We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re studying the play version of The Diary of Anne Frank<\/i> in seventh grade right now, and yesterday, we were discussing the inconveniences of hiding for your life beyond the whole obvious \u00e2\u20ac\u0153you could die\u00e2\u20ac\u009d thing.<\/p>\n
We talked about how Anne\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s family and the Van Daans, who spent over two years hiding in some small rooms on the top floor of a warehouse, had to be very quiet during the day while people were working in the warehouse below, so as not to arouse suspicion. I was trying to paint the picture of how difficult the living conditions would have been, so I talked about things like not being able to talk, or look out the window, or cook, or even use the bathroom during business hours.<\/p>\n
Naturally, students were quick to point out that technically speaking, you might be able to \u00e2\u20ac\u0153go\u00e2\u20ac\u009d as long as you refrained from flushing.<\/p>\n
Good thing we flushed out that detail, I thought to myself without meaning to pun.<\/p>\n
And then one student asked the whopper of all questions, a question most noteworthy because of the sincere and genuinely inquisitive way in which it was asked.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Why couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t they just go on the floor?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
This is a question I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m 99.99% sure my high school students have never asked me, thanks be to God.<\/p>\n
And then, because I was stupid and frankly, a little frightened, I actually attempted to answer the question So I stumbled around with answering the obvious for a while, and then we moved on to greater things, like trying to refrain from pencil tapping while reading. It was a lesson fraught with small victories.<\/p>\n Later that day, as I reflected on the day\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s events, I realized something that might forever alter my entire self-image.<\/p>\n Y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122all, this is, in essence, what I do for a living. I get paid to teach the next generation, our bright shining hope for the future, why you shouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t micturate on the floor.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re studying the play version of The Diary of Anne Frank in seventh grade right now, and yesterday, we were discussing the inconveniences of hiding for your life beyond the whole obvious \u00e2\u20ac\u0153you could die\u00e2\u20ac\u009d thing. We talked about how Anne\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s family and the Van Daans, who spent over two years hiding in some small […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1023,1],"tags":[1581,1086,1580,1549,1578,1579],"class_list":["post-2519","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-education","category-islandlife","tag-funny-teaching-moments","tag-funny-things-kids-say","tag-my-job-makes-me-laugh","tag-teaching-middle-school","tag-things-middle-schoolers-say","tag-what-questions-will-the-middle-schoolers-ask-yes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.anislandmom.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2519","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.anislandmom.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.anislandmom.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.anislandmom.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.anislandmom.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2519"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.anislandmom.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2519\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.anislandmom.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2519"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.anislandmom.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2519"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.anislandmom.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2519"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}in case I might be single-handedly responsible for preventing the next bubonic plague<\/del> as if it were a rational one. While doing this, there rose large in my mind a mental picture of the horror of a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153What if?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d situation where I would be stuck in hiding with someone who didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t understand why relieving oneself on the floor might not be the best possible course of action. Any of you ever tried to stifle the gag reflex while continuing to talk?<\/p>\n