Mariela
Mariela was a fourteen-year old Guatemalan girl assigned to my sophomore English as a Second Language class. She was short, had a chubby body, and a wide face with features that looked as though they were stuck between childhood and adolescence. She carried a hello kitty keychain, pastel sparkle pens with tassels on the end and a pack of Newport cigarettes. She wore colorful barrettes in her hair that was usually held up with pom-pom elastic bands wrapped around each pigtail. She toted everything in a fuchsia Dora the Explorer back pack that was large enough to fit one small notebook, lip gloss, her fancy pens and what would soon become the infamous photo album. Mini mind, body and bag Mariela sat in class showing off her photo album to the girls sitting around her.
Like many students, she must have thought that hiding the photo album on her lap made it invisible to the eyes of anyone other than those intended to see it. At first I ignored it, choose your battles is what my mentor teacher instructed. I figured she would show the pictures for a few minutes then return to the lesson in which she was supposed to be learning English. She had not said much since I met her a few weeks earlier. Some might claim she was in the silent face of language acquisition and I may have agreed until I realized that she had no problems calling me a “stupid bitch” in both English and Spanish. On those frequent occasions, Mariela certainly was not silent.
Ten minutes later the photo album continued to circulate the room. My strategy to ignore the problem backfired. It was now a distraction that had to be addressed. While I was planning how exactly to deal with the issue, I realized that she was showing pictures of her and her thirty-year old boyfriend. “I always knew I would have an older man”, she exclaimed glowing. “I don’t have time for these high school boys”, she gloated. The other girls leaned in with heightened interest. “I want an older boyfriend too”, one girl chimed in. Another conferred in admiration, “Oh, I wish I was you”. The conversation spread quickly like pollution through the airwaves. Mariela’s photo album went from a minimal nuisance to a serious social problem in a matter of minutes. I knew that if I did not put a stop to this it would become contagious like pregnancy or criminal behavior. Dora the Explorer back packs and thirty-year old men just did not go together. She reluctantly gave it to me with the agreement that I would return it later.
At the end of the period Mariela approached my desk demanding for her precious photos. She must thought that later meant when the bell rang, but she was sadly mistaken. I explained that later meant when I could talk with her mother about the fact that her daughter was dating a man more than double her age. I placed the photo album inside my desk drawer thinking that our discussion was over. To my surprise, Mariela didn’t think it was over and within seconds she swatted the coffee mug from my desk. Hot, brown liquid splattered as the glass shattered into pieces on the floor. Her rampage continued as she proceeded to take out her frustrations on my crates of files. One by one she picked up each heavy crate and heaved it on the floor with the strength I did not expect from this little girl. Folders and papers flew through the air and soon floated down to join the coffee and glass. I stood in shock while students exiting the class looked at her and uttered one word to explain the situation, “loca”. They shook their heads, told me they would see me tomorrow and casually moved along to their next class.
After Mariela took her anger out on the classroom, she came for me. She attempted to throw her short, chubby over my desk, but her legs were not long enough to make the leap. She reconsidered and tried to get at me from each side of the desk. I bobbed and weaved to avoid her flailing arms and legs along with a slu of Spanish profanities. I realized that this could only continue for a short amount of time before it escalated into something much worse. It was clear that I needed some assistance. The options raced through my head. The halls were crowded with students passing to their next classes. The wing of the building where my classroom was located did not have a security guard, so calling out would not help. My only option would be to call the main office, yet the phone hung on the wall on the other side of the room. Quickly, I thought that the only way to get out of this situation was to call the office for help.
In teacher training they pounded in our heads never to touch a student, but this situation was surely different. There was nothing in the manual on how to deal with a student who was acting like a rabid animal intent on attacking me. So, I compromised. I did not touch Mariela, but instead I grabbed her Dora back pack and pushed her out the door into the hallway. Behind her the door closed and locked. Safe in my refuge I called the main office requesting an administrator. Mariella pounded on the glass with the force of something from Animal Planet trying to beat through the glass for what seemed like endless time. Her rant ceased a few minutes prior to the administrator’s arrival, just missing her. Maybe she got tired or perhaps noticed the door was locked and that she couldn’t shatter the glass. What I really hoped is that she realized that she was acting like a complete lunatic, but of course not because the next day she was back in my class calling me “puta tanta” for the next two months until she dropped out of school. Later, I heard that she was working at the McDonald’s drive thru window hopefully not serving hot coffee to unsuspecting customers.
What disciplinary measures were taken against her by the school?… by the police (if any, for attacking you and vandalizing your room damaging your property), and what happened when you informed her parents that she’d been seeing an older man? Did he get arrested for statutory rape? Did she get subsequent detentions for the name calling and insubordinate behavior after she remained your student? Seems like she should have been expelled.
Nothing happened! I was told that I shouldn’t have taken away her photo album and the parent never responded to any phone calls. That is why I was so compelled to write about it.
I cannot, for the life of me, comprehend why disrespectful behavior like this is tolerated at all. They should be immediately expelled at the first incidence. Period. No expulsion hearing, no litigation, nothing. You disrespect a teacher and you’re gone. End of discussion. We send the message that this behavior is perfectly ok and it is not. I see this and worse at Cross everyday and quite frankly, I’m sick of it. On the rare occasion I catch one of my students disrespecting a teacher, or myself, I escort them to my office, close the door and proceed to inform them that only people with low-self esteem and profound ignorance resort to such unacceptable belittling tactics to get attention. I explain that it’s their teachers who are probably the only adult figures in their lives who are doing their best to provide them with an opportunity not just to learn, but to better themselves. A few I get through to… most I do not but it’s not for lack of trying. They are just too blinded by their inflated, false sense of entitlement. This tactic may cost me my job one day but I refuse to let incidences like this go unnoticed.
And you though moving out of New Haven would alleviate these types of problems. I guess it’s much more prevalent than we initially thought. It’s so frustrating constantly fighting this uphill battle with little or no administrative support. I wish you luck my dear.
First, thank you so much for reading! You’re right, far too often we tolerate this disrespectful behavior; as a result, teachers feel powerless. I think that talking to the kids is the right idea. You aren’t saying anything that is untrue. Sometimes they just need to hear it because no one else has the nerve to tell them. Even the ones who you think aren’t listening hear you. I had a girl that I used to talk to everyday come back to me after graduation and apologize for never responding to me. She said that I might have thought she was ignoring me, but she heard every word I said. Like you said, for many of these students we are the only constant adult figures in their lives.
I ran into one of my “problem child” students in the grocery store a few years after she left school, and she too hugged me and apologized! She had ODD and severe behavior issues and was belligerent and would cuss me & everybody else out any chance she got. She was the product of a divorce and she had lived with one parent who let her do whatever she wanted. When I had her as a student she was with the other parent and did not want to be there because she didn’t like the restriction or the new town. So she tried everything possible to get kicked out of school so that she’d have to go back to her original home town. They know their behavior is inappropriate but either they don’t care because they are too immature to see how it will affect their future, or they pretend they don’t care because all they can do is exist in the moment, the here and now, and they need to get attention , acceptance, and “love’ any way they can, because to them the 4 years of high school are their whole life and they can’t see beyond that.
Excuse me while I get all philosophical for a moment… A major problem with today’s students is the lack of accountability placed on them by both parents and schools. The more the focus of bad behavior and suffering grades turns to the teachers, the more apathetic and badly behaved they will become. Students aren’t stupid, they know that there will be no consequences for their actions… we did that too when we were teenagers (pushed limits as far as we could)-the difference is, our limits weren’t boundless and we got consequences once we reached the limit!
It’s the thing that saddens me most. Our students have no idea of how to truly succeed in the real world.
I have a student who has mental and emotional issues. He is volatile and explodes for no reason. The students find it funny, so they push him into exploding, which to me, is bullying. I’ve called home about the issues–mom tells me he’s just bored in his classes (his literary analysis on Sula was about the aliens who came down from another planet) and I’ve spoken to admin. about the bullying and I was told that I must have poor classroom management skills. Another time, I had a bully in my class who would call all of the girls nasty names in Spanish and hit the smaller students in the head. When I reported him to admin, I was called a ‘cry baby’ and told that he just had a bad life. My response to that is… who hasn’t had a bad life? We don’t all go around beating other people up!
It saddens me.
You are exactly right! Saying someone has had a bad life to excuse negative behavior is just enabling. Otherwise, like you said, everyone could walk around inflicting harm on others and say it’s alright because they have had a bad life.
I think the larger problem that you have is the lack of administrative support (which is often the case). The war on teachers is just getting worse. Everything is the teacher’s fault and the teacher is forced to defend herself.
I had a kid the other day who was repeatedly called me stupid, idiot, stuck his tongue out at me. He’s 18 years old, but acts like he’s in elementary school. Well, finally the parent came in for a conference. Within the first few minutes she started defending her son’s behavior and asked me to apologize to him. She turned the whole situation around to point the finger at me. I don’t get paid enough to be attacked by a parent, so I got up and walked out.