Last week, I had a 2-day stint with a first grade class because their teacher had the flu. Of course, I find this out AFTER I'd been at the teachers desk for an hour touching stuff, but hey, I've had 43 decent years.
Anyway, since Valentine's day--known to us adults as Penis Christmas or the Ultimate Side-Chick Check--fell on Sunday this year, the students were going to exchange Valentines on Friday. On Thursday, one of the students --unbeknownst to me--was going around passing out Smarties. Somehow--also unbeknownst to me--"Cody" and a little girl I'll call Imani swapped a roll of his Smarties for her shiny red plastic pencil sharpener. Well, the next day, we had a reading and a spelling test. The only pencil sharpener in the classroom was broken, so Cody was generous enough to let the students use "his" pencil sharpener before the tests. Imani stood up and said, "Can I have my pencil sharpener back please?"
Cody responded, "But you gave it to ME."
I gently reminded Imani that you don't give someone something and then take it back.*
This was the day that Imani had to learn one of life's hard lessons: Don't swap food items for non-food items, except in the case of some sort of apocalyptic food shortage when exceptions can and should be made. She scarfed down her roll of Smarties on Thursday and had to come back to school on Friday--when the Smarties were probably sewage--and watch Cody traipsing around with her shiny red sharpener. I know her six-year-old soul was crushed. But Miss ****** really did not have time to play Solomon; there were tests to administer. I put the pencil sharpener on the desk with a post-it note attached explaining the situation so the teacher could make the final decision. Whenever a student needed their pencil sharpened, I let Cody know I was letting a student use it, like it was still his. HOWEVER, it was on the desk and not in Cody's hand, so Imani had nothing to cry about. (I guess I did Solomon the situation for the moment after all.) And what did we learn, chirrens?
*I stopped short of calling it "Indian giving" because that's offensive to our Native American brothers and sisters. The teachers don't even tell students to sit on the floor "Indian style" anymore. Now it's called "criss cross applesauce"...no offense to apples. (I was being facetious there. Trust me, I'm Black. I really do understand these things.)
Anyway, since Valentine's day--known to us adults as Penis Christmas or the Ultimate Side-Chick Check--fell on Sunday this year, the students were going to exchange Valentines on Friday. On Thursday, one of the students --unbeknownst to me--was going around passing out Smarties. Somehow--also unbeknownst to me--"Cody" and a little girl I'll call Imani swapped a roll of his Smarties for her shiny red plastic pencil sharpener. Well, the next day, we had a reading and a spelling test. The only pencil sharpener in the classroom was broken, so Cody was generous enough to let the students use "his" pencil sharpener before the tests. Imani stood up and said, "Can I have my pencil sharpener back please?"
Cody responded, "But you gave it to ME."
I gently reminded Imani that you don't give someone something and then take it back.*
This was the day that Imani had to learn one of life's hard lessons: Don't swap food items for non-food items, except in the case of some sort of apocalyptic food shortage when exceptions can and should be made. She scarfed down her roll of Smarties on Thursday and had to come back to school on Friday--when the Smarties were probably sewage--and watch Cody traipsing around with her shiny red sharpener. I know her six-year-old soul was crushed. But Miss ****** really did not have time to play Solomon; there were tests to administer. I put the pencil sharpener on the desk with a post-it note attached explaining the situation so the teacher could make the final decision. Whenever a student needed their pencil sharpened, I let Cody know I was letting a student use it, like it was still his. HOWEVER, it was on the desk and not in Cody's hand, so Imani had nothing to cry about. (I guess I did Solomon the situation for the moment after all.) And what did we learn, chirrens?
THIS
IS NOT EQUAL TO THIS.
*I stopped short of calling it "Indian giving" because that's offensive to our Native American brothers and sisters. The teachers don't even tell students to sit on the floor "Indian style" anymore. Now it's called "criss cross applesauce"...no offense to apples. (I was being facetious there. Trust me, I'm Black. I really do understand these things.)
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