Little Boys in a Grown-Up World
Aside from the ridiculous drama and bullshit currently going down at school #430, I was recently really affected by two separate instances of violence with my students. Both were outside of school, but both of the guys, two of my favorites, were pretty severely hurt, emotionally and physically.
The first happened last Friday, when Larry came in first period looking incredibly pissed off. He was breathing really heavily and I could tell that he was about to snap at any minute. I planned to take him out to the hallway to see what was up, but before I could, he raised his hand and asked if he could go to the nurse. Up until then, he had kept his hands covered, so I didn't notice that his fingers and knuckles were all cut up and he had a slash across the back of his hand. I sent him down to the nurse, and he came back towards the end of class with his wounds bandaged up.
I caught him at the door and took him outside to find out what had happened. He was still really upset, and when he told me that he had been in a fight he broke down and started crying. Eventually it came out that he had been in an argument with his step-father who attacked him on his way out the door to school. They apparently fought for a while and Larry got pretty beaten up. He was incredibly upset by the whole thing and said it was the worst thing he's ever had to do in his life. This was the first time in six months that I've ever seen Larry look so defeated.
I found out about the second occurance today, when Cornel came in after being out since last Tuesday. As he was coming in, I asked him where he had been since I hadn't been able to get ahold of him since then, and he muffled to me he didn't want to talk about it before class. As he was walking away, he raised his lips to show me that his front teeth had been bashed in and shattered, and he had a wire holding the remaining pieces in place. His teeth were so jagged and disfigured that there was no way this was done by just a fist.
So at lunch Cornel came to talk to me about it and he told me he had gotten jumped and was in a fight with another guy on his block. I know Cornel's mother well, and communicate with her by email at least once a week - Cornel doesn't come from a really rough area, so it must have been over something pretty big. He wouldn't tell me the details, but just talking about the whole thing got him really shaken up.
Every once in a while you have these moments when you realize that your toughest student is just another kid. Both Larry and Cornel are incredibly smart young men with badass fronts, but it's violence like this that shows they're not much more than a couple of little boys trapped in a grown-up world.
_________________________
Added MARCH 7, 2006 at 8:17 pm
So after hearing some more serious stories from other students and teachers, I talked to Cornel today to find out what really happened. I was right - his teeth were not broken because of a fist fight. Apparently after getting jumped, he was pistol whipped and then smashed in the face with the butt of a gun. Though it was what I was expecting, it certainly wasn't any easier to hear from one of my favorite students...
The first happened last Friday, when Larry came in first period looking incredibly pissed off. He was breathing really heavily and I could tell that he was about to snap at any minute. I planned to take him out to the hallway to see what was up, but before I could, he raised his hand and asked if he could go to the nurse. Up until then, he had kept his hands covered, so I didn't notice that his fingers and knuckles were all cut up and he had a slash across the back of his hand. I sent him down to the nurse, and he came back towards the end of class with his wounds bandaged up.
I caught him at the door and took him outside to find out what had happened. He was still really upset, and when he told me that he had been in a fight he broke down and started crying. Eventually it came out that he had been in an argument with his step-father who attacked him on his way out the door to school. They apparently fought for a while and Larry got pretty beaten up. He was incredibly upset by the whole thing and said it was the worst thing he's ever had to do in his life. This was the first time in six months that I've ever seen Larry look so defeated.
I found out about the second occurance today, when Cornel came in after being out since last Tuesday. As he was coming in, I asked him where he had been since I hadn't been able to get ahold of him since then, and he muffled to me he didn't want to talk about it before class. As he was walking away, he raised his lips to show me that his front teeth had been bashed in and shattered, and he had a wire holding the remaining pieces in place. His teeth were so jagged and disfigured that there was no way this was done by just a fist.
So at lunch Cornel came to talk to me about it and he told me he had gotten jumped and was in a fight with another guy on his block. I know Cornel's mother well, and communicate with her by email at least once a week - Cornel doesn't come from a really rough area, so it must have been over something pretty big. He wouldn't tell me the details, but just talking about the whole thing got him really shaken up.
Every once in a while you have these moments when you realize that your toughest student is just another kid. Both Larry and Cornel are incredibly smart young men with badass fronts, but it's violence like this that shows they're not much more than a couple of little boys trapped in a grown-up world.
_________________________
Added MARCH 7, 2006 at 8:17 pm
So after hearing some more serious stories from other students and teachers, I talked to Cornel today to find out what really happened. I was right - his teeth were not broken because of a fist fight. Apparently after getting jumped, he was pistol whipped and then smashed in the face with the butt of a gun. Though it was what I was expecting, it certainly wasn't any easier to hear from one of my favorite students...
posted by Tom at 2:03 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home