And another Newbery is conquered! (plus, a bonus story: why I still don't have full use of my hand)

Last night I finished another Newbery, yay! This is one that I had been pretty excited about, it was Invincible Louisa: The Story of the Author of Little Women. Since that is one of my favorite books and she is one of my favorite authors, and has been for much of my life, I was way excited about this one. The beginning was kind of slow, but it was very cool to read about her adult life and when and why she wrote all of the books I know and enjoy. Overall--read it if you like any of her books :)


And now, for the story of the hand. I was subbing in first grade in Va. Beach, and I had been in this one class for 3 and a half days (one and a half before the holiday break, almost two after). There was one child, we'll call him X, who was very emotional and, when he got upset, would hide under his desk or generally retreat into hiding. Well, almost at dismissal time on the 4th day I had been in the class, when we were about to draw weather pictures, he kind of slyly goes over to the door...I follow, and put my foot in front of the door. He tells me that he is going to quit school, and I tell him that I'm sorry, he can't do that, so let's go back and finish the weather picture, since it's almost time to go home. He is still not moving from the door, so I ask him what makes him want to quit school, and he says everything. I ask him for an example, and he is silent. I guess he realized that I wasn't moving away from the door until he did, so he went over by a table and got down on the floor. In my past experience with this kid, when he got hunkered down, it meant he was just waiting until HE wanted to come back to things, so I said, "Well, if you can't tell me what's wrong, I can't help you fix it. You can stay there until you are ready to come back and join us, but if you go out that door, I will have to call the security guard and you will be in trouble, you will have to go see the principal. DO NOT TOUCH THE DOOR."

So, I turn my back (well, my side...I could still see him, but I truly didn't think he was actually going to do anything) to get the rest of the class set up with this activity (because they had ALL been watching the X-situation). I am walking BACK to the door after I have finished passing stuff out, because I'm not sure about what this kid is going to do, and as I am allllmost there, he gets up and bolts. He runs toward the doors leading to the outside, so I sprint after him. There is a teacher standing in the hall, and I say, GRAB THAT KID, and she says, "Are you serious?" and makes NO MOVE to get the kid. So I say YES I AM SERIOUS and keep running at the door. A teacher in the hall apparently saw this and wondered what kind of game we were playing until she heard me yell NO NO NO. Then she ran down to try and help, but he was out the door. I run out the door after him, and I trip and fall. I slid on my face and my right side, and I was not able to chase the kid. At this point other teachers took up the chase, not even knowing what was going on, just that there was a kid running. It turns out that he lived across the street, and he ran home. When all of these adults came running in, along with her child, the mom was yelling, "WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?" and they kept asking if she was his mom (since no one even knew which kid it was really, only I knew that and I was down). When she said yes, she was his mom, they all came back up to school to try and figure things out. I was trying not to cry, but I had to go back to my class, who had been alone for this like 5 minute incident. They were fine, and I told them to please keep working on their pictures, I needed to go in the hall for a second. I was shaking like crazy, and apparently bleeding on my chin, but I didn't know that yet. Another teacher gave me a hug and told me it was not my fault, and offered to let me use her room to wash my face while she watched my kids (she didn't have any kids then).

EPILOGUE:
I had to get my glasses replaced and my hand X-rayed. It wasn't broken, just "bruised or strained," thank goodness, although it still hurts, and this happened on the 3rd of January. since I am not a contractual employee, the school system would not pay for my glasses, which sucks, since it isn't like I walked into a wall or something, I was trying to protect a kid. X was suspended for two days.


Ask any teachers you know about their "children running away stories." I have found that most every teacher has one, and they are very interesting. One that I heard involved a child being gone for 24 hours, which made me feel better about mine, since we knew where he was the whole time (that child was found and everything was fine, BTW).

Look for the next post to tell about what I learned from this experience.