Sh*t My Students Say

Me: Since this picture shows the first lady supporting healthy lunches in school it makes me realize how important this detail is.

D: first LADY? Why they always gotta say that… She not the first.

S: I know huh? Brenda Washington was the FIRST lady!!!

G: Wait a minute, what about the natives and Pocahontas?

(Necessary background knowledge: We practice workshop model throughout our curriculum. Essentially, it has 3 parts. Crafting, Composing and Reflection. During crafting, teachers or students model their thinking to the class, while the rest of the students observe and take notes on the model’s process.)

Y: Reading a book about Leonardo Da Vinci

Me: So, what did you find out Leonardo Da Vinci wrote in his notebooks?

Y: His observations. He took crafting notes all day long.

Me: Today we’re going to change up our crafting lessons. I’ve noticed you’re having some trouble taking notes while observing me model my thinking. We’re going to try a new strategy called, “Stop and Jot.”

DC: STOP! DROP! AND ROLLLLLLLL (this is shouted while she is sitting by herself on the carpet, throwing her hands up and looking around the room for encouragement)

DB: NO!!! Jot means we write stuff in our notebooks! Dayummm! Since when have we ever caught fire during workshop??

My partner teacher, Fabvs, and I were planning a presentation for our fellow teachers. We were watching videos of ourselves teaching when her 5 year old brother walked in. He looked at the video and asked, “Who is that?” I said, “You don’t recognize me?”…. He thought about it and said, “In the video, there aren’t any red bumps on your face!”

H: When we write dialogue

Me: good! What else?

J: For titles of songs

G: Ms.Campa uses them when she’s being sarcastic! (makes quotation hand gestures)

While teaching a lesson, D blurts out, “I’m going through puberty!”… I turned to give him a teacher look and he put his hands in the air, “I don’t know what it means, my brother says it!”

J gave him a look of disgust and said, “You naaaaasty!”

I just CANNOT wait for the sex/puberty talk in 4 months!