Since moving to Oklahoma, I’ve worked a lot (too many!)
different jobs. But the one thing that has always been consistent is teaching;
even when I was working other jobs, I stayed involved in teaching. This year I’m
teaching at two different colleges and I love it.
And when you’re a teacher, fall is always awesome. Everything’s new—new classes, new plans, new
students— it’s exciting.
The things that would send me right over the edge in the
middle of the year can make me laugh in the fall.
Like a student I like to call Purple Hair No Pen.
Please understand that I have no problem with the fact
that this girl’s hair is Easter Egg purple.
My own hair has definite purple overtones after the unfortunate
My-Hairdresser-Doesn’t-Know-What-Color-Red-Is incident. But, a week and a half
after she first dyed it, her neck, shoulders, and hands are also still bright
purple.
Which makes me question her basic intelligence and,
honestly, her overall cleanliness. I
mean, unless she was actually trying to turn herself into a muppet, she clearly
used no protective gear AT ALL while dying her hair. And wouldn’t regular
showering tone it down a little after a week and a half?
Still, my problem with her is not her hair color. It’s the fact that she keeps coming to a
writing class without anything to write with.
Our first conversation about it went a little like this:
Girl "Can I use your pen? I don’t have one.”
Me: "This is a WRITING class."
Girl "Well, I wasn't here last time--I didn't
know we'd need one."
Me (to no one in particular): “This conversation is
going terribly.”
Girl "Soooo, can I have a pen?"
Me: "I only brought the one I'm using.
You need to come prepared."
This, by the way, was a lie. But this is a
COLLEGE class, I don't hand out supplies willy-nilly.
It was supposed to be a lesson for her…but I can’t
ascertain if it actually taught her anything because the next two class periods
she still didn’t have anything to write with.
And then she took our last quiz with a brown calligraphy scrapbooking
marker.
I guess I should be glad she actually had a writing
utensil but she kind of ruined her little victory by handing me the quiz and
asking “Wait—do I need to put my name on it?”
How this girl got IN college is a mystery for the ages.
If this were the middle of the year, I would need all my
self-restraint not to punch this girl in the face. But it’s Fall, so I laugh.
I thought all teachers felt the same way but that theory
was tested yesterday when I found out that I, apparently, have mutant strength.
Here’s what happened: After my first class, as I was
tidying up so the DEPARTMENT CHAIR could teach in that room, I reached over to
raise the projector screen and I ripped it right off the wall.
And by ripped off the wall, I don't mean the screen
ripped. I mean that the brackets holding the screen in the wall came off,
a huge chunk of plaster came down, and the whole thing essentially fell on the
ground.
There is now no screen in the room and there is an
ENORMOUS hole in the wall.
I, of course, started cracking up. “Wow,” I said. “I’m
like a SUPER HERO. Who knew?”
“Wow,” the department chair said. “I needed that screen for my class.”
Which pretty much put the kibosh on taking a picture of
it for my blog because she wasn’t laughing AT ALL.
And I can’t even report how her class went because I was
like “Oh, that’s unfortunate…so sorry.”
Then ran for it.
Not because I was still laughing (though I was) but
because I had another class and it’s fall and I’m a dedicated teacher who
refuses to let my students down by being even the slightest bit late.
I’m not going to lie, the fear that she might suggest we
switch classrooms for the hour so she could have a room with a projector screen
might have played in a tiny bit.
In the middle of the year, I’d be freaking out, thinking “Hope
this doesn’t affect my class load next semester…but not now…so Happy Fall, y’all!
For other Theme Thursday posts, click the link below
For other Theme Thursday posts, click the link below
