Skip to main content

and you choose to believe the 8 year old?

Holy Cow.

Wonders never cease.

My students are crazier than I thought.

I had a great labor day weekend, relaxed, read books for fun, finished sewing a pretty skirt, got lots of sun, and in general, didn't want to come home -- love me some beach time. Nope, wrong. Love me some dock-time and house-time and mama's cooking. Yum.

I didn't want to come home -- I was dreading this week. I just knew something was going to happen.

And it did. Some of my students told lies to their parents, and I was falsely accused of doing things that I would NEVER do, and the principal of my school spent two days pulling kids out of my class to question them about how I behave at school. The guidance counselor got the ring-leading kid to confess that nothing had happened, finally, and as an added bonus I got 45 minutes of time outside of my classroom unexpectedly. Great -- I did 60 minutes worth of science in 25 today. I'm sure my students feel adequately prepared for their vocab. test tomorrow....

The kid's mom is LOCA, too, and actually came down to my classroom this morning to apologize to me -- and try to pass it off as not actually having been her kid's blabbermouth in the first place -- as if I would ever believe her.

I feel blessed that the administration at my school never questioned my own role in this at all -- they told me that they didn't believe the kids for a minute, and that the parents in question were crazy, and had a history of being crazy. This is one of the benefits of teaching 3rd grade -- the parents have been around long enough for the administrators to already know which ones are a few crayons short of a box.

The kids in question are some of the worst behaved kids in the school. The administrators keep mentioning how they want my team teacher and me to work magic with them. The only magic they really need are parents who actually do some parenting. And by parenting, I do not mean barging into the child's teacher's room, whom you have recently denounced to the administration of the school, and thereby to the teacher herself, to say that your child wasn't the ring-leader. Remember, we teachers actually spend time paying attention to your child's actions throughout the day, and we are pretty aware of what is going on. And don't, by any means, force the teacher to hug you at 7:10 in the morning. She doesn't want to hug you; she wants you to fall on your face from an airplane, or something equally painful, that will help you understand what it is like to have to tell your son every 3 minutes of the day to listen, be respectful, and start doing his work.

Word to the wise: Don't automatically believe your 8 year old who has a history of looking you in the eye and lying to you. He may or may not be telling the truth, based on his desire for your immediate and sustained attention. If you gave him the attention he craved in the beginning, and without him telling lies, he might not grow up to be on our "We think we'll see so-and-so on the news in an orange jumpsuit" list. Not the teacher's list you want your child to be on.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

five minute friday

Linking up for Five Minute Friday hosted by the gypsy mama. It's Friday morning, there is no school today, and I am wide awake. I have been since about 20 minutes after my alarm usually goes off. I grabbed the cat, shoved her under the covers, and told sweet hubby "Merry Christmas". He wasn't very amused, starting scratching my head to get me to go back to sleep...but I am awake. Awake, and awakening, and growing in awareness. Last weekend was a wake-up call to me. We had a couple of friends over to watch movies on Saturday night, and by Sunday, sweet hubby and I were not on speaking terms. When we finally spoke again, late on Tuesday, I said painful words to sweet hubby.... If you are the person who was in my living room on Saturday night, then I don't want to know you. --I'm not.-- Then you will have to show me. And so we are both awakening to the task of rediscovering how to be good to one another, kind, respectful, building one another up as we r

adult decisions

(No, not x-rated, you're looking in the wrong place.) I was supposed to go on a college church retreat this weekend. And I didn't. I was very "unresponsible" and made the best decision for me -- not to go. I would have loved spending time in the mountains. I would have loved getting to know some of the students a little bit better. I would have loved spending time taking in God's majesty while watching the sun rise or set over the lake, singing songs of praise, hiking, walking the labyrinth, or sitting in a rocking chair on the front porch. Except that this weekend, I wouldn't have loved any of those things. They would have been a burden to me. And a church retreat? I'm fairly certain that it is not supposed to feel like a burden, but more like a blessing. When sweet hubby's good friend called me and texted me to see if he could ride with me, I said no. I couldn't handle the idea of talking to this man for three hours in the car af

if you met me...

Linking up at the Gypsy Mama . If you met me.... I'd be happy to chat for a little while, unless I was watching the clock and trying to manage my time. Sometimes I try, sometimes I don't. If you met me at school, I'd only speak to you in Spanish. For real. Unless there were no kids around, in which case I could speak to you in English. If you met me at the beach, I'd be running around in my pjs or a bikini. All the time. I think I even forgot to pack shorts for the current beach trip. Who needs shorts when there are bikinis and sunshine? If you met me, you might think I'm ridiculous about how much I love my husband and our cat. And please don't ask me, after you hear that we've been married for five years, if we have any kids. If I didn't mention any, I probably don't have any. And if I didn't mention on my own that I one day want to have kids, don't ask me when I'm planning to. I think it is rude, and personal, and you never kn