How old are you Ms B?
Yesterday I was asked this question. I’m not a good liar so I said, “I’ll be 38 tomorrow.”
What? It’s your birthday tomorrow? Can we have a party?
No. What’s the point of that? We’ll be learning things like usual.
Can we bring some chips and pop?
Well, if you want to…
It’s my Pre Calculus class. They’re a super nice bunch of kids. The funny thing about this is that the class is half girls and half boys. The ones that got all excited about it were the boys. They were dividing up who was going to bring chips, who would bring pop, who got the cups, etc. So I was expecting a few to stop by this morning and drop off their goodies for 2nd hour.
When 2nd hour rolled around we had more kids bringing in even more chips and cookies. I started setting everything out on the counter since we had plenty of junk food. I asked if they wanted to get some food before we went over the homework or after. They said that it would be better to do it after. It’s too distracting to get it ahead of time.
We went about our business of working out logarithmic and exponential equations from yesterday’s homework. Then, what happens? The ear-splitting fire alarm goes off. We all dutifully file out of the building and wait in the parking lot in the drizzle for the fire trucks to come. It was at least 10 minutes before we were back in the warmth of the building. We finished up the homework, took a short quiz and I told them there were no new notes for the day. (small cheer)
One student had pop in a refrigerator in a Science room. So he and another kid went to get the pop. It was taking them longer than I thought it would. So I started to go look for them. I got to the hall and another teacher motioned for me to go back to my room. So I confusingly went back.
These two that had left the room were recruiting nearby teachers to come and sing as they brought in a birthday cake. They even had candles! But the funny thing was that they had the wrong number! They made me a year older! Oh well… I can use the candles next year…
It was so sweet that they thought to get a cake. But the part I liked the best is the card. Somehow they found everyone (and then some) before class to sign it. And it’s a totally appropriate card since Snoopy is our school mascot. (yes, we’re the only school licensed to have Snoopy as our mascot)
This last quarter of the year, I really have some great students. They are really nice and fun to teach. I’m not saying that it’s a walk in the park all the time. But I don’t dread going to work at all. They make my job fun. We laugh, we learn. And today, we had cake.
Oh yeah… The reason why my age was wrong is that there wasn’t an “8″ candle at the store. They’re too young to realize that at this age, rounding DOWN is best.
