Afternoons

Afternoons were always rough, and usually, I over-planned them, taking the kids endlessly from one failed activity to another. So in February I tried something different and I spent all of my planning time on one really engaging activity, making Martin Luther King, Jr. books. The book was about 10 pages long, and I copied enough for all the kids. I even individually cut them and stapled them to make booklets. The activity seemed beautiful because of its simplicity. At 2:00, with approximately an hour until dismissal, I would sit the kids down and read the book aloud. Then, because the book was a reading level just under their grade level, I could have them take turns reading it aloud. Then, the best part, the books were in black and white, and after reading, they could color it! With over 10 pages, the coloring would take the whole afternoon, and it would run me right through until dismissal, easy.

So as the afternoon showed its first signs of deterioration, I brought out the book activity just a little earlier than planned, more like 1:45 instead of 2. No big deal because it was such a long activity anyway. I sat down all the kids, started to read the book, and they seemed happy to follow along with their own books. I didn’t have any class collections of books, so it was a big deal. Now, as I was reading, I noticed they were getting fidgety on the carpet, and I decided the story was a little long anyways so I stopped it short, “Let’s leave the ending for a surprise, now, you get to read the story; let’s all turn back to page 1…” Now some kids were getting really fidgety; they didn’t want to read anything, especially aloud, and Adam and Ryden started rolling up their books to use as bats, so I shifted gears again. I was great at shifting gears, just not driving, “Well, I think we have read enough on the carpet, guess what!? Now we get to go back to our seats and color them!” It was now 2:05, and I was praying that the coloring would last, but I forgot that my most difficult kids sprint through everything, especially coloring, and after ten minutes, Adam yelled, “I’m done, Mr. Slaughter!” Ryden chimed in, “Me too!” That meant there was a full forty minutes until dismissal. There were no worksheets to complete, no games set up, and no stations planned out. I told them they could spend the time reading their books or writing in their journals; no surprise that running around the classroom was much more fun than any of that. It was too late to escape it; I could only hold my hat for the tornado, but instead of thinking, “those darn kids,” I thought, “I won’t make that mistake again. They’ll never have a spare moment again.”

Even now, afternoons were still rough, but something had changed. Suddenly it didn’t matter if it was the kids’ fault or the parents’ fault, Price’s fault, or the principal’s fault; I was the damn teacher. I was the only one who could do anything about it. So after one particularly bad Monday afternoon, on Tuesday I kept the whole class in for recess, by myself; 25 versus 1, the odds weren’t good. Taking away recess was one of the classic teacher punishments that I could never do right. At first, I tried walking the whole class to recess and then escorting the trouble makers back to my room. As I dismissed all the good kids, the bad kids of the day just eyed the door. One would break for it, and as I would go for his arm, then the rest would break free - a classic jail break. Other times, I put the bad kids in the back of the line (always a bad idea), then after letting the good ones out to recess, I moved myself in front of the door to block anyone trying to make a break for it until I felt like they had served their time. But this was my break time too, and I started worrying more about the copies that I needed to make rather than the punishment I needed to dole out. There were other times when I was really upset with a certain student, and knowing he or she was incapable of walking with me back to class, I would physically drag him or her back; I just kept my head down, avoiding the stares from my fellow teachers and administrators. When Grandma James joined my class, my problem was solved: she could take the good kids to recess, and I could just stay in the room with the bad kids while getting my work done. But then I discovered that a group of bad kids could be tear apart a room really quickly. Then I finally conceded to staying back with just one kid, but even then there were times I had to sit at the door as the kid would repeatedly ram his shoulder up against me to break through. Taking recess was taking too much effort, and when it seemed like it wasn’t working I avoided it at all costs.

However Tuesday was a new day; I would hold the whole class in for recess. It could be the end of me. I just kept them busy with work, allowing each lesson to run a little long, and I didn’t mention a word about recess. Every few moments, I nervously glanced at the clock waiting for one of my smarter students to yell out, “Hey, aren’t we supposed to be outside?!” But nothing happened, and when I finally walked them down to the playground with only three minutes left of recess, I very calmly announced, “You only have three minutes left of recess because you were so horrible yesterday afternoon.” They seemed confused; I had never done this, and they must have thought I was lying. But the whole class was upset when I picked them up after lunch. They seemed ready to get their revenge by making my life hell for the afternoon, but then in my snootiest teacher voice I told them, “Well, you all lost your recess because Monday afternoon was so bad. Let’s see if you all need to lose another recess.” And they didn’t, at least not for that afternoon.