Year After Year the Kids Seem the Same

The first two weeks of school are always interesting. The kids are getting to know you and you are getting to know them. Each period has a personality that shows itself pretty early on. Some kids seem to show their personalities pretty early too. I realized that after having a total of about 1,600 students, many seem very similar to each other. Here are some kid categories I've noticed:

1) The inappropriate question/timing kid - this is the kid who blurts out questions in the middle of the teacher talking and usually those questions are of a personal nature. This year, I have a couple of those and here are some example questions, "Where did you get your shoes?", "What's your favorite band?", or my favorite, "Will you tell us stories about your ex-boyfriends? Our last teacher did." My response to these kinds of questions is usually, "you can ask me that after school, but this is not the appropriate time." For the last one I just said, "NO!" in a disgusted voice.

2) The eager to pleaser kid - this kid just loves his or her teacher and wants his/her teacher to love him/her back. They will offer to clean the board, pass out papers, give complements and smile a lot.

3) The too cool for school kid - this kid just wants to sit back and be quiet and not be disturbed. They are too cool for anything as babyish as enjoying class or participating.

4) The straight A kid - they have studied the book over the summer, they panic over every test and usually must have everything be known. Any unknowns cause the student to panic and rapid fire questions to their teacher. "What are we learning today? The board says we're learning about equations. Are we solving equations or writing equations? Will we need to know exponents? Are we graphing them?"

5) The blurter - this kid is so excited to know the answer that he must shout it out at any time. Sometimes he'll raise his hand as he is shouting, in an effort to follow the rules.

6) The tapper - Oh, the joys of hearing 30 pencils tapped rhythmically on 30 separate desks to 30 separate beats - simultaneously. This kid is often also the can't sit in your seat kid. They can be found wandering the classroom for who knows what reason. Sometimes it's to sharpen the pencil that they will then use to start tapping again.

There are too many more to list. I can't keep them all straight.

What I love about Jr. High is the diversity of maturity levels. I have kids who speak like adults and have deep thoughts about deep concepts. I have students who are in the middle and one day will be playing with toys and the next discussing who said what about whom. I have students who still tell their teachers they love them and want to hold their hand.

This year my kids are full of love and kindness. I have students who thank me daily for teaching them and not in a kissy way. I have kids who ask great questions and are polite to each other. They seem to be full of kindness for me and for each other. They are also full of energy, so I'm just done at the end of each day. And yet, I have time each day to pause and just be thankful for a job where I can do what I love and meet such interesting people.