Engagements and Middle Schoolers.

Well...today was eventful.

I was given a beautiful engagement ring last night from the love of my life, and after all the conversations and pre-planning that has taken place about us getting engaged, I am so excited to be wearing his ring and officially able to tell the world that it's happening. I was so excited to be able to come into work today and have all my nosy little children see it and freak out and get excited for me...but no one noticed. Aside from the extremely rewarding scream and tears that came from my close friend and coworker when I crashed through her first class of the day to show her the bling, I got nothin' from anyone. If they noticed, they didn't say anything. It seemed a little anticlimactic...I'm not the kind of girl to announce it with no lead in, so I was lost. Do I just go through the rest of the school year without them knowing I'm getting married? After they've stalked the heck out of our relationship for months trying to get as much info as they can? Should have known that wouldn't be the case. This is how it went down:

4th block was ending and one student sleepily said "...is that an engagement ring?" and another girl said "I saw it but didn't say anything." Three nearby girls freaked and came to look at it, and then the bell rang. One of them went out into the hallway screaming "MISS MELCHIONE IS GETTING MARRIED!" and then every. single. kid. from my 5th block that was standing right outside my door ran in screaming "MISS MELCHIONE'S GETTING MARRIED?! MISS MELCHIONE, YOU'RE GETTING MARRIED!" and then Miss Famous 5th Block Girl ran up and down the hallways screaming that I'm engaged. My homeroom kids showed up in awe because they never saw it. One boy from homeroom came barreling in screaming "YOU'VE GOT A RING?!?!" and then the bell rang and Miss Famous 5th Block Girl wouldn't shut up until I told them the story. So I told them how he did it.

Class: Are we invited?
Me: Of course.
Miss Famous 5th Block Girl: I'm going to be up on the stage singing and rapping.
Me: Of course.
Male Student: Can I be the best man? And the guy that makes a speech and cries?
Me: Of course.

I was immediately asked what my name is going to be [it had never really hit me how much my last name is my identity as a teacher...] and when I told them it would be Mrs. Moore, half of my students said that they'd still call me Miss Melchione, half of my students asked if they could start calling me Mrs. Moore now, and one student said he's just going to call me Ms. M, and then paused and smiled and said "...get it? Get it? Because they both start with M."

One of my [favorite...shhh] students came in late, and Miss Famous 5th Block Girl says "Miss Melchione's engaged" and he stopped frozen and said "....really? REALLY?! Ah!" and then rushed me with a hug. It took everything within me to get them quiet enough to explain what we're doing today. Thankfully, what we're doing today is watching the movie Hoodwinked to review direct and indirect characterization. A couple of them are having a hard time grasping the concept of a fairy tale cartoon, though:

Miss Famous 5th Block Girl: She is a little girl...and she's singing to the animals! Singing to the animals, Miss Melchione! This is why little kids love fantasy trash now!

Miss Famous 5th Block Girl: A taxi in the middle of the woods?
Me: Move on.

On an unrelated note, one of my boys has told me that he would like to be called "Batman" from now on. Not sure where that came from...honestly don't want to know. Also, I took one of my boy's phones about a month ago, and his mom never came to the school to pick it up because his grades sucked. He kept coming to me and whining "my mom won't come get my phone until my grades don't suck!" and I would say "well sweetie...your grades still suck." He walked in today with a HUGE smile on his face and a swagger to his step, announcing the my engagement is not the biggest news of the day: his mom gave him his phone back. And then he interrupted me several times to tell me, with a huge smile on his face, that he got his phone back. Ten minutes into the movie I look over and he's staring at his lap. I called him out and said "you wanna lose it the day you get it back?" He's been dutifully watching the movie since then.

Cake Boss and such.

Last week was Spring Break, and this week has been sketchy at best. Not one teacher wanted to be there Monday for the Teacher Work Day, and not one student wanted to be back yesterday. Yesterday was rough. Lots of attitude all around. I literally had a student say "It feels like the year is over." Yeah. There's only NINE weeks of school left, but they've all checked out. Every single one of them. I thought I could expect this after the SOL, not this soon. Today was more fun, though. I worked them fairly hard today - with Dr. Seuss, sure, but I made them work - and then let them run wild for about 20 minutes. Turns out that was a good call...but it also created some funny conversations.

While my 4th block had free time, they all ended up talking about the Hunger Games. They've all read through the series at different places, and they were all discussing the end of Mockingjay even though they haven't all gotten there yet. One boy who's in the middle of Catching Fire kept freaking out when someone would spill something important. He had just gotten over freaking out about something really minor...there was a pause of silence in the room as everyone who had finished the series weighed the pros and cons...and then one brave soul said: "Prim dies." I thought that kid was going to have a heart attack and die right there on my floor.

Student 1: Algebra will never be used in the real world.
Student 2: Dude, all I need to know in life I learn from Cake Boss. I'm totally serious.

Student: My ears are great! [pretending to adjust his ears] I'm listening to the NFL right now!
Me: How's that off-season working out for you?
Whole class: OOOOOOOOHH!

[after reading Yertle the Turtle earlier in class]
Me: Stop trying to climb onto my filing cabinet!
Student: I'M TRYING TO BE YERTLE!