Let It Happen, Boys

I was spending some quality time with one of my worst blocks in the computer lab, working on our research papers. "Why worst?" you ask? Well, because as a whole they have the lowest rates of attendance, achievement, and desire. Add on top of that a really high rate of Sped students (which does nothing to bring up the non-sped, but chronically lazy or thoughtfully-challenged students -- by "thoughtfully-challenged" I mean a chronic resistance to independent thinking, not an inability) and you get a challenging blocks.

Well, a (sped) student from another class came in to tell me he was going to the library to work on his paper. And then he came back, because all the library computers were in use. This particular student is capable, but definitely has behavior issues -- and he knows it. He's spazzy, sure, but he also has some anger management issues. This morning he said he just felt like punching someone. Just because.

But, since I'm a sweetie, when he asked if he could use a computer with my class, I agreed. Of course, he spent a lot of time chatting with his friends. He was getting some work done, although not as much as I might have wished. And then.

And then.

He looked at what his friend was doing. "What?" he exclaimed! "Where are your papers? Where are your notes? What are you working on?" I just sat back and listened and smiled. He then started to walk his friend through the process of writing a research paper. (If this student has issues, he also has supports from the awesome sped department. The Friend has issues, but doesn't qualify for any support; Friend has poor attendance and low interest and probably a lot more going on.) I couldn't do or say anything better than what my interloper is doing. He's taking over my role. I love it!

Interloper came over and asked me for the handouts that Friend didn't have. Then came back over and asked me to please explain them in more detail because he forgot.

I can't buy that kind of advertising. And I just loved listening to it. For all the goofing off that Interloper did, I think he contributed a lot to class today.