teaching story!

This afternoon during math centers, one of the boys came up to me all distressed and tattley, and weirdly protective, telling me, "Ernesto and Will said Emily's hot!"

I could see, on the one hand, how this could be a disturbing situation. You sort of want to say, "Children, none of you are hot. You are children." Also, it's a personal remark...it certainly seems somehow inappropriate....

but, on the other hand, they didn't say this to the little girl, to bother her, they were just talking amongst themselves. She's pretty much everyone's favorite person in the class. And, it's not like they're 40 year old men saying a 7 year old girl is hot....they're 7 year old boys, hardly knowing what hot is, calling a 7 year old girl hot.

But...inappropriate for school, right? The little girl's mother was volunteering that day, mere feet away.

But....
So what I did was: shrug my shoulders, throw my hands up in the air, and say, "Well, what're ya gonna do." Yes, a reaction that hardly makes sense.

The boy wandered away, confused.