- The kiddies are doing a worksheet on momentum-impulse theory stuff. There's a problem on the worksheet about a bug that hits a bus windshield. You know.. the force on the bug is the same as the force on the bus, the impulse is the same as well, etc, etc, etc.. one of my groups of boys just can't seem to concentrate on the worksheet. They keep talking about cars.. fixing them, mod-ing them, wrecking them, and no matter how many times I tell them to get back to work their minds always seem to come back to cars.
After the bajillionth time trying to get them on task, one of the boys insightfully asks, "Ms. Chew, all we can think about are cars. You should put cars on this worksheet."
I reply, "But there is a car. There's a bus."
"Yeah, but who wants to drive a bus?"
"YOU will if you don't get your act together and graduate high school!!" - Then during the next period, some of the girls on student council are talking about the big winter ball in January. It's quite pricey, but they assure me that it's because it's really nice, at a nice place, and there's food. They want to know if I'm going to go. I tell them I'll go only because I'm a teacher and I don't have to pay.
Then my favorite slacker (the soccer player who skipped out on his club tourney in LA) then says, "I'll go with Ms. Chew so I won't have to pay either!"
To which I respond, "You don't do anything for me why am I gonna go do anything for you?!?"
But then sometimes reality checks are not so pleasant. Like last week's brutal reminder that yes, I am working in an inner-city and my kids are real-life city kids. Last week was especially crazy and usually our incidents are much more spread out. Things were already tough when we found out a few weeks ago that another one of our graduates was killed in some gang-related violence. I teach his girlfriend too. Tristan and her are in the same circle of friends, so it's been especially tough on them.
Then the crazy of last week.
On Monday we had one of our sophomore girls threatening to jump off of the 3rd floor balcony. Luckily there were people around to diffuse the situation and get her help so she didn't hurt herself. I don't know her, but I know it got a lot of people shook up for the beginning of the week.
On Tuesday one of my boys (well, not technically my boy b/c I don't teach him, but he always tries to sneak into my 7th period) was stabbed in the neighborhood after school because of his colors. Or more specifically, from what we hear it was his girlfriends' colors that caught attention and then he was asked to lift up his shirt and show his belt color. One of my kids told me that the incident was very similar to how Tristan's boyfriend died, so that circle of friends was again very shaken up.
On Thursday another one of my boys, from the same group of friends, was held up at gunpoint for his iPod in Daly City. I don't know too many details about that story, but it was the cherry on top of a bitter, gritty week of city life for my kids.
Sometimes it's good to be reminded of why I do what I do. My kids shouldn't have to go through these hard times day after day. They're good kids, they are. They don't always make the best choices but if you just spend a few days and get to know them, you'll find that they're not all hardasses and they really are just kids at heart. It's this damn city that beats the kid out of them. I hope and pray that I'm making a difference in their lives, if through nothing else but just loving on them day in and day out. I'm not gonna lie, I'm very much looking forward to the break and time off of school, but maybe 2+ weeks off of school is dangerous for them. I pray that they'll be safe and come back to me in 2008.
