Please note that this particular child doesn’t dress like a lawyer from the 70’s- but his facial expressions are dead on. In short- this child looks miserable. Every morning my Mini- Walter comes grumbling into school. Every morning I say good morning to him and he grumps off to his desk. Every afternoon I ask him how his recess was and he mumbles something about “there’s not any fun things to do around here”. At the end of every school day I see him off with a smile and he shows me something I know he feels is a smile but looks more like a grimace. And every evening I drive home wondering what he’s thinking, if he’s getting what he needs when he’s at school.
Today the children filled out an “About Me” page. We had a new student, Juan, join the class and I thought it would be a fun activity for them to do- fill out the sheet on likes/dislikes, what they wanted to be when they grew up and favorite colors. The students worked harder and were more thoughtful in answering their questions than I had anticipated. My mini-Walter handed me his at the end of the day and I put it on my desk so I could help do up winter coats.
After the hallways cleared and the silence settled in, I grabbed the completed sheets to put up on the bulletin board. I giggled as I read how the children disliked ’spinatche’ and wanted to be ‘waitrs’ and ‘azztrotnots’ when they grew up. But my smile turned into a few hot tears as I stapled my Mini Walters sheet to the wall. He had listed his dislikes as ‘murnings’ and ‘brockolee’, but under his likes he only had one- my name.
I drove home tonight proud of myself and feeling far more confident in my teaching abilities than I ever have.
It’s funny what 8 letters written by a 7 year old can do to a girl.
