La Cucaracha

I love Test Day. The quiet, the intensity of the students’ motivation, the quiet, the focus, the part where I don’t have to do anything…but, really, mostly the quiet. Last Friday was just one of those test days. It had been a long and hectic week, full of pre-Halloween anticipatory madness and post-Halloween sugary hangovers. By the time Test Day arrived, we were all ready for a calm day. And so it went. I answered last minute questions, gave the requisite schpiel about cheating, and passed out the exams. The kids began working, I made a few rounds to make sure everyone was on track, no problem. Everything went flawlessly. 

Then, for the first time since last Test Day, I sat down. In my classroom. While students were there. I was savoring the moment, taking some deep breaths, thinking maybe teaching wasn’t so bad, when a sweet little girl in the front row raised her hand politely. I looked up, and she very sweetly asked, “¿Cómo se dice ‘cockroach’ en español?”

I wasn’t sure why she was writing her mini-essay about cockroaches, but 6^th graders definitely do weirder things. “La cucaracha,” I replied.

If my classroom was New Orleans, this cockroach is Hurricane Katrina

 

Simultaneously, and without any warning whatsoever, exactly half of my class erupted from their seats and stampeded to the corner of the room. It was like someone flashed a gang sign and they all went to war. Or the moment when they raise the gates at the horse races.  “Iwannakillit!Iwannakillit!” ”Lemmesquishim!Lemmesquishim!” “Canistompitpleasescanistompit” ”Diemonsterdiiiie!” “deathtocockrooooooooach!” “Aaaaaaaaaaaahh!” 

Not to be outdone, the other half of the class burst into song. Yes, song. “La cucharacha! La cucaracha!” One even got up and began dancing the cha-cha. They were like spectators at a gladiator event, only more musical.

 

During the .003 seconds that it took for this chaos to erupt, and in the ensuing 15 seconds it took my brain to catch up with what happened, I just sat in my seat. It was Test Day. I was supposed to be allowed to sit. I thought. Is this what anarchy is like? What just happened? Why are they singing? Did that kid just do a victory dance? Oh please don’t take your shirt off. Does this mean I have to get up?

I’m not proud to say that I just sat there for a minute and watched this all unfold. And then maybe another minute. (Hey, I don’t like cockroaches, ok? I figured I might as well let them kill it first.)  When finally I resigned myself to the fact that I wouldn’t be relaxing this Test Day, I reluctantly got up and made my way toward the madness. So long, chair. Maybe next Test Day. Oh crap, is that the door I hear? Is one of them escaping? Oh, good, it’s just… administration? Oh poop.

That’s right. The admin chose this lovely moment to drop in for a visit. Maybe it was the smell of bloodlust in the air, or perhaps they heard the chanting and beating of drums, I don’t know. But drop in they did, and what a snapshot of my classroom management they took! 

I have yet to receive a pink slip, though, so they either know what “cucaracha” means and pieced together what was going on, or they were as exhausted from Halloween week as I was and didn’t notice. I mean, at least the kids were singing in Spanish, right? 

But the most impressive part of this story is that, even after being repeatedly kicked, stomped, squished, and smeared by a horde of crazy 6^th graders, that cockroach lived. It lived long enough to crawl back under the wall where it came from, only to reappear a day later during my 6^th period class, missing legs and all. But that’s a tale for another day.