Chin up

The first week of school was fairly uneventful, with the exception of two things that happened Wednesday afternoon.

Taking my 4th graders on a nature walk around the school grounds seemed like a harmless idea, a chance to point out the flora and fauna of the landscape and serve as an intriguing introduction to the Plants science unit. I invited them to sit on the benches near the baby palm trees and instructed them to sketch the tree in their observation notebook. "Miss," a student whined, "It's hot." Every student at the school calls their teacher "Miss" ("mees") or "Mister" ("meestir"), not sure why, except that it's cultural. I considered the student's comment and glanced at the sun beating down from above. There was an area of shade underneath the palm tree the students were sketching, so we relocated to the shade.



No sooner had the students gotten settled, that I began to feel that something was crawling up my leg. I walked around a little bit, keeping an eye on my students, while wacking my leg occasionally. A few ants, no big deal. Then every few seconds I felt tiny bites around my ankles. The principal walked by and I gave him an "everything's okay" smile. He walked past and I looked down at the bottom of my nice white pants, a little muddy and now crawling with ants...fire ants. Nice and easy, I started to brush the fire ants off my legs, trying not to spread any panic among my students. Too late. "Hormigas coloradas!" One of my boys jumped to his feet and began stomping the damp grass below him. Several students followed his lead, stood up quickly, and walked back to the benches where I was motioning for them to go. Thankfully no one was bitten, and they did finish their drawing of the palm tree from a safe distance away. Lesson #1 learned: Don't sit in the fire ants.










Lesson #2: Students will do what you least expect. (*Names were changed to protect the naive.)


The last thirty minutes of class on Wednesday, the students are cleaning up the room and packing up their bags like I've instructed. I am transitioning the students who are all packed up and whose areas are clean over to the reading circle. A few students are still sealing up their bookbags and organizing their desks. *Jeremy is getting his backpack out of his cubby, when he stands stock still, directs all of his attention toward me and states, "Miss, *Angelina is stuck."
Um...I don't know what to think. The worst scenarios flash through my mind, and I want to immediate answers: What? How? Why? Where?

I cross the room in three strides and am by Angelina's side or rather, backside.
I look down and see her bent over on her knees, her hands clutching the back legs of her desk chair, and her short brown braids threaded through the desk chair opening. She has gotten her head stuck inside the hole of her desk chair!!
Okay, revised lesson objectives: 1) Keep the other kids calm and in their seat. 2) Get Angelina's head out of the chair hole. 3) Be able to laugh about this later. Please Lord..

Well, number 1 got ruled out when all the students in the class started to gather around, like true Hondurans. While number 2 was still possible, I sent a student upstairs to get the vice principal just in case we weren't able to free Angelina from the chair. Thankfully, Angelina is the most calm and optomistic child I have ever met. She talked cheerfully to me the whole time she was stuck, and as I asked her to move her head this way or that. Finally, we solved the rubix cube of head positions and POP her head was free! She stood to her feet, and the whole class cheered. (Talk about ways to build classroom community.)

A minute later the principal arrived and offered a witty remark to the students about how rules are there because we ourselves have done these stupid things before and want students to avoid them. Everybody had a good laugh and objective number 3 was met.


All in all, God is good and He gave me the stamina to finish out the week and prevented any further predicaments from arising under my watch. On Friday morning, Jeremy* walks over to my desk and hands me an apple. I am flabbergasted by the gift. "Thank you," I manage to say with a sincere smile. For now, I feel like a teacher.