Day 2 – September 2

Nick’s Point of View

I walked into the classroom. Today I was properly dressed. I had on a pair of khaki pants and a blue button down shirt. It probably wasn’t as dressed up as Miss Abbott would have like, but I was doing my best. I didn’t own nerdy teaching clothes.

“Mr. Carter, you are late. Miss Abbott is going to be mad.” Anastasia told me.

“Miss Abbott sent me to make copies in the office.” I showed her the stack of papers. Anastasia huffed and walked away.

I set the papers down and stood there watching the students quietly come in. I was going to try to learn the names of the children. Miss Abbott said that it would be a good idea to get to know the students.

I walked over to a table. The students were working on printing the letter m.

“That is a very nice m, Missy.” I made sure to look at her nametag.

“Thanks. My sister has your face on her wall.”

“Why are you on her wall, Mr. Cart?”

“Umm…well…when I’m not helping in your room, I sing. It’s Mr. Carter, Freddy.”

“Don’t call me Freddy.  GGGGGRRRRR!”  He growled like a tiger at me. I decided to move to another table.

“Wow, Emma! You have beautiful handwriting.”

The little girl did not look up. She continued printing perfect letter m’s.

“Mr. Carter.” A little boy called me over.

“Yes, Jake.”

“Emma doesn’t talk. She’s very smart, but doesn’t talk to anyone. She’s my cousin. I love her but she doesn’t talk.” He whispered in my room.

“Thanks buddy. Maybe we can help her use her words.”

I felt sad for Emma. What would cause a little girl to not want to talk? Did she go through some type of trauma? Was she abused or did she have speech issues? I would talk to Miss Abbott about Emma.

“Mr. Carter, would you check their papers, while I teach morning math and morning circle? Then you can cut out these shapes for math class tomorrow.” She hand me a stack of shapes that needed cut out.

“No problem Miss Abbott.”

I settled myself at my small desk and got to work.

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“Okay, class quietly walked back to your seats.” Miss Abbott had the students clean up their learning centers and sent them back to their tables.

“Miss Abbott, can I pass out my snacks. I brought grapes, pretzels and juice boxes.” A dark haired boy asked.

“Yes, Max. Please pick two helpers. Nick will give each kid a squirt of hand sanitizer.”

I walked around the room giving each child a squirt of hand sanitizer.

“Thank you Mr. Carter for the hanitizer.”

“You are welcome Jake.”

I walked over to Emma’s table she was sitting quietly not looking at anyone in the classroom. I bent down and looked her in the eye.

“Emma, please hold out your hands.”

She quickly held out her hands. I kneeled and squirted some hand sanitizer into her little hands. Emma did not look at me. I tried to get her to look my way, but she made no contact with me. I smiled at her and moved on. I was going to get her to acknowledge me.

A few minutes later the snack was passed out. The kids were eating and chatting quietly. Miss Abbott walked over to me.

“Mr. Carter, you are doing a better job today. I am quite pleased with what I see.”

“Thanks Miss Abbott. I’m really trying hard. What’s up with Emma?”

“Her parents say that she has withdrawn for the past two years. Everything was fine and one day she just stopped talking and tuned people out. They have her in therapy, but so far nothing has worked. She is very bright and understands what is going on. She just won’t talk or interact with people.”

“That has to be hard for her parents. Is there anything that we can do to help?” I watched Emma as we talked. She sat at her table nibbling on a pretzel. Everyone else at her table was chatting with one another.

“Just keep including her in the activities. I think its great how you keep talking to her and getting down at her level. You are doing great with her.”

“Miss Abbott, Tony’s head is stuck inside his shirt.” Anastasia yelled.

All the students at her table started laughing and jumping around. Tony was flailing around trying to get his head outside his shirt. He started putting his head into the sleeve and jumping around as he did it. Miss Abbott quickly walked over to him.

“Tony, freeze.”

Tony kept jumping around and wouldn’t listen.

“Tony Little, please stop.” Miss Abbott raised her voice a little.

He stopped, but his head was still inside his shirt. Miss Abbott quickly helped Tony fix his shirt.

“Tony, you know we don’t wear our shirt that way. You could have gotten hurt or hurt someone else. Please think about your choices. Go sit at the time out table and think about it.”

Tony stomped over to the table. He started to cry. Then he started to howl. It was a full blown out meltdown. I don’t think anyone could hear Miss Abbott reading the story. I was getting a headache. I quietly walked over to the table and sat next to Tony.

“Tony, can you stop crying for a minute and listen to me.”

He looked at me as tears ran down his face.

“It’s not fun getting in trouble. Miss Abbott wasn’t trying to be mean.”

“But she yelled at me. I wasn’t doing anything bad.”

“She was worried about you. You could have gotten hurt. What if your head got stuck in your sleeve?”

“That would have been a problem.” He sniffled and wiped snot on his hand. I got up and grabbed him a tissue.

“Exactly. Miss Abbott cares about you and doesn’t want to see you get hurt. You made a bad choice, but next time you know that it is unsafe to do that.”

“I don’t want to make no more bad choices. I’ll go tell Miss Abbott.” He got up and ran over to Miss Abbott.