Aliens Are Short and Cute - and Sometimes Nerve-Wracking

I think I know why Wednesdays always seem to find me too exhausted to post. I believe I've found the answer that has stumped us all  me these past few weeks. 


Aliens.




Yup. Aliens.




Remember back awhile when I said that I felt like aliens my third graders were sucking the life out of me? Well, y'all, what if they ARE???? I think I may be on the verge of discovering all those government secrets of Area 51 or 53 or whatever - you know, Roswell, where the aliens crashed way back in the 1900's? I think those little aliens DID crash there, then took over the minds of several folks, who then reproduced, but then the government figured out what was going on and they were all like, "We've got to do something about this," but then the scientist folks were all, "No, wait, we should USE these things to our advantage and study them," so the government started this program and here we are decades later, and my third graders are aliens. How 'bout that, y'all! Isn't that something? I know some of you doubters out there will need proof, and boy do I have it...just look:


*Even after all these years, they still do not completely understand our language. I mean, look at what I go through day after day when trying to communicate with them:


                                       ~ When I tell them to sit down, many of them continue to walk around the room as though I never said a word!

                                      ~ When I tell them to walk quietly down the hall in a line, they will often form small groups or "clumps" and chit chat in normal tone voices until I freak out and "SHHHHHUSH" them in my loudest shush. And then we repeat the whole pattern again a few moments later.

                                    ~ When I distinctly say, and then write the page number of the book we're opening up for our lesson, 95% of them ask repeatedly, "What page?"

                                    ~ Every day the morning routines and board work are posted on the dry erase board. #1 is ALWAYS "Turn in your folder and put away your backpack." Inevitably 1-2 students will NOT turn in their folders and there's always 2 or 3 backpacks on the floor or near the desks instead of where they belong!

                                   ~ They can be given an assignment to read a certain passage. That passage might contain the words, "Matter is anything that takes up space and has mass," for example. They may, for example, have a question that asks, "What is matter?" They will tell you the answer is NOT on that page and that they've read it two or three times. What the heck?!

*Their eyes apparently have functions that have less to do with actual vision than ours do. Here's more evidence:


                                 ~ Even my own children have this problem: THEY        DON'T       SEE        MESSES. They just don't. It's like their brains "erase" any sort of messiness that we see. I can tell a student to clean up the mess around and on her desk and she'll claim it is clean, despite the huge pile of paper clippings, broken erasers, crayon stubs with no paper on them, shredded crayon paper (hmmm, wonder how THAT got there?), pencils, and a few unidentifiable (OMG - could it be alien paraphernalia??) odds and ends that surround and completely cover her desk.

                                ~ A student can swear he doesn't have a particular book in his desk and swear I must've never given him one (true, stranger things have happened), leaving me to scramble to find a spare one to give him so we can continue on with our lesson.....only to realize that the very book he's looking for is sitting RIGHT ON HIS DESK.......................OUT IN PLAIN SIGHT..............NOT COVERED UP BY ANYTHING............EASILY SPOTTED BY ADULT NON-ALIENS.

*They hate to wear foot coverings of any kind...even in the bathroom where GOD ONLY KNOWS WHAT THEY MIGHT BE STEPPING IN/ON IN THERE. 

True story - I've had to punish several of my aliens students for this infraction. See, they take their shoes off when we're walking the track after lunch and as we come in the building, we pass the bathrooms, so obviously, being a whiz at time management (NOT), I have them stop by to use the restroom on our way back to the room. The only problem is that several of them "forget" to put their shoes back on before going into the germ-crawling, pee-covered floors of the restroom. Ugh. Feeling a little sick just thinking about it.......breathe......breathe......breathe.....


*They believe their pencils MUST be sharp enough to perform surgery with EVERY time they use them.

This one makes me nervous. Could it be they are stockpiling weapons in order to take over the school and then the world? A sharp pencil can be deadly you know.

Okay, I made that last part up, but sharp pencils DO hurt when you get poked with one. I would know. I've had my share of run-ins with razor-sharp pencils over the years.

*Bathrooms are a place of ritualistic behaviors, including (but not limited to: roughhousing, jumping, running, SCREAMING, GIGGLING, slamming doors, splashing water, and other general areas of play). 

Yes, I know. I DO NOT teach kindergarten. I DO NOT teach toddlers or preschoolers. I teach aliens third graders. And this is what third graders do in the bathroom. Again, more evidence, I believe, of alien behavior. Perhaps this is their way to communicate with the Mother Ship? They create a ruckus in one bathroom, where I go to investigate & SHHUUUUSHSHSHSHSH them, while the aliens in the other bathroom make contact. That way they can't get caught in their communications, since they know I don't have the ability to be in two places at once. Speaking of which, I wonder if they can do that and if they can, would they teach me?


*Last but not least, my final bit of evidence that third graders are aliens: They plan to slowly take over my mind after I've completely lost it. I doubt I have to give you any other reasons as to why I might lose my mind, but I'll indulge you once more: they plan to make me go insane by talking to me all at one time. And boy do they do it, too. At any given moment during the day, I may have 5 aliens students surrounding me (literally IN MY PERSONAL SPACE), talking all at once as though I am listening only to them, while another one continuously taps me on the shoulder while saying my name over and over and over again, while yet another 3-7 simply call out my name over all the others. 


I rest my case. I am surrounded by aliens that are trying to make me crazy crazier by using odd tactics and practices that regularly blow my mind. 


That's okay. I'm not scared. 


You can't scare me. 
I'm a teacher.