The thing I've most enjoyed throughout this experience has been the role reversal. I remember sitting where they were, thinking about how boring and pointless it was to learn Spanish. I remember thinking of harmless schemes to take up the teacher's time and delay the lesson, passing notes to friends and hounding teachers to watch movies or play games instead of doing grammar activities. Throughout this trip I've gotten to know a whole new generation of schemers.
Take Fran for instance. Fran is easily one of my worst students. He is also one of my favorites. Fran is a tall, dark 14-year-old prankster who spends most of the class trying to learn anything except English. I think that's one of his most endearing qualities, his light-hearted disregard for classroom discipline. Every time I have class with Fran he will move from the back of the classroom to the very front, so he is basically underneath me as I teach. He doesn't usually care if I'm talking or if I'm answering other questions, he'll tug on my sleeve until I stop and listen to him. Often his questions will have nothing to do with the lecture and are Spanish variations of:
"Riiiichard, do you have enough chalk? Should I go get some more?" (this is a weekly question)
"Riiiichard, can we play chess?" (also a weekly question)
"Richard, I have to go to the bathroom again."
"Richard, do you like Reggaeton or house music?"
"Richard, do you like Real Madrid or Barcelona?"
"Richard, how do you say 'gracias' in English?" (he occasionally mixes it up with other basic phrases that I know he knows already.)
"Richard, how do you say 'which way is the weigh room?'"
"Richard, what does 'dildo' mean?" (or any other inappropriate word he can think of)
He will ask me just about anything as long as it distracts me from the lesson. They're always innocent questions for the most part, which is the cleverest part of his masquerade. I can never get angry at what he says because most of the time it's hilarious and harmless, but he is a master of delaying and distracting the class. He'll walk up to the board and start drawing something or he'll make ridiculously enormous paper airplanes (one was the size of a desk) or he'll make a tower out of whatever he has handy. His best trick of all though is that he toes the line, but he never crosses it. There are kids who hit each other in class, refuse to read, openly talk throughout the entire class, refuse to participate even with basic activities and there are some who get up and run around. Fran never does anything blatantly disrespectful. He knows what he's doing and how to throw a wrench in the works without getting in trouble.
Fran was also the first student to make me feel truly welcome in a non-ironic way. There are a handful of students who say hello to me just because my accent is funny, but then there are a lot who are genuinely happy to see me. Fran leads this list. I can't walk past him without getting a high-five or being interrogated about my weekend. He'll always ask if I'm coming to class even when he already knows the answer is 'yes.' I can't help but see a little bit of myself in this kid. He's definitely a schemer, but he's totally non-malicious in his actions. I think it is these more mischievous students that have become my favorites and they will be the ones that will be hardest to say goodbye to. They're the one's who make every workday interesting and in many ways they're the one's who make it fun.
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