• Karrar Raad, 12, works in a muffler shop in Sadr City. His brother Allawi, who is only 10, works in the adjacent garage. The owner offered them work, paying about $3 a day, after he saw them scavenging for cans — a dangerous living in bomb-prone Baghdad. Their father is ill and has no job, so the two are the breadwinners for a family of 10.

• Ali Kadhim Baidani, right, tries to fix his tractor with the help of an unidentified friend. With his father unable to work, Ali uses the tractor to collect garbage for a local contractor, starting at 5 a.m. each morning until 2 in the afternoon. "The happiest moment for me,” he said, “is when I receive money from the contractor and give it to my father to spend on my family."

• Sajjad Hassan Saadi, 12, quit school in the 4th grade to earn a living selling government rationed flour diverted to the black market. It's illegal but unremarked upon in Iraq. He can earn $8 to $12 a day, but on a recent afternoon, he had no money in his pockets. He fears he has no future unlike other children who go to school.

• An Iraqi boy drinks from a broken pipe in Sadr City. A United Nations report found that 94% of boys in Iraq attend elementary school, but that number drops to 44% by high school. For girls, 81% start elementary school; 31% go on to attend high school.

• An teacher leads a class on the first day of school at Al Rasafi elementary in Sadr City after the end of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan and the Eid al Fitr holidays.

• A young boy watches worshipers during Friday prayers in Sadr City. Children in the poor walled-in Shiite Muslim neighborhood have been shaped by war and poverty. They are witnesses to sectarian violence, Shiite militias, angry sermons and troops patrolling.