For an hour a couple days ago I had the power to mold and shape the minds full of mush of our six young scholars. BaseG had to visit the Bureau of Motor Vehicles to resolve an issue with a flotation device he purchased. That means I get to move to that really big and swell looking table with the gold trim on the sides that occupies the front of the room.
Before I moved to the front of the room I realized that I needed a game plan so I could keep the scholars on task. It needed to be a good game plan because if I couldn't maintain their attention their brains will go off in a dozen different directions which frequently results in bad things happening in the classroom. BaseG left work sheets on the scholars desks so I thought I'd use those in addition to our morning writing prompt. By the way my job is to come up with the daily morning writing prompt. Sometimes I'll get ideas from the internet and sometimes I just make it up. Today's writing prompt was made up. It if you could go anywhere in our country where would you go.
With a game plan in mind I head to the front of the room and realize that I have encountered my first obstacle. There in front of me is the really big and swell looking table with the gold trim on the side and there are a few things on it that I don't need. I figure it's a small obstacle as I'll just move the items to another location. Twenty minutes later the table is clear and I'm ready for the day.
The scholars are arriving and the day is about to begin. After they finish their breakfast and say the Pledge of Alligience and our school motto it's time to go to work. I decide to change the order that we do things and tell them we are starting with the morning writing prompt. That doesn't draw any response until I show them my timer and tell them they only have fifteen minutes to complete the writing assignment. The first eruption came from CorP. Fifteen minutes, we can't get this done in fifteen minutes. The next eruption came from Floss who basically repeated what CorP said. My response was brief. You have fifteen minutes to finish the assignment. I've already started the timer and you've lost thirty seconds whinning about it. I suggest you get started. Dead silence. They are writing. A couple minutes go by and still dead silence as they continue to right. I make eye contact with PhD? Sparty who is occupying my chair in the back of the room. She sees me and smiles and gives me the thumbs up sign. The dead silence continues. No one is talking. There is no bickering. No one is up wondering around the room. They are just writing. Floss and Straw are finished. Yo and The Collector finished shortly thereafter. CorP was the last one to finish. When he handed me his paper I stopped the timer. I looked at him and said there are still one minute and forty two seconds remaining and you said fifteen minutes was not enough time. I smiled at him and we exchanged high fives and he headed back to his desk.
I was on a roll as the two remaining worksheets were completed in near silence. Shortly after the morning work was completed BaseG arrived and I headed back to my makeshift desk at the back of the room. As I sat there thinking about my time up front I realized how different the view was from the back of the room. When the scholars are working on academics all I can see is the back of their heads. If one of them is struggling with the assignment I don't realize it until their frustration level is high and eruptions are about to begin. When you are in the front of the room you can look them in the eye. During the writing assignment I saw that Floss was stuck and didn't know what to right. When they were completing the language arts assignment I could tell Yo didn't know what to do and I got his attention and reviewed the instructions. The math assignment was on area and perimeter so anticipating that Floss may erupt, pound both fists on his desk and then flip it over and say see this is why I hate math I wrote the formula for area and perimeter on the white board.
Back to the morning writing prompt. If you could go any place in our country where would you go. In hindsight I should have avoided that type of writing assignment. Why? If Mary was standing next to me she would have said that is a poor writing prompt. She'd go on to say to me how many of your scholars have ever been on a vacation that took them out of Indianapolis. Have any of them been on an airplane? Have they ever driven to NYC or Chicago with their parental unit? Have they even ventured as far as the canal or the cultural trail? She's right, they probably haven't and I won't make that mistake again.
I enjoyed my view from the front of the room. I had fun up there and I'm sitting here smiling as I think about it. Maybe sometime back in 1974 or 1975 instead a declaring a business major I should have chosen education.
I'm out of here. Jake LaMatta arrives in the morning and I need to complete my decision making list.
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