The Here and Now

There is something magical about the last week of school. Grades have been turned in, projects are completed, and there is a general feeling of nearing an end in every nook and cranny.

Classrooms are gradually becoming more and more bare. The walls are returning to their former state of white and cork.
Shelves are, for the first time in a year, clean, strait, and color-coded.

There is but a day and a half left of the school year.

To honor the institution of education and the importance of teaching out every last once of learnin’ left in them, we are watching the second “Pirates of the Caribbean” movie.
The lesson in this flick, “What happens when good grammar fails to manifest.”
Also, “An in-depth look at buoyancy, geography of the south seas, and what happens when barnacles grow on your face.”

The forefathers of the schooling profession marvel at my skills.

My current classroom by numbers.

-- 3 are playing Gameboy in the corner. The beeping and dinging noises are heard every time the movie hits a quiet moment.

-- 2 are making planes. Attempting to create the finest high flyer every fashioned from lined paper.

-- 4 are painting their names with watercolor on large pieces of construction paper. 13 year olds love their names. I have a stack of paper and inch and a half thick, all beautiful paintings of names. Their own name, their friend’s name, my name, any name will do.

-- 1 is eating soup. I have no idea where the soup or the bowl came from. It does smell good though.

-- 1 is sleeping atop the window sill.

-- 3 are chatting “quietly”* in the corner.

-- 2 are watching the movie.

It’s a fairly educationally motivated day.

* the quotations marks around “quietly” indicate that I am using the word in it’s loosest possible meaning. It might be more appropriate to refer to their conversation as “boisterous” or “rambunctious” or even “bloody insane.”