Nobody Gets Away with Giving them Red... Tuesday, January 22

At 5pm on the dot, exactly 1,257,100 won was deposited into my bank account by a "no name" and for no apparent reason that neither Snickers and I can come up with.  I had just finished my last game of floor hockey for the camp season and was putting away the floor hockey sticks when I got the text notification, telling me that this lump sum had been deposited.  I was already in a super good mood -- it being the last full day of camp and me going home tomorrow -- but this put me in an ultra great mood.  And with the kid's talent show and big campfire being tonight, I was ready for an action-packed night of giggles and fun. 

Earlier in the day however, things weren't all peaches and roses.  My homeroom class had hit a rough patch -- the roughest of rough patches -- and it had left them scribbling in their diaries things like "the teachers are scary" and "I was too scared to say it was fun".  It happened while they were off doing a pancake cooking class, a teacher had flipped on them.  When they hadn't returned yet to me and twenty minutes had passed by, I started texting the teacher and wondering what was up.

They showed up super late and they showed up super stressed and upset.  

The camp gives out blue stickers and red stickers.  Good behavior is rewarded with blue and bad is punished with red.  Last camp I gave out three red among my homeroom students and this camp I only have given one.  However today, after pancake-making class, five of my students (three of which are my top ranked students) showed up to class with one red sticker each.  Four of the three broke down in tears while the fifth looked like he was going to punch a hole in the wall.  The leader of the class told me why each of the students had received a red sticker.  None of them had recieved any due warning, just a flat out, in your face, red sticker.  Perhaps the teacher was having a bad day, I don't know, but I know my kids.  They're by no means perfect but I do really push the importance of manners with them so five of them getting a red sticker in one class was really strange.  

Nobody puts Baby in the corner, ok, but nobody gives my Texas class a red sticker.  I was upset for them, disappointed, so I marched down to the teacher's room to defend my students and ask questions.  "You stay here, I'll go fight for you!" I told them.  The teacher wasn't there though so I took matters into my own hands.  I headed back to class and insisted all five students to give me their red sticker.  I threw their red stickers into the trash and then did some major, much-needed damage control -- hugging each of the red-sticker-labelled student and telling them to forget about the whole thing. 

It was a rather sour end to the last day of study together and I felt terrible for them but perhaps it drew us all closer in a way.  When the talent show came around and I entered the building with a coffee clearly in hand, one of my students blurted out, "I'll fight for you if they have problem with your coffee!"  I think perhaps because of me defending them I too felt closer to them because I was the loudest among the teachers, shouting my head off and cheering for my class as they presented their talent show act and even when they weren't presenting I cheered them on.

After the talent show, we headed outside for a campfire and some smores.  The kids all loved that and it was cute to see how excited they were to make their first smore.  After all the smores were gobbled up and we were in line for hot chocolate, some of the girls did rock-scissors-paper to see who'd get to hold my hand.  I toasted all my homeroom students and thanked them for being such a great group of kids.  They really were so great to me.  And as we parted ways and went to our separate dorm rooms, the texting began.  I got about half a dozen "I love you" messages, countless "thank you teacher" and numerous "sweet dreams" and hearts.  

Tomorrow marks the last day of camp.  Their parents will be coming here to see their final group project presentation, we'll be packing up all the classes and everyone will be leaving the camp.  Winter camp will have concluded and, as great as it will be to return to my own reality, my house and my family of Snickers and four-legged babies, I can't help but wonder what my camp kids will be returning to, especially B.