Absence

Hey all! Sorry for my absense from the blog. After attending Army BCT all summer, it's been a race to catch up. But I'll do my best to update at least every other day from here on out. Here's a sampling just so you won't forget me.

Apologize...

The counselor was in the room and talking about apologizing to friends when you mess up. She gave the scenario that your best friend had told you a secret and you had, for whatever reason, told it publicly. Her question was, "How do you handle the situation?"

One little girl raised her hand with an answer. "You move and change schools."

Goals

Anybody who works with kids knows that they love to tell stories. A sales men's first rule is that people love to talk about themselves. Get them telling personal stories, and you can sell them anything.

Anyway, anytime a kid sees you unattended, they will latch on and start chatting. It's kind of like seek and destroy.

One morning, I was sitting down at the teacher table, enjoying my breakfast, when a little boy (not in my class) came up with a smile on his face. He closed in til he was about 3 inches from my face and said, with no segue whatsoever, "Hey, do you want to know what I'm gonna do when I grow up?"

Now, you can't just say, "Scram kid, I'm eating." no matter how much you want to. It makes their little day to have just a little interest in whatever they're trying to tell you. It's a huge deal to them. So I answered, "Sure. What are you gonna do?"

Smiling like The Joker, he proudly proclaimed, "I'm gonna climb the highest mountain in the world!"

That actually caught me off guard. I was thinking more along the lines of, say, fireman or wrestler. I was impressed. That's a pretty lofty goal. Wondering what other huge plans he could have, I asked, "What are you going to do after that?"

He scrunched his little head in thought. Apparently no one had asked this before and he hadn't gotten that far into the planning stage. He pondered for a few moments, then quietly said, "Well, I guess I could climb back down..."

Kids are far, far more brilliant than we give them credit for.

Bloody Battles

When I first started teaching, along with my science, I also taught 5th grade social studies, which focuses on U.S. History. Children's innocence amazes and astounds me every day, but one day in particular stands out.

We were discussing the Civil War, and I was really going into detail on the horror of war and the insane situation of having to fight your own country and just why the two sides were so desperate to beat the other. At some point, I mentioned that the battle (I know longer remember which battle) lasted all day. At this point, one of my little girls got a curious look and raised her hand.

I have always told my students that curiosity is a wonderful thing and they are allowed to ask questions in the middle of a lecture as long as they raise their hand and I call on them. Seeing her hand, I called and asked what she wanted to know.

With a truly worried look, she asked, "If they fought all day, did they stop and take snack breaks every couple hours?"

That's funny enough, but even funnier is that no one else in the room thought there anything strange at all with that. Perfectly reasonable, in their minds, for two warring factions to halt hostilities and engage in a quick snack.

And that's why I love teaching.

Lonely

At bus call at our school, how we handle it is that our secretary calls each class one at a time to have the students go down to wait in the cafeteria for their bus. My class, more or less, always leaves as a group. However, there are usually a few stragglers that just can't pack their stuff up quite as fast as the others. As they called my room one day, the class got up and left as a group, except for one little boy. This little boy is not usually a straggler, but had more than he usually did and was having trouble getting it ready to go. He looked up and saw he was alone, so he yelled, “Hey, why are you leaving me? I deserve to be loved!” in his most dramatic voice to the retreating backsides of his classmates.

Old Time Morals

As a science teacher, I have several class pets. Some of my favorite are a small rodent called a degu. They are super energetic, don't bite, and hilarious to watch.

For the longest time, I only had one male. They're hard to find where we live and the pet stores only seemed to carry boys. Finally, I visited one day and behold, they had a little girl. So I got her. As instructed, I placed her container next to my degu's cage so that they could get used to one another and not fight. I left her there for an entire day.

The next day, I got ready to throw her in with him. My class was working (supposedly) as I walked over to the degus to put them together. I picked up the girl, opened the aquarium lid, and was getting ready to throw her in when I heard a heart-stopping scream.

Scared to death, I turned, still holding the female degu, to see what the commotion was about. Staring at me, wide-eyed, was a little girl. "You can't put them together!" she screamed.

"Why not?" I asked, not having a clue what the problem was. The kids all knew I wanted a set so that I could have little degus. I had followed all the rules and done all that I could to make the transition harmless for the little rodents. I couldn't imagine what the problem was.

“Because,” she stated matter-of-factly, “they’re not married yet.”

Sick and Twisted

The rumor about me at school is that I am mean and evil. I love that rumor. I started it. How it began, was that when I would tell a kid no to something, for whatever reason, they would look at me with world-weary eyes and say what all kids say when they get a negative response. "You're mean."

To that, I would reply, "And...."

Then the kid would roll their eyes, and in a voice suggesting many repetitions, say, "Mean AND evil."

There are more instances. For example, in one class, a little girl was having trouble stapling some papers together, so she marched up to me and told me to hold her papers for her. I had been watching, and she had struggled with this thing for several minutes. I'd have stepped in to help already, but I was trying hard to contain my laughter. Some of the noises she was making rivaled that of some bodybuilders I know when they're going for a new record on the bench press. Keep in mind, this kid weighs around 60 pounds, tops.

I held her papers for her as she struggled and struggled to staple them, not making any headway. Finally, she gave up and handed it to me with the instructions, "I quit. You do it."

For the first time I was able to see just why she was having so much trouble with the stapler. It had been out of staples the whole time.

Trying very hard not to laugh and make her self-conscious, I told her what was wrong. She straightened up and got real serious. She looked at the stapler, then back to me.

While glaring her most evil glare at me, which was still pretty cute, she said, “You’re a sick, twisted man.” Then promptly grabber her un-stapled papers, turned, and walked away.

Magical

This story occurred while we were watching an educational video (how exciting!) on cells in science class. I am not a big movie-during-class person, but the kids had been good for a sub, so we had done a project that they could eat. While they ate their projects, the video played.

At one point, during a closeup of the cell organelle the mitochondria, the dull announcer's voice intoned, "Now let's take a closer look at the magical world of the mitochondrian..."

A little girl sitting near to where I was standing had a thought. "He says it's magical, but I bet there's no unicorns."

I can't argue with that kind of logic.

Art

One day as I was walking to my room, a little girl came walking out of our art class looking totally forlorn. I put on my "sad face" and asked her what was wrong.

She pointed to her shirt and hands, which were covered in paint. She looked up at me sadly and said, "I got art all over me."

What's that noise?

I have a small class of 4th graders. One day, a boy in the back kept complaining he was hearing a whistling noise. "What's that noise? Does anybody else hear that?"

He was the only person in the room that could hear it and he just kept complaining about it.

Finally, a little girl that was sitting beside him said, "That's the sound of the wind going through your ears."

Simple Machines

My second year or so of teaching, I was teaching simple machines (lever, pulley, etc.). The kid's end-of-the-unit assignment was to create a new kind of mousetrap that had to use at least 2 simple machines, and trap the mouse not kill it. (I did that to make them think I was letting mice go in the room, which I never said but implied. I love watching them squirm. I also had some class hamsters at the time that were getting annoying...). They weren't alone, they were put into small groups.

They had 2 class days to work on it (about an hour each, at the time, they weren't my homeroom). They brought in God-awful amounts of materials to work on their traps. I watched and helped a lil and offered advice.

Most of the traps revolved around a bucket or cup that would trap the mouse. One trap played music, I beleive as a Pied Piper influence... However, the coup-de-grace was massive.

In the front of the room on the day the traps were due, one group put together a monstrosity. It was as big as my desk and composed mostly of tape and rulers. They put it together in about a minute (apparenlty they had practiced at home. It didn't help.).

This trap was swaying with the breeze, and there wasn't a breeze. While trying not to look like I was attempting to hold my composure, I asked, "Well, how does it work?"

One kid, who either 1) didn't agree with his partners about the construction of the trap or 2) had enough engineer in him to know it wouldn't work glanced at his partners, glanced at the trap, then turned to me and said....

I love this kid. He passed.

"Well, we were gonna put up a VACANCY sign and hope for an industrial accident."




And they say kids are dumb.

I'm not a kid, really!

Before we start, let me say that in this episode, I was 27 years old. I am around 5 ft 5 in tall and weighed around 170 at the time. I had very short brown hair, and while not in a suit, was dressed in nice clothes.

Ok, here's the scene. Last spring, our 4th, 5th, and 6th graders got to go on a 4-H field trip to Frankfort. Yes, it's a great trip. Anyway, on the trip, we got to see the Governor's Mansion and the Capitol Buidling. It's at the Capitol Building where our misadventure takes place.

At the Capitol, what they do is, firstly, line up all your kids and teachers and take a picture to send you a zillion of later. Done and good. Then our Representative Robin Webb comes over and shakes everyone's hand. We can't open a hotdog stand without having Mrs. Webb coming over to shake hands. It's all good.

Anyway, then a little tour guide lady, I didn't get her name, comes over and says, "Ok, you adults go in and go through the metal detectors, and I'm gonna have a talk with these kids."

Here's the misadventure part. Like the others, I get up and trudge off (I'm in the back of the line. I don't like people behind me, makes me paranoid) toward the doors with the metal detectors. From behind me, I hear.....

"I said that's for the adults. You stay here."

I turn to see who the offender is so that I may yell at them. The problem is that the tour guide is staring AT ME.

I say, "I know. I'm going, just like you said."

She responds, "Thats for the adults. You stay here."

And we stare at each other, not comprehending what the other wants. From behind me, I do hear parental chaperones, teachers, and even some kids from the side cracking up.

Finally, another teacher (the only other one on the trip) comes over laughing her head off and explains to the lady that I am indeed a teacher. Now the laughter from behind is considerably louder, to the point people who aren't with us are cracking up.

The tour guide stares for a moment, then says, "He is not!" Why let logic intrude on her perceptions? In the ensuing discussion, it is revealed that I'm older than she is.

I still get comments from teachers, kids, parents, and even our janitor won't let it go. Everytime I pass him in the hallway with a group of kids, he tells me to get in line.

When does gray hair set in?

Background

Let me start this blog off by setting the stage for you. I work at a very, very small school. In our entire building, we have less than 100 Pre-k to 6th graders. Our school is WAY back in the sticks and is surrounded by a community of very lovable but redneckish folk.

One day a few years ago, the road up our hill had iced over so bad that buses couldn't go up it. So we (the teachers) sat and chatted in the lunchroom for 2 hours til the ice thawed enough to be scraped.

We have 6 teachers, I'm the homeroom for the 5th and 6th grade (yes, together, still usually under 20 kids). We rotate subjects, so I do all the science and have 3 snakes and a degu (look it up) in the room that the kids adore, far more than they like me.