The Great Expectations School (27 page)

I balked, having already mentioned numerous times that these events occurred over two hundred years ago.

“Yes, is he alive?” Athena chimed.

“George Washington is not alive. This was all over two hundred
years ago. No one from that time is alive, and none of their children or grandchildren are alive.”

“Is Thomas Jefferson alive?” Hamisi, who looked like he was listening, inquired in earnest. I refrained from hanging my head. In a movie, the scene would end on such a punch line, but we still had thirty minutes of this lesson to battle through.

I explained that very few people live to be a hundred. When only Sonandia and Seresa could tell me that 1904 was one hundred years before our current 2004, I realized with similar surprise to the “What planet are we on?” revelation that these kids did not understand elapsed time, be it in minutes or decades. As a litmus test, I asked what time it would be sixty minutes from now. No hands. What time will it be one hour from now? Four volunteers. Thus, my hopes for in-depth, history-based lessons were banished to make way for my new, deceptively simple-seeming campaign for “Time.”

I had a shaky history with bringing kids up to the classroom for lunch. The idea was first presented to me in September by Evan Krieg as an isolation punishment, but I quickly learned that spending lunch hour with my hypersocial offenders was more of a punishment for me than for them.

One day in October, Destiny Rivera tugged on my sleeve and in the meekest voice said, “Mr. Brown, I'm having trouble with place value. Could you give me any extra help at lunchtime?” Soon, I had a motley rotation of six extra-helpees, anchored by Destiny. I knew that Destiny got extra math help in the after-school program for ninety minutes, three times a week, covering exactly the same material I reviewed at lunch periods. What she really enjoyed, what they all did, was the intimacy and attention. I couldn't blame them. But my desperate need for a midday respite slowly made “coming up for lunch” a nostalgic thing of the past. On this March day, when I appeared in the cafeteria to bring up my six budding Ian Flemings, I was besieged with pleas to tag along. I smiled at my new leverage, and Seresa, Dennis, Sonandia, Athena, Jennifer, and Evley raced up the
stairs. We spent our too-short half hour analyzing Seresa's “Teacher Gone Missing”:

One day a teacher named Mr. Planter had not come to school. But the thing is that he is alwayl at school and he is never absent so the chridren thougth that mabey he is sick. So the kids let that they pass. The next day he did not come so the students say let's investagent it. So the class had a plane to get Mr. Planter address but the office was full. So they made so much noise that all the people that were in the office came to ther class. So the shortes person sneak out of the and went to the office and went though the file and got Mr Planter adrees. So the Class got together and went to his house and when the rang the bell the door opend and then a stremer pup out It was a party for the hole class and They were very surprised and that was the story of the Teacher Gone Missing.

The next day, nineteen kids came to school with spy stories. Most were more awkward renditions of my initial we-have-to-findMr.-Brown caper. Tayshaun wrote a five-page epic, complete with drawings of the scene where he and Dennis fistfight my captors. The work reflected enthusiasm for the material, now flowing once the seal had popped.

I marked up each composition with longer-than-usual comments, questions, and recommendations. Since the kids were psyched about their subject matter, this was my opportunity to zero in on clarity. I didn't need a class full of O. Henrys; coherent written thought was a major victory. They wrote second drafts in class, which I again marked up. On Friday, I tabled the spy stories to finish
Phoebe the Spy
and write book reviews.

I felt reinvigorated over the weekend. I set Monday aside for exchanging spy stories with peers and making comments, using the model from my lunchtime workshop. As soon as we began, though, I sensed problems.

I had been following—and feeling good about—the progressive draft model recommended for portfolio work, but the kids were out of steam. Three days had passed since our last tinkering with
these papers, and they had already written three drafts. I should have anticipated that peer-revising wouldn't work. Many of them had a hard enough time stitching two logical sentences together, let alone giving or receiving substantive feedback. Frustration boiled over immediately. “Dennis the Spy” was dirtied on the floor, thoughtlessly pinned beneath an impaling desk leg. Gladys F. got upset with her partner Bernard and ripped his paper, so he ripped her paper. Cwasey scribbled all over Tayshaun's opus, so Tayshaun tore it up and cried.

The folder containing all of Seresa's subsequent drafts of “Teacher Gone Missing” disappeared forever.

I didn't know what to say. My train derailed, all in one minute, while I was talking to Evley about making sure that his readers understand the setting. I collected the surviving stories and put them in the portfolios as they were. No 4-217 spy book.

When Ms. Croom showed up for my prep period, I shepherded my six tutors to Ms. Pierson's class in the minischool. On our way to Trisha's room, we passed K–1 assistant principal Diane Rawson's office. She called out, “Yo, Brown! I want to talk to you.” I delivered my tutors and answered the request.

“Mr. Brown, I've noticed you've been taking some of your fourth-graders to the lower-grade rooms, like right now. How is that going?”

“Extremely excellent,” I said in a somber tone, still raw over the spy fiasco.

“Great. We've noticed, and we think it's a very positive thing for the school,” Ms. Rawson said.

Who was
we
? Did
we
include anyone who was considering “giving up on me” several months ago? I noticed Diane Rawson's gray, cigarette-stained teeth, and they somehow made me angrier.

“Thank you,” I said.

“We had an idea. This month is Dr. Seuss's hundredth birthday. We're planning a special celebration for the lower grades, and we want to have groups of upper-grade kids going around the school to read Seuss stories to the little ones. We thought you might be interested to
do it with your class as the readers. Some parents are going to whip up some green eggs for everybody. No ham, though. Too complicated. What do you say?”

“It sounds great.”

“Great! We're going to do it next Tuesday, on the parent-conference half day. You know, a nice thing before we give out report cards. I'll give you more details tomorrow.”

“I have something to ask, though,” I said. “Or at least, something I'd really like. Art. I want Mrs. Kreps to come to my class for a period to make paper Cat in the Hat hats. The kids would love it.”

“Um, we'll see. I'll have to talk to Kreps about her schedule.” Rawson's reluctance was evident.

“Okay. Thank you for the offer. I think everything will be terrific.” I wheeled out of the office on an instant mission to track down Mrs. Kreps before Rawson got to her. I was successful, and we made a morning date for Friday.

Off the cuff, during our social studies lesson on Wednesday, I mentioned that as a fourth-grader, I did a report on the state of Pennsylvania. Sudden and overwhelming interest in doing state projects of their own caused me to change gears and tabulate the interested students (everyone, even Lakiya) and their selected states. I did not have state projects in my plans, but I didn't want to stanch this unexpected geyser of academic enthusiasm. The next day, Maimouna (Missouri), Seresa (Florida), Jennifer (Ohio, her home state), and Destiny (Texas) brought in lavishly decorated construction-paper folders containing information printed from the Internet. I had underestimated the hunger for projects and looked to the upcoming Seuss-fest as an opportunity to execute a more structured whole-class adventure. I decided to tuck away the state projects as an ace for next year.

Meanwhile, I sought to salvage writing lessons by focusing on a fresh concept: figurative language. I brought back my Robert Frost poems and focused several lessons on passages from Louis Sachar's
Holes.
Sony wrote a poem called “Touching the Sky”:

Up! Up! So high
People look like ants
I see this all over town
Why is this?
I am touching the sky
With its baby blue color
Tippy-toeing on the top of a skyscraper
Tryin' not to fall.
This giant sky which I'm tryin' to reach is tryin' to pull me and hug me
How much more can I reach the sky? Hmm!
Who knows?
Up up and away I go?
Into the sky blooming into a beautiful sky and being together. Oh I have reached
the sky.
It feels great!

I announced the coming Tuesday's event, giving special highlight to 4-217's exclusive participation, and received the hoped-for enthusiasm. I let them choose their own reading teams (a mild circus), and modeled dynamic Seussian possibilities by performing
The Foot Book
as a rhythm poem. Lito Ruiz's face showed life that had not been there since before the ELA Test. “Mr. Brown, I can't wait till Tuesday!”

Mrs. Kreps's art project was a massive success. The kids were giddy with their new paper hats, giggling throughout the one-two-three-step process. The remainder of the day proved a better than usual Friday, with art catalyzing the upbeat mood.

Over the weekend, I caught a Greyhound back to Jersey to collect my mom's comprehensive roundup of Dr. Seuss books and paraphernalia, including eleven giant red felt bow ties with safety pins, several Thing One and Thing Two dolls, and a full-body Cat in the Hat mascot suit, hat and footies included.

Our rehearsals on Monday forebode disaster. Inhibited by their peers' glazed-out stares and occasional mocking comments, the groups
turned
Marvin K. Mooney Will You Please Go Now!
into indecipherable mumbles. Realizing the 217 stage was a deterrent for performance, I separated the groups for private practice time. Whatever was going to happen on Tuesday, it would at least be out of the ordinary.

At the end of the day, I brought out the special rewards bag to bestow packs of Starburst to last week's winning group. My hand felt frantically around the bag. No Starburst. I opened and closed my desk drawers. Gone.

Who had stolen from me?
From my desk
? I mentally riffled through the primary suspects' imaginary dossiers. Deloris, my previous offender, had been banished. Lakiya, I didn't peg for a thief. Marvin had been very happy lately, and he only seemed to misbehave when he was upset. If Tayshaun had stolen the candy, he would have bragged and word would have gotten back to me. Eric did not have the guts to pull off such a risky move. I felt guilty for suspecting specific children, all of whom, or at least all but one, were innocent. I got angry at myself for not learning my lesson after Lakiya's Yu-Gi-Oh stack disappeared a couple months ago. I didn't
want
to lock my things away from my students. I wanted us to share a basic trust, to be a team. Reality socked me in the face; it wasn't working.

At the back of the Professional Development room, I seethed. The fourth- and fifth-grade teachers leafed through three-inch-thick red binders, our new bibles for the coming transition from Success for All to Balanced Literacy. With the new literacy curriculum, homeroom teachers would deliver daily Writing Workshop and Reading Workshop lessons in a ninety-minute “golden block” of time. As Marge Foley explained the new flow of the day, set to begin April 13, I tried to slow my raging pulse.

As I mulled over how I could not trust my kids, Ms. Guiterrez took the floor and gave a speech about how immensely critical the first days of Balanced Literacy would be in setting good routines that would last for the rest of the year. When the floor opened for questions,
I raised my hand. “I agree that getting the routines going the first day is crucial. I have two kids [Marvin Winslow and Lakiya Ray] who I absolutely know, I am absolutely positive, will not be able to follow the workshop model and independent reading schedule. I'm worried they could throw off the dynamic for the whole group, especially in the new program's infancy when we're setting the tone. Could we set up, just for the first few days, with Ms. Devereaux or someone, a preemptive pullout of sure-fire problem kids, like we did for the Test last month? Kind of like a Balanced Literacy jail.”

The jail comment drew some bland chuckles, and Ms. Guiterrez proceeded with her speech without acknowledging I had said anything. “We have a tough job changing gears in the middle of the year. It's going to be hard, but I have confidence…”

Being ignored, especially after making what I felt was a reasonable and actionable suggestion, pissed me off. Ironically, I had been the only fourth-grade homeroom teacher not to send any of my kids to take the Test in Ms. Devereaux's circus room when the option was given. I waited a few minutes, raised my hand again, and made the same suggestion.
I will be heard!

Ms. Guiterrez did not look at me. “Mr. Brown, if you cannot control your own children, then there are larger problems than Balanced Literacy. Look at Ms. Mulvehill. She has Horace to deal with, and she's doing fine.”

Melissa Mulvehill visibly cringed when Guiterrez dropped her name, forcing a weak smile out of politeness. She had been interviewing at other schools since January, and talked openly during my occasional lunches in her room about her disdain for every administrator in the school. In December, when she received a voice-mail message during lunch that a close aunt had suddenly passed away, Mr. Randazzo would not let her go to her family until the end of the day, because he could not find someone to cover her room.

I'm finished with you, Guiterrez, I thought. You don't believe in me, and I don't believe in you. No one knows how this is all going
to end, but it's probably going to get ugly. And breathing does not equal being fine.

I opted against marring the start of our Dr. Seuss/parent-teacher conference half day with accusations about Starburst. Instead, I bought new packs at the corner deli. The uncharacteristic morning candy distribution fueled excitement for our big day.