The crying in the hallway caught my attention after school.  As a mom, and I know all of  you moms out there understand, I listened for a moment to decide what kind of cry it was.  Most of the time after school, it tends to be a frustrated, tired, angry cry of a child whose life has ended because they didn’t get the purple crayon to color with or something major like that.  However, this was a hurt cry, and while I knew there were YMCA counselors with the kids, they tend to be college students and I just popped my head out to see if I could do anything.  The poor little guy has done something to bite a chunk out of his bottom lip and you would have thought he was dying.  The girl with him was trying to calm him down but he was convinced that he was badly hurt, so I invited him into my room to use my phone to see himself.  It actually took him a minute to find it and he started to calm down.  As the girl started to take him out, a second little guy came in and very timidly said “Mrs. Bush?  There’s a clogged toilet in the boys bathroom”.  I assured him I would let someone know, and as he walked out with the little guy with the hurt lip, he looked at the YMCA counselor and candidly told her, “I hadn’t done that in like two months!”.

There are things that happen while I’m at school that methods class just did not prepare me for.  For instance, the other day I was giving the beginning of school, different kinds of drills speech, and we talked about code red drills.  These tend to worry kids, so I try to make it a little humorous to help them relax.  When one of the kids asked what I would do if a bad guy came in our room, I very calmly told them that my room was full of “weapons” (instruments) and I would go all ninja on the guy.  To which, a young man, perhaps 8 years old said, “yeah, she would kick him in the ……!”  I’ll let you fill in the blank.  Needless to say, the little girls in the room gasped, the boys grinned and I had to sit him somewhere else in the room for using an inappropriate word.

Before school is also interesting.  This morning a couple of fifth grade girls stopped me in the hall because a little guy was playing hide and seek in the bathroom, peeking his head around the corner and then darting back in the bathroom.  So I walked over and called him by name.  A little voice answered from the stall.  I asked, “Do you know what the bathroom is for?”  “Yes”.  “Then use it and get out here”.  “Ok”.  So I waited.  A couple of minutes later, he peeks his head around the corner to see if I’m still there, gives me a little sheepish grin and goes to wash his hands.

My day is full of tying shoes and tying sashes, untying knots, putting hairbows back in  hair, fixing zippers and occasionally snapping up jeans that are too hard for little fingers  to snap.  I hug away tears from little people who miss mom and dad and older kids who have had a bad day, listen to stories, notice haircuts and new glasses.  Lunch duty consists of telling kids to sit on their pockets, not eat with their fingers, wipe their faces and not yell across the room to their little brother or sister.  I remind them to stay in a line, not touch the walls with their dirty fingers and pick up their trash. In other words, I play mom to 400+ children every day.

Oh, and by the way, I teach.  In the first week and a half of school, I’ve worked with 2nd through 5th graders on audiating, I’ve had kindergartners play steady beats on rhythm sticks and begin singing together, 1st graders have been using iconic notation to play simple rhythms on percussion instruments, 2nd graders are learning about the characteristics of the percussion family and creating their own rhythm patterns to play, 3rd graders are learning the story of the National Anthem and how to sing it, 4th graders are creating harmony with partner songs and rounds, using movement to show how rounds work and 5th graders are learning countermelodies to create a different kind of harmony.  All while working to maintain appropriate behavior in class, being kind to others, and learning listening skills.

Some people wonder why teachers are so tired and why a break is so needed.  I and my fellow teachers begin our day running and for the next 7 1/2 hours, we put in thousands of steps, tweak and troubleshoot with children from a myriad of experiences and backgrounds using materials and lessons plans that have taken hours to plan outside of our work day.  I’m pretty sure I’ve taken a nap every other day since school began.  This is why for most of us this is a calling.  Nobody in their right mind would do this on purpose otherwise.  And, quite frankly, you never know what’s going to happen next.  Just when you think you’ve seen it all, a little guy will walk in and tell you the boy’s toilet is clogged.