9th graders

As of this year, all 9th graders will spend the first marking period of the year in study hall, in the hope that they may acquire the habit of completing their night's homework (or at least, getting a head-start on it) during their free periods in the day.

Today, I had my first study hall of the year. It was in the science building, which is not a building with which I'm intimately familiar. So, when I came to the room and saw students inside, sitting quietly — some working in their notebooks and some looking in the direction of the blackboard — I naturally assumed that I was in the wrong place. So, I double-checked the number on the door and looked at the students again. They seemed so young, their faces certainly not the faces of high schoolers.

So, I checked with a different teacher this time, who confirmed that no one seemed to be in the room.

Then I went in.

There was no teacher there. Only a student at the front of the class, who had captured his fellow inmates' attention. And these were ninth graders.

Babyish as they look now, by the end of the year, they'll be much older and cruftier. And I will still, as a teacher, look as if I should be taking some math placement test.