diet, eventually she gets to Tucson, Arizona and meets up with Sandi who works a Burger Derby and has a child who is taken care of by Kid Central station, a free baby-sitting service for mall shoppers. Taylor imitates Sandi's parenting and they are almost mirror images of each other. Taylor eventually finds out that working at the Burger Derby is not for her and she quits. She looks for jobs and a apartment then she meets Lou Ann, who has a child about Turtle's age named Dwane Ray. Taylor decides that Lou Ann is some one she would be comfortable living with. She moves with Lou Ann and learns about parenting from her. She begins to pay extra attention to what Turtle begins to eat and she gets herself a job at Jesus is Lord Used Tires, the tire shop across the street from Lou Ann's house. She eventually takes Turtle to a doctor, where she learns that Turtle was abused. Taylor learns how cruel people can be when she learns that Turtle has had several broken bones. The next major thing that Taylor learns about parenting is the pain felt by a parent whose child has been hurt by a stranger. This happens when