Ingrates Ingratiate

(New Followers who are writers: This is another teaching post, but it’s short and insane funny.)

You know how I’ve been talking about my difficult class since last fall? Well I’ve been proud of myself because they (mostly) behave for me. And I’m also proud because I’ve challenged them with a Renaissance Biography project. They’ve done research, created posters, and then were doing presentations of said posters.

To keep them focused, besides saying, “What does a good audience look like? What does an audience sound like?” I also bribed said when we completed the presentations, I’d bring in Dunkin’ Donuts to celebrate.

This is their response:

“Dunkin’ Donuts?” one boy said. “Why can’t we have Kentucky Fried Chicken?”

“Yeah, I love Kentucky Fried Chicken,” a girl responded.

There were murmurs of agreement.

“I’m not getting Kentucky Fried Chicken,” I declared. “Our class is at the end of the day.”

“We can eat it for lunch,” the girl offered.

“Or pizza,” the boy said.

This generated a chorus of “Yeah” and “Pizza”.

At this point, my voice has raised an octave. “No. We’re not getting pizza. You know, I brought doughnuts in to three other classes. And guess what those students said? ‘Thank you.’ Nobody tried to change the menu. I’m bringing in doughnuts or nothing.”

Ingrates.

A boy who’s visiting from a northern European country raised his hand and asked, “How about fruit?”

The entire class shouted, “FRUIT?!”

From their tones and the looks of horror on their faces, I believe they actually thought I’d change my mind and bring in fruit. He was like the kid who raises his hand asks a teacher if there’s homework.

“Don’t worry, if I bring in fruit, I’ll still bring doughnuts.”

“Aren’t you leaving soon? Why don’t we have a pizza party?” another boy asked.

“No. We’ll have the doughnuts and that’s it.”

After the severe sidetrack, we got to the presentations that (mostly) went okay.

Near the end of class, the girl with the bright idea for pizza came over to me by the door. (I have to stand there to make sure they put up chairs before they leave and that they don’t sneak out before the bell.)

“We should have a pizza party before you leave.”

“No, I’m not giving up a day of class time. We have a lot to do before your teacher returns.”

“We’ll have pizza and work. We’ll take care of it.”

Damn, that was sweet.

P.S. Yesterday, I brought in doughnuts and grapes. The doughnuts were a hit. When I looked over at the grapes, only the skeleton of the twigs remained.

P.P.S. I made it to the 2^nd round of ABNA Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award in the YA category.