"Mees, Mees!"

I had a good week in the schools again. Next week will be busier with teachers taking most of the afternoons off to prepare for the Thanksgiving meals.

After that event with the science students, I spent two days at the Middle School subbing for the math teacher. At first that sounded challenging but once in the classroom with a quick review of the basic pre-algebra laws posted on the wall, I felt better about the topic.

The teacher was still there, writing out quick lesson plans for the day. He had to take the day off to finish his on-line college course on the Arizona Constitution, a class required for all teachers in this state. He gave me a run-down of each class' personalities.

The “Class full of Special Ed” students (his term for a wild bunch) turned out to be one of the best, but second hour was pretty darn good as well; I got to learn many of the names and was able to chat with Michaela’s sister Sam. Memories of the Middle School came back to me, but I’m still glad I was able to get out of that school in time.

The class with the English-Language Learners was especially heart-tugging. Eight Mexican boys sat together in one part of the class and worked as a group over their algebra. One young man kept coming up to me “Mees, is deez correct?”

I’d look at the problem and reply “Yes, it is, great job!” and the little guy would walk back to his desk beaming with pride. Although the boys got animated and reverted to their native Spanish, they all were well behaved and worked diligently on their math.

Some of the boys gave me high fives the second day I had them. And the girls were well behaved, too.

The students did their work. What bothered me was that I didn’t have any new material to keep their attention. Some of the advanced-placement students breezed through the exercises and spent the last 15 minutes hanging out with their friends in class.

The students wanted the lights out and the windows wide open. That gave them warmth of the afternoon sun, with a direct view of the open copper mine across the street and a corner gas station that was still selling gasoline for $4.09 when it sold for $2.19 everywhere else. (The next day the station dropped the price to $2.89)

One young man, sitting next to the teacher’s desk, looked at me and asked “Do you drink?” I wasn’t sure what to say. If I said no I’d be lying. If I said yes I could be tempting him to be just like me.

“Why are you asking?” was my final response.
“Because I drink…”
“Well, you know it’s not legal at your age."
“I know…”
“All I can say is be smart about your drinking. Don’t do it in school, don’t do it in the open, and don’t get caught. Alcohol can make people do some really stupid things.”
“Don’t tell anyone I drink” he said.
“I won’t, but just be careful no one else ever sees you. And you know if I see you drinking on school grounds I'd have to turn in your name to officials. Just play by the rules!”
He didn’t act or smell inebriated, but he did hold his jacket over his mouth from time to time.

The next day he was pretty cool toward me, doing his work and acting like all was fine in the world. We chatted about Bisbee and the town. I told him I really liked it here.
“Yeah, but it’s pretty poor.”
“It may be poor but it’s more of a community than Sierra Vista!”
And to that many of the students nodded in agreement.

“Are you a native?” he asked.
“Native? As in Mexican? Indian?’ Or do you mean if I lived in Bisbee all my life?”
“Native, you know, Mexican!"
“Do I look Mexican? I replied, pointing to my dark blonde hair.
“No, I’m part German.”
“My grandfather was German!” another girl from across the class yelled. She, too, was a towhead.

Later I gave him and his friends a small lesson in life.”Boys, you guys are pretty smart young men. I want to see you all make good grades and go to college, You are going to need a college degree to make it in this world. And if you are given a chance to go to school on a scholarship and then turn it down, you have only yourselves to blame. You can’t blame others, or blame discrimination for your own mistakes.”

They all looked at me and smiled. “Yes, Mees.”
I hope to have them again for more life lessons.

One of the boys later did tell me he was kicked out of a store "because I was Mexican."

All the middle school students had one problem that really irked me, and which I nipped in the bud the second day: they went through pencils like chocolate bars. I gave out almost an entire 24-pack of new pencils that first day. What I should have done was write up those who didn’t have pencils with them with “Unprepared for class” and have them serve "lunch detention" the next day. During recess I was picking up full and broken pencils from all over the school yard, sharpened them and placed them back on Mr F’s desk. The first student who got a stubby pencil just looked at me and scowled.

“You either take that pencil or you get an Incomplete for the class…”
The student took the stubby pencil.
By lunch time on the second day few students were asking for pencils.

And of course we had our share of drama and excitement. “Look, a squirrel!” screamed one girl as she pointed out the window. Within a nanosecond half the class rushed to the window to see the squirrel. If there was a squirrel it had already jumped off the young oak tree and scurried across the parking lot.

“What’s so exciting about a squirrel?” I asked her, dumbfounded.
“You don’t see too many squirrels here in Bisbee!”

Which actually isn’t quite true: where there are tall deciduous trees and oak trees, there will be squirrels. Bisbee has many tall cottonwoods and oaks along its washes and drainages. We have a bunch of them here in the Huachuca foothills as well. The squirrels live where water is available. When the creek in town is running, there will be squirrels.

One young girl, Brittany, brought out her seashell collection to class and neatly lined them up on her desk. She and her friend next to her were into the outdoors and were working on their science project for the next hour. Later during their PE class she found a Walking Stick sauntering up a sagebrush. Oh, how I wish I had had my camera handy to photograph that one! All three of us stood by watching it move slowly up the branch.

“Stick Dude” she named the guy.

I really liked that group of 7th and 8th graders. When I showed up for the third day today many of the students by then recognized me. “Are you going to be our sub today?”

“No, Mr F is back in class today, I’m here for Ms C!”

“Ah, bummer. You’re awesome!”

Awesome, huh? I sure didn’t feel that way with the 6th graders a few months ago. Looking back now, there were things I said and did that I know now were not quite appropriate for 6th grade. My sarcasm gets misread in the lower grades and I’m more cautious talking with the younger people. I feel much more comfortable with the middle and high school students.

Like this afternoon: I had first graders for the afternoon. The procedures of lining them up, reminding them NOT TO RUN ON THE ASPHALT went on deaf ears. John ran to his next class, tripped, and bruised his thigh. In shock, he lay on the ground crying. He had me scared. I lifted him up, took him to the principal/nurse office and by then the second iteration of first graders were waiting for me by the classroom door.

That first class of first graders were as bad as that class of six graders from a few months ago. My god, I thought, they act like mini-6th graders! They ran around the room like splitting amoebas. They had been sitting down so quietly the first 15 minutes and then all hell broke loose. If it was a magic word I had said I’d sure like to know what that word was!
.
We watched the 1987 cartoon “Sparky’s Magic Piano” for the music class. I got to see that movie’s first half three times. By now I could recite the dialogue! I was glad to finish the day; I was feeling flu-like symptoms coming on again with a constant chill, watery eyes and sneezes and coughs all day long. I never did take off my jacket.