Teaching stories: September 19

Me, during and after a lockdown drill during lunch with 180 seventh and eighth graders who, when the drill was announced, began to screech and run around the gym in the most stunning display of “exactly what not to do during a drill” behavior. Grateful for the three other women who were also in the gym who worked to get the kids to re-embrace their wits. After the Picture Day Debacle Of 2018, this lockdown drill had the potential to take this teacher down. Don’t worry, I rebounded when a substitute teacher told me this joke: why did God invent short people? Because they make good pets. Uh huh. I may never recover (until I do, by tomorrow, to do this crazy thing called teaching.)