School is a serious place 99.9% of the time but every once in a great while you need to let go and have some fun. I decided that I wanted to plan something really spectacular for April fools one year. The kids had been planning good things for the last couple and this was going... Continue Reading →
Six and the loss of a cousin
Six is the oldest of three children, and it was my pleasure to teach two of them before they moved away. I actually knew her family because one set of her aunts and uncles lived next door to me when I lived in the city in which I taught. Six was, and still is, a... Continue Reading →
Five and her upside down and backwards writing
Five was a surprise from the first time I met her. She was incredibly bright and had a personality that made her friends with everyone. She was that student that pulled groups together and made people smile.
Four and the letter from lockup
When he was tried and incarcerated at the juvenile lockup he learned some hard lessons. He wrote me about how he tried to help someone who had also been a student of mine and he deeply felt the pain of helping them adjust to being locked up and then asking the other child to write to him when they were released but never hearing from them.
When you lose a student
Three years ago I lost a former student when he drowned during a Memorial Day weekend swimming trip. He was out with friends and laughingly went into the pond and then within seconds, he disappeared under the water. He did not know how to swim and had gone into water that was too deep. They dove... Continue Reading →
Two and the trip to the Emergency Room in an ambulance
Yes, Two and I ended up in the ER late one afternoon. I left a substitute teacher in my room to go help administer testing in the computer lab. We had already had a run in because I don't have 'bad' students. I have students who behave badly or make bad choices, but that doesn't... Continue Reading →
Many Years Ago There Was Student One
One was exactly the kind of child who will make you love teaching middle school or leave it. He was a no holds barred, pain in the neck, always wisecracking, always 'on' kind of kid that can make you miserable if you aren't just as fast and just as funny. One and I were kindred spirits.
“My Kids”
Over the last two and a half decades I have met and taught between one and two thousand children.
