My Heart Begins to Leak

The school day is not yet over and I feel the need to write.  Unfortunately, I am having difficulty finding the words. I do not know how to describe the turmoil I feel inside that four more of my students have been suspended. Two for fighting, one for instigating, and one for swearing at a teacher. It seems as if some of these students have been out of class more than they have been in it. Two of the suspended students recently came back to school from another suspension. I understand the need to come down hard on kids for fighting and to send a message. However, I question the effectiveness of it. The behavior is not stopping.

As I was heading into third period today, I overhead another student saying, “Don’t do it. It’s not worth it.” Her response, “Nobody talks about me that way. I am going to f@$*ing kill her.” I immediately followed the student down the hall. In the past, she has taken the time to talk to me when in this state. Not today. Looking back, I should have walked her directly to the office. I didn’t. I asked another teacher to call the office so I could get back to my class. BIG mistake on my part. However, I did not know this until later.

Fast forward thirty minutes. I was ready to take my students to lunch when I saw one of my planning period boys at the door waiting to talk to me. As he was telling me about an upcoming fight, another boy came over and told us it already happened. I guess ‘snitching’ didn’t bother him any. Of course, the other teachers are saying it is because one of the girls was his girlfriend. I went to the office.

Not only were three of my girls from first block sitting in the office, so was a boy from third block. This is where words get difficult. Surprisingly, I teared up when talking to him. These kids have so much potential and are so much smarter than the behavior they are exhibiting. When I asked him what happened, he took responsibility. He thinks he is not wanted back here anymore and that no one trusts him. I told him I wanted him here. I hope he believes it.

Back in class, another student (not in any of my classes) who has many issues, came into my class. He said he was kicked out of another one. After sitting and cooling off for a few minutes, I wrote him a pass to go back to class and headed to the computer lab with my class. Within five minutes, the student was back saying he was kicked out of class. I let him sit quietly. Until….

One of the girls who was fighting came and asked for her work. I walked her back to my classroom after dropping off the other student in the life skills room to help out. Once inside the room, I told her about all that she has going for her. I don’t think she was expecting that. I spoke straight with her. She reminds me of so many girls I have worked with in the past. Little girls with so much baggage they didn’t know how to handle all the anger it caused. She teared up. I gave her a notebook to write her story while also giving her the choice of whether to share it with me or not. We will see what happens.

I returned to my class only to have the teacher from the class the boy from earlier had left from tell me that the boy needs to be in his class. I agree with him. We need to get together and do some problem solving.  Not only for this boy. We need to look at ways to save these kids. To give them strategies to stay in class. To teach them better ways to handle their problems. To show them we care.