A girl made my day this afternoon, so much so that I told her she did. A boy in the middle of the classroom was talking a bunch of baloney, which is nothing unusual at all. This is the kid who, after failing the first two quarters miserably, has turned a corner and somehow so far has an A in my class for the third quarter. But today he started talking and said to his classmates (loudly enough for me to hear of course), "Mister doesn't care if I keep my A or not. He doesn't care about me."

A girl in the back of the room got his attention and said to him very sternly, with a very serious look of concern on her face, "No. He DOES care about you."

It made my day.

Whether she meant it or not I couldn't tell, but she said it like she believed it was true. Maybe she believes it's true because the other week she and I spent a half hour after school figuring out a complex problem together that I had assigned for bonus points. And during that time after school I asked her if she was going to be a teacher, because she should be. She said no. I asked her if she was going to college, because she needs to. She said no. I gave her a hard time about that and told her she was much too smart to let it go to waste. She gave a bashful smirk and avoided eye contact and told me she'd think about it.

Maybe she believed what she was saying today in class. But even if she wasn't being serious, the way she said it so dry with sarcasm was priceless, and dry humor makes me just as proud as trying to defend the teacher. So, whatever the case, it still made my day.