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.