The kids are everything. They say the darnedest things.
I have a little guy who really struggles with anger and keeping his emotions in check. We're working on it. Daily. He gives me lots of opportunities to try new strategies.
Yesterday, he didn't win a sight word game we were playing. (Who knew sight words could be so fraught?) He ran screaming from the room to the bathroom across the hall.
It's handy that the bathroom is across the hall because I know where he runs to and I can usually talk him down from the hall or send one of my sturdy, easy-going boys in to cajole him. I have two boys that remind me of my brother Enoch. They are the biggest boys in the class and grin easily and don't take themselves too seriously. One is Samoan and one has bright red hair and freckles. They're who you need at such times.
As he was running from the room, another student, a new-agey girl with feminist sensibilities (Why weren't women in the first mission to the moon? Why hasn't there ever been a woman president?) who always has a few craft projects going at any given time and pilfers tape from my desk whenever she can, called after him in the most hopeful and encouraging tone you can imagine, "It's OK, when you don't win! It's how you leeeaaaaaarn!"
***
We went on a field trip to Orem Junior High for a play. Beforehand, one student said that his mom made him bring his warm coat. I said, "Moms are smart."
He said, "Yeah, they are. They don't look smart, but they are."
I wasn't sure how to take that. (And I've met his mom. She looked smart to me.)
***
Another day, I was mentioning the 13 original colonies and one student raised his hand and said, "Wait. So what you're telling us is that the world used to be smaller?"
Um.
He continued in the face of my stunned silence, "Because there weren't all 50 states."
I walked to the map and showed them which were the 13 colonies. "All this land was still there," I said. "And people lived there. Do you know who?"
After more guesses than there should have been, they finally landed on Native Americans.
***
One of my brilliant students who has only known English for a little while, needed help figuring out a word for something she was writing. She told me the Spanish word but I came up empty. I gathered three other kids that are really good at switching back and forth between languages. They had a rapid fire conversation in Spanish, disagreeing and agreeing and finally said, "Knitting. She's talking about knitting."
Then she had another word. Lots more consultation. One student said, "Planting and growing crops. That's what she means."
I asked, "Farming? Do you mean farming?"
"No, no," she said. They talked some more. I just waited and admired them so much. Their seamless and competent bilingual ability just impresses me.
Finally a student said, "She means planting seeds and growing trees. Like apple trees."
Everyone nodded and was satisfied.
***
The newly minted English speaker asked me how to spell mysterious the other day because she was writing something else.
How is she so smart in English and I can't pronounce words in French to make Emma even a tiny bit satisfied?
***
I was walking to the work room to make copies and another teacher was locking up her door and heading home. "You're so together," I said. "You always leave right at 4:00."
She said, "This is my fifth year. My second year, I thought, 'this is so much easier than last year,' and then my third year was even easier."
It gave me so much hope.
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