Evil-Doers Beware!!!

Every now and then when teachers are thinking they just aren’t getting through, their best efforts are being wasted on the swirl of hyper-changes and gusts of emotional whirlwinds that is the junior high school student, a tiny ray of light will shine through to illuminate the true impact they truly have on children. One of those rays recently beamed down on me from two ninth graders.

We were doing a textbook class on Rachel Carson and her research on the danger of farm chemicals. I know, yawn right? Who even knows much about this champion of the environment in the States much less junior high kids on the far side of the world from Carson’s hometown. Anyway, the key vocabulary word was “dangerous.” Of course, the class seemed as exciting as, well, fill in the blank with a highly boring and nap-inducing activity. Anyway, eyes were glazed, heads were on desks, and those who weren't sleeping found teenage topics to keep them entertained so the “Shizuka nishite’s” and “Hana shinai’s” (loosely, I mean really, loosely translated, “For the love of all that’s good, please stop talking kids.”) were flying every five minutes or so. So, you assume no one got anything out of the class of course.

Well, after class, two bright beams of light came up to talk to me. They said they had decided to give me a nickname. They even made it in English. It was directly after what I thought was an abysmal failure of a mandatory text book lesson, too. So I was bestowed the name “DangerRusty”. That’s right ‘Dangerous’+’Rusty’. Brilliant! Why had I never thought of it myself? What a great codename!! Anyway, I will now wear this new name with pride and dignity. Not because it is necessarily completely descriptive of my personality (although I hope more so now that I sport the name in various adventurous situations). I proudly don the title because it meant my work got through. They were listening through the façade of teen flippantness. Not only could the kids get the meaning, they made it their tool in creating new thoughts. That’s a teacher’s dream.

So now, if you need a helping hand, if danger has surrounded you, just call up your friendly neighborhood ‘DangerRusty’ and I’ll be there.