My sister-in-law gave me, for my prize drawer, a box of her old high school trophies: several music trophies, a marble piano award, a couple plaques, a couple field hockey trophies, and even a student of the year trophy. They all have her name on them, and the year awarded, which was when my students were all about three years old.
Earlier this week, after an intense practice of the keyword reading strategy that I teach, several of these (among other) prizes were claimed:
The student whose parents unbelievably stick up for him through all of his wildly inappropriate conduct grabbed the hugest of them all, the 1997-1998 Student of the Year trophy. “I’m going to show this to my mom,” he said.
One little girl snatched up a field hockey trophy. When I asked her, today, what she did with it, she said she took it home and put it on her trophy shelf.
And then there’s my Honors student who hasn’t gotten her act together for much of this year. She took the “Annie” Director’s Award plaque. “I showed it to my mom,” she told me, “and before she read it, she was all excited. But when she read it, she was like, ‘Uhh…'”
I might be getting an award soon, I hope I hope I hope. Another student of mine, whose dad once summoned me to court and who on Monday donated his aluminum foil “intellect magnifier” (most other students called it his “thinking cap”) to my prize drawer in exchange for a pottery cup, asked me today, “What’s your favorite kind of pie?”
“Strawberry rhubarb,” I told him.
I would consider that kind of gift quite a prize.
