A friend of mine was substituting in an inner city middle school where fights among students were commonplace each day.
One day, a fight broke out in her classroom between two boys. After attempting to break it up without success, she went next door to get the assistance of a male teacher. As he learned about the fight, an insane look came across his face, and he headed for her room.
Once inside, the male teacher yelled, “Fight me!” And he put his hands up in the air to taunt them.
He pushed one of the boys to the ground, while the other one, so frightened by a teacher acting this way, took off running down the hall.
The male teacher climbed onto a chair, and began shouting to the rest of the students, “Clap for me! Clap for me!”
They did. On the chair, the male teacher began slapping his elbow in preparation to do a wrestling move to the boy on the ground, who by that time was laughing pretty hard. The teacher jumped off the chair, landing on the student, not harming him, but finishing the move.
Then he turned his attention toward the other boy who had disappeared down the hall. The male teacher ran down the hall in the direction the boy had gone and eventually found him hiding under the principal’s desk.
Fight thwarted.
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Reminds me of a colleague I had a study hall with the first year I taught. He didn't break up a fight; he just made it very clear that nothing negative would be accepted in that study hall. He climbed on the bench seat (we had the study hall in the cafeteria in our over-crowded school), peered over the lot of beings under our charge, and said, "Open your book, shut your mouth, and, no, you may not go anywhere so don't ask." We didn't have a bit of trouble from that moment until the end of the year. Everybody knew you didn't mess with Mr. S.
ReplyDeleteNice. Send more stories to misteracademia@gmail.com if you've got them. That's a good one.
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