The Here and Now

I wonder, more and more often, if I am actually teaching my students anything.
When I ramble on and on about parts of speech, multiplication, and vocabulary, are they even listening?

Is the information I attempt to pass-on going in one ear and out the other?

Today in class a stack of papers disappeared from my desk.
"Who took the worksheets?' I question.

"Classmate did! That scoundrel!" a student tattled.

"Scoundrel" was one of last week's vocabulary words.

A smile passed over my lips.

Later as I wrote the days homework I mis-copied a page number and was corrected.
"You imbecile, it's page 13!"

Should I be angry that he called me an imbecile?
Or happy that he used a vocabulary word in the correct context?

The problems involved in the education field.