Jennifer<\/p>\n
So, you wanted tales from college. This is a tale from middle school.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
First of all, you have to know that I am apparently known for my \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Um\u00e2\u20ac\u009ds. Students tally them. Two years ago I let on that I knew, and that didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t improve the situation, so I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve gone back to pretending that I have no idea why a pair of kids might be listening intently while simultaneously, apparently totally distracted by a tally sheet between them with, um, 40 \u00e2\u20ac\u201c 80 tally marks on it.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Earlier this week I noticed the students were oddly distracted in a different way. Something to do with their hands. Watching each other, not me. Suddenly I remembered \u00e2\u20ac\u0153zap\u00e2\u20ac\u009d \u00e2\u20ac\u201c a student writes a time on the back of someone else\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s hand, and a name on the inside. If the zapped student looks at the name before the time indicated, he\/she has to \u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know what. I thought maybe kiss the person, or ask them out, or something. Are you-all familiar with this game?\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Sure enough, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s what they were playing. I couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t really find out what the rules are, because they know they shouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t be doing it. (Although they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll claim it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fine to play, they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll lie about how it works.) Some students will challenge your authority to disallow it at school. But I did a pretty good job, I thought, both telling other teachers to be on the lookout for it, and telling the students they had to stop and there had to be no consequences to the zapped students for quitting NOW.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
One colleague decided to play it cool. She found out from older students (who play less innocent games) that if you look at the name before the indicated time, you have to ask the person out and kiss them. (Duh.) Then, in the next class, she got various students to show her their hands without letting on she knew about the game. I think she may have inflicted permanent psychological damage, because apparently she started laughing so hard she couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t teach when she saw the principal\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s name and her own name \u00e2\u20ac\u201c but those poor kids couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t check why she was laughing because their times weren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t up. \u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Jennifer So, you wanted tales from college. This is a tale from middle school.\u00c2\u00a0 First of all, you have to know that I am apparently known for my \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Um\u00e2\u20ac\u009ds. Students tally them. Two years ago I let on that I … Continue reading