Creative thinking

Each morning at 9:12 we have a routine. Principal Crazy plays a tune on the loudspeaker, welcomes us to a "BEAUtiful day at PS ..." and then has a "very special"class say the pledge and sing 'God Bless America'. The rest of us have the kids stand, face the flag and sing. The "special class" gets a writing utensil (pencils for K-5, pens for 6-8) each time (as if they should be rewarded for screeching into the microphone).

Today, our homeroom had the joy of being that "very special" class. We took the kids down threatening months of detention if they misbehaved. As it turns out they were very good. I told the kids to meet me in the hallway when they finished. They ran up to Pr. Crazy, snatched a pen in the color of their choice, and skipped out the door...

...only to have the pen confiscated as soon as they crossed the threshold.

You see, last time we did the morning exercises, those pens were destroyed. In ways you would not think of destroying a pen. It was disastrous. And wouldn't you know FN already had his split in half by the time he reached me today...approx 3 seconds after receiving the pen.

Ms. Happy took the kids upstairs and I returned to the office with my booty. "Pr. Crazy, I wanted to let you know that I confiscated all the kids pens." I told him, hands overflowing with 34 half-inch-wide weapons.

"Why did you take those from them?" he was rather startled.

"Well you see, last time we did this, the kids took apart the pens" He gave me a confused look. "See this top part of the shaft? When they stick it between their cheek and molars, it becomes an invisible whistle which they blow when we turn around to write on the board. See this squiggly thing (the part that supposedly clips onto your shirt pocket)? This is snapped off and they scratch their names into the desks with it. The ink tube is then snapped inside desks and on chairs to sabotage the next student who uses the desk. I decided that it wouldn't be a good idea for them to take these pens to their classes."

His response was not one of understanding. His response was not one of shock, horror, or sympathy to we poor teachers who have to deal with all of this x34 every day. Instead...

...he smiled.

A big, dorky, goofy smile. He started nodding/shaking his head, pointing to me, and looking at the secretaries in the office who just stared back at us, as dumbfounded as I was.

"Future scientists! That's what we've got up there! Future scientists! I can't believe their creativity! How do they do it?! That's great!"

I have nothing left to say about this. You can draw your own conclusions. I'm drawing mine with a bottle of gluhwien from some friends in Germany. Without support from my administration, it's about all I can find any solace in. Prost!