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Saturday, February 09, 2019

Shine


Shine
On Thursday, after debriefing the warm-up and introducing the lesson on isotopes I made a proposition to the eighth grade:
“Last year the eighth grade walked the entire jog-a-thon! Anyone of you who runs the whole time today will earn a cookie! If you run with me, I will give you two!” One boy blurted out, “What if we beat you, can we get three?” I quickly calculate the possibility. “Sure!” I spread the news to both the sixth and seventh grades as they lined up in their advisories to walk over to the course. “One cookie if you run the whole time, two cookies if you run with me!”
Taz is the only one who keeps walking in late. He’s the only one who lost his paper, again. He’s the only one who forgot his pencil. He’s the only one who needs another periodic table. He’s the only one who keeps standing up and walking around the room. He’s the only one who keeps talking four seconds after I call for the class’s attention. He’s the only one who has three “M”s, “missing” assignments, in the gradebook three weeks into semester two. He’s the only one who took my offer.
He did not take it right away, but after a few loops around the block course. He was in the wolf pack of eighth graders bulging off the sidewalk and into the gutter. A few of them called out at me, “I ran three laps, do I get my cookie?” I reply, “You need to keep running to get a cookie!” No one budges from the pile of boy. The pace remains snail. I weave right and left to get around the mass of hoodies. I give them a couple of cheers anyway, “8th grade!” and “keep going!” I run past them. However, one pink hoodie emerges from the pack. “OK, Ms. Bascom, for a cookie”.  It’s Taz.
He cranks up the pace, running on my shoulder. Together we dodge an army of seventh grade girls and another row of seventh grade boys. “Try-hards!” they call out at us. “Trying is good!” I yell back. My own seventh grade son coaches me daily on not saying geeky things like that. In the moment, it just slipped out. Now that I have a running partner, I feel a bit less geeky not being the only try-hard runner at the middle school jog-a-thon. After four laps, my eighth grade running partner has a steady breath and determined pace but the rose shade of his cheeks makes me encourage him to lose his pink hoodie. “Yeah, I will, on the next loop”, he tells me. We coast into the water station where he hurls his hoodie into the arms of some kids who have stopped early to redeem their PowerAde. He tells me, “I think I can go another couple”. I think we have been going for over thirty minutes. Every loop we make his English, Spanish and Math teachers shriek in delight. You guys are still running!!!! They call out in disbelief.
Two more loops, were in a nice rhythm, no one has called times-up yet. We are still running shoulder-to-shoulder after we circle twice more. I tell him, “I think I heard them say five more minutes back there. Can you keep this up?” “Yeah, I think so” he replies. We keep on. There are still clusters of kids walking the circuit. It’s much better than sitting in class but not one of them earned a cookie under my criteria. Except for Taz. He earned two cookies.
The next day, at recess he came to find me in the yard. “Ms. Bascom do I get my cookies?” “Yes! You do!” But, you have to wait until lunch. Third period, my planning period, I run over to Berkeley Bowl. They have giant chocolate chip cookies, the size of your head. “That one”, I point and the woman opens the glass case and puts it into a waxed paper bag. Back at school, fourth period finishes up, it’s lunch time. There’s Taz with his cronies, he is begging for their lunches. I hand him his prize. Another boy says to me, “hey you said you would bake it!” I admitted not to be able to wake up early enough this morning to bake it myself. Taz accepted the cookie with a smile and thanked me. Then I made him go upstairs to his locker and give me his assessment he forgot to turn in, yesterday.