Anderson

"Literal language," I explained, "is when you say exactly what you mean. For instance, if you want to tell me that Meg has blue eyes, you would say 'Meg has blue eyes.' Figurative language is the opposite. When you use figurative language people have to figure out what you mean. Get it? So if you want to say the same thing with fig--"

Before I had a chance to complete that thought I heard in the purest falsetto, from the back of the room, "She's got eyes of the bluest skies." Anderson's Guns N' Roses tribute momentarily silenced the class.

And then I had to admit... it really wasn't a bad example.

Chelle

It tooks months of cajoling, but my students finally got me to tell them that I voted for Barack Obama. Seriously, I'm a teacher. Voting Democrat is in my contract.

I was pretty reticent to share because in the diverse group of students I teach, there were avid supporters of both candidates. But I gave in because, well, I am a sucker.

Anyway, I was feeling pretty crappy about it, but as Chelle left my classroom, she looked at me and said, "Hey thanks."

I asked what for, and she said, "For helping to make history."

Brayan

Brayan has the face of a Cabbage Patch doll... and the stature of one. And a whole bunch of fluffy hair. He's a really sweet kid though. Let me tell you what I mean.

Brayan raised his hand in class yesterday and let me know in no uncertain terms that there was a cockroach on my bookshelf. "Can I kill it?" he asked, and I could hear the hope and anticipation in his voice.

Never one to disappoint a child, I knocked it off the shelf so he could smash it with his shoe. As he wiped its remains up with a tissue and deposited them in the trash can, he smiled at me (this doubled the width of his face.) "I'm a good boy."

You really can't make this stuff up.

LaKeisha

A profile. LaKeisha has these big fawn eyes, and an easy smile full of perfect little teeth. She is courteous and cooperative, and I have never in my life caught her talking. This is probably because every time I hear a whisper or a disruptive shuffle from her side of the room, my eyes dart over to find her batting her eyelids, looking as innocent as a baby dove. Nothing says, "You can't prove I'm guilty" like LaKeisha's smile.

I am the teacher, but sometimes I'm pretty sure it's LaKeisha who is running my classroom.

RaShawn

I’m still figuring out this whole regular-blog-schedule thing. For now it looks like I will be posting every weekday (read: Sunday through Thursday nights.) The tricky bit here is that I’ll have to remember something about Friday’s school day on Monday. And fortunately, nothing remarkable really happened on Friday. So in light of that, I will take this moment to share what might be my favorite student moment of all time.

RaShawn had to go to the bathroom, and he asked me to sign his hall pass. He had filled it out; all I needed to do was initial. When he brought it to me, I grabbed the nearest writing implement–in this case, an Expo dry-erase marker–and signed the pass. RaShawn took a moment, silently looking from me to the marker to my signature, and back to me again. “That’s pretty ghetto, Ms. E,” he remarked. “You sure you ain’t got some black in you?”

Oops. Looks like Student of the Day isn’t always going to be PC. But hey, I didn’t say it.

Shaquille

Classroom-management-problem-solvers, take note! We have, at my school, what is called a no-jone zone in which students are prohibited from insulting one another. But for some reason, telling a fourteen-year-old to "just be nice" yeilds... about as much fruit as you would expect. My solution to the mean kids in my 5/6 period class is The Nice Paper. In essence, it is this: when a student insults someone else, the insulter has to write five complete sentences about how he or she admires the insultee.

My favorite so far has been from Shaquille. He wrote, "Chandra has great self-of-steam."

You may be wondering what we are teaching these children.

Apparently... not too much.

Fernando

"How long is a paragraph?" I ask my students.

They chorus, "At least five sentences."

I don't like these strict, unrealistic rules of writing (who, in the real world, has ever written a five-paragraph essay?) but you have to set some kind of standard. Fernando knows the rules all too well. This is his paragraph responding to the question, "What animal represents you?"

I'm like a lion. Because I have pride and stuff. And also cause i'm strong and stuff . Im also protectant and I cant thint of anything else. Cool I quess I don't know yet.

Count 'em. Five sentences.