Robo-dance

Disciplinary issues are still a point of contention in my classroom. I thought I had seen it all last year, but this year there's a whole new crop of problems. One new issue is that a few of my students can't help but dance. It looks to be some new strain of ADHD: these kids are physically incapabale of sitting still and will be doing dance move from their seats, or in some cases, get out of their seats to do the dance moves, right in the middle of a lesson. Interestingly, this handful of dancing students are exclusively male. At this point in time, it's cool for teenage boys to perform choreographed routines to impress others with their moves. I find it cool as well, just not during instructional time. I feel as though things have reached new levels of absurdity when I find my most frequent reprimand to be "Stop dancing and work!" It's as though I'm the un-hip authoritarian in Footloose. To counteract some of the impromptu dance moves in my jiggiest class, I've actually agreed to learn a couple of steps from their favorite dance at the end of each day that they have behaved. I like to dance, but I can't follow steps for the life of me, so it ends up being fairly embarrassing, but I recognize that's kind of the point for these kids and I'm willing to make that trade off.

As I was explaining this strange scenario to one of my coworkers, this teacher told me about eir student who constantly acts like a robot. Apparently, this kid speaks using a cyber voice, employs jerky arm movements, and randomly beeps. Furthermore, Robo-kid is always in character, even when the other students yell at em to stop and get a life. Clearly, Robo-kid either has major guts or perhaps has been hardwired to be a facsimile of a human with such qualities. At first, the teacher found it amusing, then annoying as the joke wore thin, and now just normal since it happens all the time. According to the teacher, it's become so routine that it's hardly disruptive anymore. The only problem was when the principal came to evaluate the teacher and included a note in the formal write-up about not allowing students to "behave like robots." Try explaining that one.

At least my kids aren't that eccentric. They're too concerned with their image to portray themselves as cyborgs. The only robot I imagine I'll be seeing in my classroom is the dance move.