Spring is Springing?

Every year at this time, students come out of their shells---not like snails peeking out, but like nuts cracking open.

Could be the weather.

Though there is still a foot or so of snow on the ground here in 'sconsin, the air has changed. In "Walden" Thoreau describes the coming of spring as a "memorable crisis." Anybody who works in a school knows what he means. Spring break, prom, and graduation are monopolizing everyone's minds---while the looming AP tests, the ACT and final exams are not yet in any acknowledged realm of existence.

Could also be that students have become accustomed to me and know my limits, so they feel comfortable extending them a bit.

One of my rules at the beginning of the year is not to write on the white board with my markers without asking first. Last week I hid the markers because one day the front board became a grafitti wall. Colorful and school appropriate though it was, with alligators and penguins and messages to other classmates, it used up a lot of marker juice and took awhile to clean. And, even worse, now that students have discovered that I'm not a Disney fan---silly, obnoxious Disney characters, princesses and such rot, regularly surface on my board like shiny, smiling, smarmy worms after a summer rain.

Last week I handed back papers, and Chris said to me, "Mrs. Kies, what's this?" I went to his desk, thinking he was disgruntled over a quiz score or something. "See?" He pointed at the top of his paper. "Yeah? It's a smiley face. You too old for those, or something?" "But, Mrs. Kies. That's mean." I asked, "What are you talking about, Chris?" "What are you doing giving me a one-eyed smiley face? See?" He pointed again. The class laughed and I turned red when I finally got what he was implying. "Real funny, Chris," I said.

The ensuing conversation revealed that he had lost his eye at age nine when the hooked end of a bungee cord struck him smack in the face. Of course, he told the rest of his classmates at lunch that I had given him a one-eyed smiley face, and I was plagued with jabs for the two afternoon classes.

One student in my AP class has hardly said a word all year. Not even to complain about quizzes or reading assignments. Lately, however, he pipes up regularly saying things like all the authors and characters in our women's unit were "crazy ladies" and that One Hundred Years of Solitude consists mainly of beastiality and incest. Though he's got a point, I find his sudden urge to spout these comments after months of quiet compliance somewhat weird.

Gotta be the cracking of the pond from the longer days and increased sunlight that Thoreau described. Or, hormones maybe? Ah, the topic of my next blog.