ABC

I have this student, I’ll call her ABC, who has recently come to my attention.

She is in the 6th grade, one of the oldest in the class, yet acts like a 4 year old.  She does anything to not pay attention or do as the rest of the class is doing.

Last week, she came in with her hand bandaged up.  She sat in the chair for 40 minutes unwrapping and rewrapping her hand all the while making grimacing noises and long exaggerated pulls on the wrap so everyone was sure to notice that she had an injury.

Another day, she sat at her desk shaving a piece of chalk into a pile of dust in the middle of her desk.  As the chalk piece disappeared and the pile was nice and large, she sat back to admire it, took a deep breath in and made a large, exasperating exhale blowing the chalk grinds all over the poor kid sitting in front of her.

None of my kids will sit next to her and they are always pointing out things that she is doing during class as if to get her in trouble.

I came to find out that this girl is not liked.  By anyone.  Teachers can’t stand her and even her own parents show lack of concern for her.  Apparently, she only befriends younger kids who don’t know how ornery she can be.  Then, she takes their money, their pencils, erasers, MP3 players, and once, when invited to a friend’s house, she allegedly stole some of the mom’s jewelry.

I am told too that the bathroom stalls up on the 6th grade floors are littered with the Korean equivalent of “ABC has no friends” “ABC will go to hell” “I hate ABC” and so on.

This poor thing has no friends, no allies, and doesn’t make it easy for anyone to have any empathy for her.   I find her antics to gain attention somewhat amusing and don’t hold such a serious contempt for her.  But, I guess we’ll she how her behavior elevates during class this week.