A couple weeks ago:
Student: "So mista, was Shakespeare's time back when they had, like, castles and dragons and everything?"
Me: "You mean like everyone was walking their pet dragons around?"
Student: "Yeah."
Me: "Ah, no, that's more medieval times, which was like 0 - 1300. Shakespeare was in the 1600s."
Student: "Zero, no way. That was like cavemen and stuff."
Me: [pause] "Good luck on that Global History Regents exam."
Student: "Huh? I already passed that."
Today (Not sure what's up with the Shakespeare theme):
Student: "Mista, we're reading MacBeth. That shit is mad boring. Did you ever read MacBeth?"
Me: "Yeah, I read it in middle school."
Student: "Middle school (eyes wide)? Damn, that book must be old."
Also today (no Shakespeare here, but still worth it):
Student 1: "Shit, I'm hungry. I'm gonna go get a Pepsi with my benefit card." (the fact that the Pepsi was going to constitute her lunch is not really germane to the story, but is an interesting side note.)
Student 2: "Yo, that benefit card is the shit. I used to be embarrassed to use it, but now I just roll in like, 'What!', swipe."
Student 3: "For real, it's hot. You got a benefit card, mista?"
Me: "What are you even talking about?"
Student 1: "Son, you get a benefit card, then you go to the grocery and just swipe it and you don't got to give any money."
Student 2: "Yeah, but you can't O.D. on it. You gotta get food. You can't go to the grocery and get like plates and shit."
Me: "Where do you get it from?"
Student 2: "From the government."
Student 3: "You should get one mista. All hispanic people have them."
Me: "I don't think it has anything to do with being hispanic."
Student 3: "All the hispanic people I know have them."
Me: "So, is there a limit or can you get as much food as you want?"
Student 2: "No, there's a limit, but you don't ever really reach it. I think it's like 600."
Me: "Can you roll over the money?"
Student 1: "I think you can. Also if you want to you can get cash with it."
Student 2: "Word, we get the food and then my mom gets the 100 cash."
Me: "So, everyone in your family has a card to use whenver they want?"
Student 2: "No, it has my mom's picture on it. But I can just go and use it."
Student 1: "Yeah, my mom's picture is on mine. But she didn't like the picture she had on it so she went and got another one."
Me: "Your mom didn't like the picture on her benefit card so she went and got a new one?"
Student 1: "Yeah."
6 comments:
If he thinks "Macbeth" is boring, wait'll he reads "All's Dull That Ends Dull," am I right?!?!?!?!
Your students assume you're Hispanic?
Amazing anecdotes, by the way.
Well, they all think I'm hispanic at the beginning of the year, so they always ask me, "Mista, where you from?", to which I reply, "New Jersey".
Then I tell them I'm half black and half white and they are fascinated for about 4 seconds.
Then eventually, days or weeks later, it comes up that my wife is Dominican and then they treat me like I'm Dominican.
Actually, also today this one kid, who represented a small contingent of 3 or 4 says to me, "Mista, if you could choose to be all black or all white, which would you choose?"
Obviously I said, "I don't have to choose, I get the best of both worlds. Like Miley Cyrus."
And a precursor to that conversation was that the same group of kids asked me if being a math teacher was my first choice of profession. I had said that since I didn't make the NBA, being a math teacher was second. So then after my snarky Miley Cyrus comment I said, "Maybe if I was all black I could have made the NBA."
It was an interesting day all around.
God I miss Newtown.
Best Post.
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