5 days til Christmas break!

Today I let my students know that I was staying with them, and the craziest outburst of joy and strangeness occurred. I must say I am glad they feel that way.

Yesterday we made collages based on images found in Song of Myself by Walt Whitman. I was really careful to edit the magazines for sketchy pictures. I walked up to one group where three boys were talking about a scantily clad, practically naked woman and when they continued to talk about it after I was standing there, I proceeded to rip out the picture and ball it up, telling them that there was no need for them to look at things like that in my classroom. The boy who had had the magazine on his desk just sat there with his mouth open. Laughing, the other students told me that it was his personal magazine, not one of mine. This caused my mouth to fall open, and then I just laughed. In my over-zeal for protecting my students eyes and the dignity of women everywhere in my classroom, I had ripped up one of my students personal magazines. I just uncrumpled it and folded it nicely so the picture couldn't be seen and apologized. You have to laugh about that though. Today the same group held up a picture of a girl in a bra and ask me if I wanted them to rip it out of the magazine...Funny right?

Today J came into my classroom during his lunch to see if he could salvage his grade. All semester long we've been butting heads as I've begged him to engage and live up to his full potential. The only reason he cares now is because he's transferring to a local middle college. I went through my grade book to see which grade we could possibly fix. He began to tell me that his role models were his cousins who tripped on acid all through middle and high school only to go to a community college so they could transfer into a 4 year university. He told me his grades didn't matter cause usually in the last three weeks of school he could fix them. As he was sharing with me, my heart broke. Sometimes I feel silly for caring so much about my students, for agonizing in prayer for them, for begging them to succeed. Then I remembered that someone had to mourn for children who have broken lives and heart, and that it was acceptable to mourn for a little while, but that it couldn't take over my own life. I told J that I thought he bright, that I loved when he shared in class because he had great ideas, and that I expected great things in his future. There's a hard way to do things, and there's an easy way. Unfortunately people have to learn this on their own. I have 5 more days to love this child to the best of my ability and then he's out of my hands. When I almost lost my first and second periods, God reminded me once again, that they're not really in my hands anyways. I have to live with open hands as I love these students. There is no guarantee how long they will be in my class, so I have to take advantage of every day.