For a living, I substitute teach. I am looking into becoming a full time teacher, but really that's not interesting in of itself. The interesting part is subbing.
Everyone remembers days when they had subs in school. It meant free period. Pop in "The Sandlot" or "Apollo 13" and chat with your friends about what Kimberly said to Jason between classes and how Billy and Trini kissed last night at the movie (and yes, I just went Power Rangers on your ass). I, as a little delinquent at that time, knew it meant fresh meat for me to screw with ("Teacher always lets us listen to our Walkmen during class.")
So before I walk into a room, I know its going to be lots of little delinquents trying to do the same kinds of things to me. Which is fine with me, because I can argue logic till the blind cows come home (take them longer than the regular cows), and I will always catch the students in their lies, and then point out to them how bad and obvious their lies were. But again, I digress from my story.
I don't know if it is because I am a man, because I'm younger than most teachers and subs, because I'm 6'2" 260 lbs, or they just want to waste time, but students always seem interested in me (which works, because I'm pretty interested in me too). It also doesn't seem to matter what grade level either, but middle school more than anyone. After my third or fourth day of subbing, I realized that I could use this to my advantage, so I tell my students that if they work quietly and get all their work done, I will let them ask me appropriate questions in the free time.
So this one class I am in is 8th grade English, and I was there for a full week. The first two days, they didn't have any free time, so by the third day, they are DYING to ask me questions. The questions are pretty basic: How old are you?, Are you married?, Where did you go to school?, favorite sport teams, etc. By the end of the third day, I had been through 5 classes and each had gotten their question time. My last class of the day was the honors class, and I am always a little more relaxed with honors kids anyways. So one of the girls asks me "Do you like Twilight?" to which I reply "No. I would rather gag myself with a spoon than read any of those books or see those movies." Being that there was a high female population in this class, this statement causes an uproar. The girls are shocked and upset, the men are agreeing (loudly as to be heard over the girls). I finally calm them back down and explain "First of all, I am not a 13 year old girl, so those books just aren't written for me, but more importantly, for the last 1800 years, vampires have turned to dust when they go out into the sun, not sparkled so it is a little late to change that now." Again, an uproar defending sparkling vampires. Once the class starts to calm down, one girl in the back goes "That's not true. My brother is 24 and he's read all the Twilight books and likes them." And without missing a beat I reply "So in other words, he's gay."
Not exactly the smartest thing to say to a group of middle schoolers, ESPECIALLY if you're the sub. The class is in complete chaos. There are LITERALLY kids falling out of their chairs they are laughing so hard. I am trying desperately to both not laugh and think about what my new job will be once I'm fired. I finally get the class calmed down and say "I'm really sorry. That was a joke, but completely inappropriate. I'm sure your brother is not gay, not that there's anything wrong with that, and I am truly sorry."
Thankfully, she didn't tell her parents and I didn't lose my job, so I am sure there will be plenty more stories for me to tell.
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