35 - A Simple Act of Kindness Goes a Long Way.... Kids Learn How to Behave Based on Adult Behavior

     My English class was working in groups on an assignment. Again, I asked the students to return to their desks so we could correct the classwork. I struggled to get them quiet, and it wasn’t occurring quick enough for me, so I started calling out names. I don’t remember if I said something rude out of frustration to Jose or what, but he turned around in his seat, looked at me, and growled, “Fuck you!”

     Some students gasped, and others instantly eyed me, their mouths slightly gaping open, waiting to see what I would say or do. I froze for one second, grasping onto my literature book and staring at nothing on the page. Then I looked at Jose and asked, “Would you like to say that differently?”   The air expelled from the students around me as if I was inside a hot air balloon. The young man reworded his frustration, and we continued with the lesson.

   During that millie second of silence, I had thought, okay, I can either blow this out of proportion and send the kid to the dean and then a day later, he would return, mad at me and more than likely not do any work the rest of the semester. Or I could accept that, like all of us, we sometimes react without thinking., or something happened at home which placed him in an aggressive mood. Finally, I realized that I could not take his remark personally.

     My father had worked for the Air Force and not to sound cliché, but he was tough. My siblings swore that he drank four pots of coffee because he was highly edgy when he returned home from work. He’d lose his temper about the stupidest things, and sailor-like words spewed from his mouth. Sad to say, I learned some of his habits. So as a teacher, sometimes I would get mad in the classroom, and a cuss word would sneak out. I really worked on getting rid of that bad habit, and most o,f the time, I was pretty good, excluding ‘hell week,’ which is the week right before a play opens. To be a theatre teacher and handle all the different elements of producing a show was extremely stressful. Thank God I had some reliable, mature students. But, of course, drinking two cups of coffee the week before the show opened didn’t help me stay calm either.

     So, you see, I, too, was guilty of losing my cool, so how could I condemn this young man? This time I didn’t talk to the student after class about the incident like usual. It didn’t seem like I needed to. He knew what he had done wrong. But I say that I gained respect for a kid that rarely showed any. Suddenly Jose asked if he could help collect papers or pass them out, and he quieted the class down. I never knew such a simple act of kindness would solicit an ally.