The Return of the King

I LOVE taking a day off from school, don't you? You can sleep in, it feels like you're playing hooky, and you can get so much accompished that you usually can't do -- I mean, heck, I paid bills, balanced my checkbook, got hotel reservations confirmed, spoke with a travel agent about a honeymoon, bought some painting supplies, bought a new coat, did laundry, cleaned out my closet, caught up on some TV...

On the other hand, I HATE coming back to school the next day because, invariably, I discover that many or most of my kids were complete jackasses to the substitute and to each other. I find things missing from my desk (a dollar's worth of quarters this time). I find papers turned in with no names and no work on them. I find (usually lengthy) lists of names of people that misbehaved.

And today, I found one kid in In School Suspension.

Why can't I just come back and find one or all of the following:

• A glowing note about ALL of my students.
• Completed work with all steps and strategies shown.
• A winning Mega Jackpot lottery ticket.

Battle Royal

An idea occurred to me this morning when I ducked into the restroom only to hear my kids going wild outside. Just let them go wild. They're going to do it anyway. I mean, if they haven't learned the proper way to behave by now, then they're certainly not going to in the next two weeks.

So why not just have the elementary school equivalent of a last man standing match. A battle royal, if you will.

At first, I thought this quite literally. Just let my boys duke it out and send home the ones who can't get back up. If they want to fight that badly then maybe I shouldn't get in their way anymore.

But then I thought maybe I could really do it metaphorically. I'm thinking I might put all of the kids' names on my whiteboard, and whenever they break a rule, I put a line through their name. Whoever is left unmarked on the last day of school gets some fabulous prize, like my overhead machine or something.

Of course, I can guarantee half of the class would be gone within an hour. So maybe I would have to make it three strikes and you're out again -- like the field trip.

Yes kids, Mister Teacher's patience is wearing VERY thin...