Flashbacks

I was looking at some photos of my class the last year I taught. It brought it all back to me so very vividly I had to recount some of my "fave" personalities in the class. I am here to tell you it's impossible not to have a few faves in the classroom, though I think I usually could find something endearing about everyone.

One of my favorite students was a very memorable third grader who wanted to be a teacher so badly that he had a play classroom set up at home. His parents bought him old textbooks and workbooks. He actually had an overhead projector, his own stapler, and a copy machine. He used to ask questions about how I did things, and was intrigued if I returned from the copy room with a stack of collated or stapled copies. Never had I had a kid who seemed especially attuned to my every move.

Another memorable kid was the class wiseacre. Totally struggled with certain subjects in school, totally pulled kids off task plenty of times, but was super duper endearing and had glimmering moments of being wise and mature beyond his years. Loved him.

One very memorable girl that I won't forget was a Piece. Of. Work. I LOVED her. She told me one time "She saw dead people." She struggled in school and missed school all the time. She was basically raising her younger baby sister. One time she stood up in front of the class and shared about her step aunt being R-A-P-E-D (she spelled it for the class). Could the girl spell any other words? Not so. But she could spell rape.

Yep. There are definitely days when I miss teaching.