And will our voices be heard

I got tested and I don't have Covid.  Most likely.  Yet.  

At work the kids were cutting out, among other things, a picture of cheese to glue on their paper.  Super-achiever JXC told me in all innocence, "I'm going to cut the cheese, but I know it doesn't go on yet.  It just makes it easier to get to the other pictures."  I thought I detected HND, a mischievous towheaded lad, smirk at the cheese phrase.  Indeed, later he announced loudly, holding up the picture, "Who wants me to cut the cheese?"  After a positive response, he tore the picture with his hands.  JXC said, "That's not cutting, that's ripping."  At which point SEM, an earnest Indian boy, cried, "Yeah, you ripped one!  I didn't rip one, you ripped one!"

I didn't even know those expressions were still in use.

I could always use a little bit more to hold on to

S3, when the class timer went off: "My goodness, Mr. Chance, that beeping scared the tapioca pudding out of me!" (Cute, but possibly picked up from a TV show?) 

***

J2, on being asked to name something that starts with A: "Ares. He's the Greek God of war." (Impressive!) 

***

J1, being shown the photos in my digital camera: "How can a camera take pictures when it doesn't have eyes?" (Uh... good question. Magic?)

***

G2, walking down the hall with me, at the head of the line, apropos of nothing, cheerily: "My daddy is much fatter than you!" (What the hell? I'm not fat!)

My life is standing still but I'm still alive

Today, Prestigius was closed to students, but the teachers came in for a full work day, because it was that time again --- visits from prospective students! Of, course as I learned from this day and its follow-up, no one gives a tinker's dam what we teachers have to say on these kids' files, so it was pretty stress-free day. I saw Muffin and her little kid who is applying for Pre-K.

There was a smart bunch of kids visiting my room, very pleasant for the most part, and we had a lot of fun. There were eight of them (four didn't show up, which means their parents paid the $150 admissions fee for nothing, I guess) in the room with two teachers, me and Mrs. Hatfield, plus our two assistants. That's a very relaxing ratio.

At the end, we went to the circle and played the "what do they have in common" game. To introduce them to the concept, I gave them the easiest one. I named all of the girls, and they stood up one by one. "Now," I said, "Why are only these four standing up, and not the rest?"

One girl waved her hand excitedly. "Ooh! I know!" she cried. "Because you told us to!"

True dat!

You're wearing out my joie de vie

Little H, who looks to be repeating kindergarten next year if the school has anything to say about it, threw a pen at M2's neck just before recess. She wasn't hurt. When I asked him about it, he did what he does every single time his behavior is commented on --- "Well she" or "Well he did" and blah blah blah. The kid has no sense of accountability. And yes, many five-year-olds do.

So we went out to recess but he and I had a little chat on the bench. He said that M2 wouldn't get out of his way, whatever that means --- were they in a corridor? (By the way, it's really appalling how much goes on in my room that I don't notice. I try hard to be with-it and everywhere at once, but clearly I'm missing a lot.) Well, anyway, so I tried role playing with him. "I'm M2," I said. "Ask me to get out of my way."

"Get out of my way," he mumbled in his squeaky little baby voice.

"No!" I said.

H shook his head. "She didn't say no. She just 'tood there."

After shouting, "Look, numbskull, we're not re-enacting the verbatim court record here! This is an exercise! Don't you have any notion of the abstract?" in my head, I said, "Okay, I'll just stand here." So I folded my arms and made a hmmph noise, like M2 does when she's being sassy.

There was a long pause.

I broke character. "Uh, H. What are you going to do? You asked, but M2 isn't getting out of your way. What do you say? What do you do?"

He furrowed his brow, clearly at a loss. Then he brightened. "T'row the pen the other way so it doesn't hit anyone!"

Yes. Because that will help.

I trust I'll end up sleeping cradled in my doom

Say, this is turning into a "Kids Say the Stupidest Things" blog 24/7, but that's because I'm Distracted right now. Only time for quick posts. But that will change, surely.

Anyway, remember when I said to W1, "What are we adding?" and he said (correctly but not relevantly) "Numbers?" Well, a similar thing happened today. Talking to M1, a girl who is not quite as desperately in need of a shopping spree at the Clue Store as W1 is, I stressed the importance of putting spaces between the words.

"See, here," I said helpfully, "because I told you to, you put a space after this first word, but then after I went away you didn't put any more spaces in. But spaces need to go after every word. Not just after the first word, but after every word. Now, where do the spaces go?"

Little M1 took a breath, as she does when she's not quite sure what's going on, but plunged right on: "They go on the paper."

Man, I love my job.

Where another man's life might begin, that's exactly where mine ends

I was informed today by a child that our president was "taking everyone's money away and is going to make them into hobos."

(Wait, hobos? Consarn it! All riled up on giggle juice, I'll wager! Fetch the railroad bulls and march 'em off to the hoosegow!)

Another teacher said to this boy, "I'll bet your parents watch Fox news."

He said immediately and with gusto, "Yeah! It's so boring!"

Man, I know people enjoy sacrificing reason on the altar of righteousness and greed, but do they have to tell their kids about it?

***

Oh, and also today a boy looked at my lunch bag and said, "That lunch box sure has a long strap."

I said, "Yes, it does."

He replied, "Let's go ahead and call it a purse."

It's sweeter than the ripple wine

The other day the Spanish teacher told the kids she'd been out because of an operation (she'd gotten her appendix out in an emergency procedure a few days before). This prompted R to share that his mother has ovarian cancer --- he knows all about it, including the fact that she can't have any more children --- which somehow led to H gleefully proclaiming, "I love to feel my mommy's boobies!"

That's where I stepped in and asked, "Kids, have you ever heard of the phrase T.M.I.?"

***

This morning, during the circle time, E asked if she could take her shirt off because she was hot in the room (she was wearing a spaghetti strap top underneath). "I guess," I said complainingly, "but I'm hot too, and you don't see me taking off my shirt."

She giggled. "No! 'Cause then we would see your boobies!"

Say, why do they all call them "boobies," anyway? And why do they think I have them?

Take a look now at what your boy has done

I was trying to guide W1 through a story problem today. This kid, although a decent reader and apparently bright in several ways, is sporadically clueless. Everyone else groks what's going on, even my youngest little whiner, H. But this kid, who can read the thing himself, is just lost. The problem says A has 4 blocks and B has 3 blocks. How many all together? I remind him the key words that make this an addition problem. I help him work this through the number line. I direct his drawing of four blocks of one color and, separated by a gap, three of another. And then we get to the part where he writes the number sentence, and he acts as though he just woke up, in his hermetically sealed pod, which arrived from Alpha Centauri a thousand years ago.

He writes, "5 + 4 = 3." I suppress the urge to kill and read through the problem with him, again. Recalling, of course, that he can read it himself. I get him to point out the numbers that the problem gives. "Where'd you get five from?!" I screech at him in my head. I trace the number line activity. "See? We start at four and add three. Three jumps on the line. So the numbers in this problem are four and three. Four blocks, and three blocks." I show him the picture that he drew. I look at him, and he nods. "So..." I prompt through gritted teeth, "what are we adding?"

"Numbers," he mumbles.

After throttling him mentally, I go over it again. Finally, he has it. he writes the equation.

I breathe a sigh of relief. Another math fact pounded unwillingly into the blunted brain of a blockhead.

Until it's time to write the answer in tally marks. And W1 puts down twenty-five of them.

Here he comes with a green one once again

Today at school R wanted to use the Rubik's cube. He couldn't remember the name of it, and hemmed and hawed until finally he said, "Mr. Chance, can I play with the... uh... Mucus Block?"

Why isn't our new puzzle toy selling well? There are quintillions of combinations! Imagine the endless possibilities! So why aren't bright kids picking up a brightly-colored, challenging Mucus Block®?

Laugh along even though they're laughing at you

So there are a number of brief, on-the-spot games I play with the kids between instruction or projects. We play a variety of hangman, a sort of game like Mastermind except with words, four-in-a-row team tic tac toe, equation solving tic tac toe, and so on.

One of these games is What Do They Have in Common; in this game I ask several kids to stand up, and the class takes turns trying to guess what characteristic belongs to that group, and only that group. The simplest example of this would be: all the girls stand up. A slightly harder example is: asking the kids in striped shirts to stand up. A very hard example might be: have the kids whose names begin with vowels stand up.

In general, kindergarten kids are not very good at this game. The first day I introduced the game, after the more obvious boys/girls and hair color examples didn't go exactly smoothly, I had my assistant and I stand up and all the kids sit. They had a very hard time coming to conclusion that what we had in common and they didn't was "adulthood" or "are teachers" or anything of that kind.

The kids will excitedly and erroneously proclaim the current round's characteristic to be the same as the previous, even when it is clearly not ("no, not all the girls are standing up this time, so that can't be it..."). They will attempt to conflate it with patterns ("there's a girl, and a boy with shoelaces, then a girl, and boy without shoelaces"), which is pretty much the opposite of the idea. They are also largely incapable of figuring out abstract common themes, such as "everyone standing has a double letter in their name." And, finally, when asked to come up with their own characteristics to form a group, usually miss one person who fits the condition, or put in an extraneous one ("A2 is standing up, but he isn't wearing any buttons!").

In short, it's great fun. They're getting better at it. And to be fair, it's a pretty hard game. Today I could not figure out a couple of the characteristics that the kids thought of themselves (everyone with collars, with brown eyes). On the other hand, one of the kids standing up in the former game was not actually wearing a collar. So that made it a bit tougher.

So but anyhow this morning I had the three kids whose names end in Y stand up. There were a couple of desultory guesses, then A3 raised her hand eagerly. "What do you think these three classmates have in common?" I asked her.

"They're all very slow in finishing their work!" she said gleefully.

Cue: Assistant and I convulsing with laughter, amid faux-horrified protests at the idea.

Out of the mouths of babes

I still think fondly of some of the kids at the old Job at La Poubelle School, especially the toddler CF (this kid, of the original Kids Say... post).

I liked CF a lot. He didn't like candy or any kind of sweet food like ice cream. But he would enthusiastically chomp down on these huge honking pickles his mom would pack him for lunch. I was surprised the first time I saw that, and said to him, "Is that really a pickle? I didn't know kids your age liked pickles." CF stopped crunching for a second and said, "Pickle good." I got a big kick out of that.

His mom dressed him in button-down shirts and sharp dress shoes, and so he looked like a little man, with a mischievous grin and his little snub nose. He would often enter the toddler room with a sudden rush, sliding to a stop with arms outspread, sort of like Kramer on "Seinfeld" but with more élan and less kinetic slapstick. Then he'd give his big smile and bellow, "Hello, girls!" (A real junior ladies' man it seemed, but occasionally he'd change it to, "Hello, boys!" He wasn't picky.)

Anyway, one day I was changing his diaper (I've changed more diapers in my time than most young mothers), and he reached down, fingered his penis, and said to me, "What dis?"

I said, playing it straight and clinical, "Well, CF, that's your penis."

He considered that just a second, his eyes flashing, then said reverentially, "Penis good!"

Man, he really knew what was what. I just wish I could see how these kids turn out as adolescents and adults.

Amusing and bemusing conversations

With three-year-old B, brother of A2, who visits my class nearly every morning:

Me: "Hello, B. What's going on today?"

B: "Sunday."

Me: "No, it's not Sunday. It's Tuesday."

B: "Ha ha! That sounds like the number two!"

Me: "Well, it is the second day of the school week. But what I meant was not what day is it, but what is happening today?"

B: "Windy."

Me: "Windy?"

B: "Windy all day."

Me: "Perhaps so, B. But, more specifically, what people mean when they say 'what's going on?' is what's happening with you in particular."

B: [Pause, then holding up pinky, ring, and middle fingers] "Three."

Me: "Three, eh?"

B: "Three all day."

Me: "Well, it was nice talking to you. Sorry you can't stay."

***

With my mother and aunt:

Me: "I was over reading a book at a kid's house the other day."

Aunt: "Is that a typical event, or a one-off?"

Mother: [Completely flabbergasted] "One off? What does that mean? One off what?"

Aunt: "It's an expression meaning one time."

Mother: "Why not say that, then? Why not say 'Are you doing that just the once?' What is this off business? You're not Jazzy Jeff and the French Prince! What are you talking that rap slang?"

Aunt: [Laughing too hard to talk]

Me: "Yes, Aunt, why are you talking ebonics?"

Mother: [Totally baffled] "Bonics? What are bonics? What are you talking about now?"

Me: "That's the language the French Prince speaks."

Just a fine and fancy ramble

So, my class went to the zoo today. It was very hot. And tiring.

If there's a better method to corral sixteen kindergarteners than bellowing constantly, I'm not aware of it.

The following brief anecdote reveals everything that escorting kids this age to the zoo is all about:

We get to the monkey area, and there's a long row of cages with various kinds of simians, leaping and cavorting about their trees, swinging from a branch here, grabbing cage bars with their tails over there, engaging in dizzying aerial gymnastics in all directions.

And just at the moment we draw near, one kid calls out in a voice of wonder and excitement, "Oh, wow! Look! A doodlebug!!"

And sixteen kids cluster around a small patch of dirt just under the cages, jostling one another as they crane their necks to get a better look.

Later, I asked everyone what their favorite part of the zoo was. Mostly, it was petting the rabbit at the children's area. One girl liked the fact that a chimp at the zoo shared her name. And a couple of others thought the merry-go-round ride was the best.

No one mentioned seeing any animals. Kindergarteners are very tactile creatures.

I wish I could break the spy glass, set it free

Today I was playing math tic-tac-toe with R, the class' only seven-year-old. He picked a square with the problem: "the age of both players added together." He asked how old I was, and I told him to guess. He thought for a bit, then said, "Ninety?"

Some of the kids nearby watching started giggling. "Ninety?!" I sputtered. "Do you think I'm an old grandfather with wrinkles and white hair?"

"No," R said, and thought some more. "Ninety-two?"

But then, this is the same boy who earlier volunteered that sixteen plus five was twelve. After I'd pointed out that he was adding so should get a higher number than he started with, he reconsidered and guessed, "Eleven?" So I don't think I should worry about being elderly. However, I do have to worry about R's numeracy.

***

Today was the second parent observation, an event I was first treated to back in October. (The parents watch the kids at work from another room behind one-way glass.) This time it was a much less stressful affair --- I just went about the usual daily routine, and everything went very smoothly. I didn't do any special planning. Nor did I wear a non-wrinkly shirt. I am what I am, dagnabit.

***

I talked with our admissions director Max about 74's daughter the other day, and today he said she was offered a spot. I actually had nothing to do with the process --- again, I have no power whatsoever --- but it looks like I did, so I can pretend to be the Big Man with 74 and Zaftig. "Yep, I got your daughter to the top of the list. Just used a little of the ol' influence with the boys upstairs. 'Tweren't no big thing. ...'Course, now you owe me."

Also, I've been revising Palfrey's resume and cover letter for her, as she's hoping to get a job with private schools. And what halfway-decent teacher wouldn't? The public schools here are appallingly managed and basically a joke.

So now I'm the employment expert with the good job connections or something. The chronically unemployed loser twentysomething me --- indeed, the underemployed, underpaid, uninsured loser thirtysomething me --- would never have seen this day coming. Life sure has its zigs and zags, don't it?

Wisdom is old

We had some Prestigius alumni visit the school today so they could talk to the kids about how Prestigius was back when they went to school there (I didn't go, but I saw a photo of my room from the '70s, and man, the carpets were ugly back then).

Our room was visited by two women, mothers of current Prestigius kids, probably in their mid-thirties. One of the women said that she herself had been a kindergarten student in that very room where we sat now. The kids all oohed and ahhed at the living relic of ancient history, and one asked, "Was Mr. Chance your teacher?"

I said with as much dignity that I could muster that I was probably in first grade at the time.

***

One of the little girls, Z, a bossy type, accidentally poked L hard in the eye while they were waiting in line. She was probably jabbing her index finger in his face, acting all pushy. He screamed and cried (even though he was totally fine), and when I asked him what was the matter, he yelled, "Z poked me in my eye, and it was my best seeing eye!"

***

I introduced simple, three line book reports to the kids today (they write the title, one adjective about it, and then a short description of their favorite part). It went pretty well, but I was disappointed with L. This kid, whose mother is always raving about what a genius he is, and who can read way above his grade level, chose an extremely simple A-level reader with a lot of repetitive text and no story. When I later took L aside and said I'd like him to use that big brain of his to read a more challenging book and tell me a bit about it, he rubbed his chin and said, "Maybe I'll read a book in Chinese."

I'd settle for something with more than twenty words. Man, the gap between what L thinks he's capable of and what he actually produces is like the Grand Canyon over here.

Time you straightened right out

Today L (this quirky kid), approached my assistant during free time, while I was out of the room. He handed her a piece of paper, saying "telegram for you."

She opened it. On it, L had written, "blah blah blah butthead butt."

Lovely. It's interesting how this kid can do equations and spell a vast array of second-grade vocabulary words and yet be so retarded.

Amusing snippets

Prestigius had a viewing of the historic inauguration for the whole school in the auditorium. The kindergarten classes went for a little while.

During Biden's swearing-in, J turned to me and whispered, "What does the Vice President do?"

I said, "If we're very lucky, nothing."

***

Afterward, they shared their feelings about the celebrations.

"I loved it. He talked about something and there was music." (That's about as much as I typically get from formal ceremonies, I admit.)

"It was awesome because I voted for Obama." (A common sentiment.)

"The lady singing had a very funny hat on." (She sure did!)

"I liked it when they shot the cannon."

***

I also read them a book about Martin Luther King's life and work that ended with the information that he got shot and killed. B, a feisty, funny little guy, excitedly raised his hand.

"Martin Luther King was shot by black people!" he blurted.

"No he wasn't," I said. "Who told you that?"

He looked crestfallen. "I was guessing?"

I think he missed the point of the book.

***

The school receptionist stopped by my room and we tossed a couple of friendly barbs at each other, as we do. She turned to the kids and said, "Kids, Mr. Chance is fifteen hundred years old. He was born in 200 B.C.!"

I said, "That would make me 2,208 years old."

She said in surprise, "You can figure that out so quickly?"

I gestured into the room. "Have a seat. Stay a while. I'll get your name on a chair by tomorrow."

***

Tonight, I was driving my mother back from visiting my father and we passed one of those big digital time and temperature displays outside banks. My mother said, "That sign says it's five of. Five of what, though?"

Me. "..."

Mother: "Oh, I guess it says 50 F. That's the temperature, I suppose."

Me: "..."

Mother: "Can that be right? It feels so warm."

Me: "You mean here in this car? With the heat on?"

Mother: "Yes."

Kids say the nastiest things

The other day, I assigned a journal page for literacy. I had the kids finish the phrase "In winter, I like to..."

I went over to little five-year-old girl Z and read what she wrote: "In winter I like to have hot cockcock."

I smiled and said that was very good, but what two letters make that first sound in chocolate? And isn't there an L in there somewhere?

It ended up as chocklock.

***

That's funny, but a boy in another K class wrote on his paper, "I LIK PENIS." And that was intentional. (He meant like, not lick, which was a source of debate among us teachers afterwards.) Give me my sweet, naive kids any day; those other teachers have a bunch of six-year-old hooligans.

My batteries are fading, too

Today I called the custodian and asked for some batteries for our automatic paper towel dispenser. He said okay, and never showed. Later in the day he saw me, stopped, and said, "Oh yeah, I never brought you those batteries, did I?"

I said no, but that was okay. He said, "I'm getting old. I got them out and set them aside for you, and then just forgot all about them. Oh, I know why it was. The fire alarm went off after that, and I forgot." (We'd had a fire drill in the morning.)

I said that it was understandable to be distracted by the fire alarm. "Not really," he said. "I was the one who set it off."

***

That reminds me, before the break I got a new chapter book to read to the kids. I showed them the cover, which depicted the main character standing in a snow-covered tiny village, bending over and shaking hands with tiny people with pointy ears. I showed them all this, and noted the title, Stanley's Christmas Adventure. "Now," I said, "based on all this, where do you suppose the story takes place?"

D, an artistic, clever boy, raised his hand excitedly. "Santa Fe!" he shouted.

He's got the right idea, I suppose, but his train of thought seems to have jumped the track and pulled into the wrong station there.

I adore the passerines, my little chickadee

At work, the kids were doing a word find that featured words in the "-it" family. Little B, a smart and genial boy, muttered to himself several times while he was scanning the sheet, "I'm looking for tit... I'm looking for tit."

If I had a nickel for every time I said that....