[thunk]
[thunk]
Somewhere, someone's head is beating against a wall.
Today's drama:
The Senior Athlete had to student-teach a class as a project for one of his own classes. So he chose a class he was sure would be great. The Cheerleader's Freshman gym class.
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She was stunned to see him there, suddenly "in charge" of her (oh, and the rest of the class, too). He thought it would be fun, AND he had a built-in excuse to spend 50 minutes of his day with his cute little not-quite-official-but-everyone-knows-it-girlfriend...with the added bonus of seeing her trot about in a gym uniform as opposed to the regular school uniform. What a great day! God is good!
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Foolish, foolish move. When he selected teams for the class rather than allowing the class to divide itself up along its usual partisan lines, she was separated from her usual gym-team buddies and became bitter with him. Apparently her team usually wins - and he seemed to be testing her ability to deal with loss and adversity. He made the mistake of telling her so when she complained about it.
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When he then did not officiate the game in her [team's] favor, she sassed him. He had to respond appropriately, and so he called her on her unsportsmanlike conduct...followed by a whispered plea that she not get angry, he was doing what he had to, and trying to get a good grade.
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THEN....just when it couldn't have gotten much worse....her two chief adversaries/girl-tormentors came into the class (cutting their own regular class) because they'd gotten wind of what was going on and wanted to see for themselves, and to sneer at and heckle them both. The Princess whispered to him that they didn't belong in the class, and that he should send them on their way (she had a point), but he refused, not wanting to make a scene and fuel their fire (a valid counterpoint).
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Another teacher happened by, espied and yanked the skanks, and sent them to the office. The Princess, being an irrationally outraged 14 year old at this point, took this as a direct personal insult...he did not defend her honor.
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"HE should have done that! He could have asserted his authority as a teacher and gotten rid of them! He certainly asserted his authority over ME in front of everybody! I could've done a better job! I'd've SO kicked their a**es out of there, to HELL with the grade!!!" (Ouch! She was so furious, she started speaking in salty tongues!)
[THUNK]
She cut him dead for the rest of the day.
There was no 2 hour phone call tonight.
There was no call at all.
Radio silence.
(Oh, dear....)
I did my best to be the voice of reason, I really did. I sympathized with her, but I also advocated for the poor boy and tried to get her to understand that there might possibly be some good reasons for what he did, and moreover, for what he did not do.
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I got the trademark slitty little green eyes of rage in return, which were only slightly cured by a peace offering of a hot fudge sundae and tea. Then we snuggled together under a blankie for a few hours, saying very little while the phone didn't ring....
She knows she's a brat. She knows that petulance rarely plays well, and pays even less. And we all know she's only 14. Some allowances must be made. She'll get over it and she'll even laugh at herself about it...at some point. Hopefully he will, too.
Oh, that poor, poor boy.
6 comments:
So let me see if I understand this...
The school had one of its own students student-teach a class with no direct teacher supervision?
When I was in high school, our student teachers (who, of course, were college aged and up) were still directly supervised by our full-time teacher until they'd been on at least a few weeks, maybe even a whole quarter.
I think the school should've sent him to the junior high to student teach his class. But that's just me.
Hopefully he was just avoiding getting reamed again by not calling, and they'll patch things up at school in the next day or two...
Well, as I understood it, the Communications class teacher was there grading his efforts, doesn't teach any underclassmen, and so had no idea who belonged in the gym class and who didn't. (The attendance gets taken and sent to the office at the beginning of the period). The gym teacher swapped places and took the Communications class, so he wasn't there to catch the two interlopers in the act.
However, when they were discovered to be absent absent for whatever class they were skipping, another teacher with a free period is sent to the halls looking for them and - idiots that they are - they didn't know this and didn't bother trying to escape detection.
It is a frosty day here...as of this morning, she plans to "not speak unless spoken to...and then I'm not sure what's gonna come out." YIKES!
I just picture that poor kid thinking this was the best plan ever...and then watching the whole thing implode before him in the face of those little green slits of rage, a perky little upturned nose, and the swish of a ponytail as a back was turned on him.
The girl is a natural with the drama, but worse yet, she does the righteous anger and outrage thing really, really well. Adult-level well, because she stands her ground and can reason quickly and well during battle. No huffing off and slamming doors in our house. She battles to the death (usually until one or both of us start laughing).
Ultimately, I think his ability to forgive will be directly tied to his grade. He is a good-natured kid who recognizes and is generally amused by her antics. She, vain little snot-rag that she can be, gave him an unduly hard time for not making it obvious that she was the teacher's pet. And she knows (now) that she was wrong to do it...not that she'd tell him that without some serious groveling on his part first.
Ah, love!
She'll get over it. By the time she's 35 or 36.
In the mean time "he's an alley cat, dirty rat, and I flatter."
As a guy, I realize that I'm deficient in the proper ratio of "how to interpret feelings" genes and neurons and all that, so I'll refrain from adding my $0.02. Not only would I be completely wrong, I would also potentially make things worse.
Except to say that this sounds like a scene from the upcoming "Life of Kit" movie. Get writing!!
Oh, go ahead and pelt us with your 2 pennies, Larry - the Y chromosome perspective is always welcome here...you know that!
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