My Special Project!

My heart is so unbelievably happy right now!!! As a teacher, there is always one student who is your special project for the year. It may be the child who is resistant to you and swears that you are their least favourite person. You are secretly trying to win them over and make them not hate everything you do. Or it may be the student who throws tantrums in your class and requires more patience than you think you could ever have. Most of the time this special project is a child who requires overwhelming amounts of patience and 200% of your time. For some strange reason, though, you tend to love them even more for this.

I have a favourite student. I know teachers are not supposed to admit to having a favourite student, but I think we all secretly do. That, or I'm a terrible teacher and I just admitted it to you. Either way, I still have a favourite student. Her name is Belinda (Note: this is note her actual name....it would be funny if it was, but it's not. Sorry to anyone named Belinda that may be reading this). She is such a sweet girl, and a girl of few words. By few words, I literally mean she does not talk. And no, I am not talking about that shy girl in class who is really reserved and never says anything. Yes, she does fall into all of the above categories, however she literally never talks. For the first few weeks of school I heard absolutely nothing out of her and she never talks to her classmates. Over time she has become more comfortable with me and she will talk to me, but it is very quiet. Unfortunately any bit of sound that is coming out of her mouth is usually drowned out by the obnoxious, yet mandatory, air conditioner.

Even when you are working one-on-one with her she will usually not say anything, and I provide her with options A and B so she can point and choose rather than talk. I try and make her talk sometimes, but it is a task and a half so I usually do not have the time to wait for her response. I will ask her a question and it will take a full three minutes for an answer to come out. Now, i know that doesn't sound long, but if you are thinking this I challenge you to time 3 minutes and see how long that is. Usually when you have to wait 10 seconds for someone to respond you think they have checked out of the conversation. I know the look she gets in her eyes though when she has an answer, and she gives me a little smile/smirk. You then just have to wait. And wait and wait and wait. Eventually she will come out with an answer, but it is a patience testing endeavour. Talk about teacher wait time!!

Anyways, she has becoming a lot more comfortable with me recently and I have been hearing her speak a little bit louder. I started tutoring her and she will speak quietly, but a lot louder than any other time. She will never speak in front of her classmates, so in tutoring when it is just us it is a good chance to ask her to speak.

Today I had the largest moment of teacher breakthrough with her though. I have been doing reader's theatre with the class and I purposefully gave her a role with the least speaking possible. Knowing that this would be a terrifying endeavour for any child to speak in front of the class (definitely was for me as a child!), I knew this was bound to make her cringe. I told them that reader's theatre was able to check off some of the curriculum goals for the year, and this was an alternative to standing in front of the class alone and doing speeches or presentations. I still knew she would be uncomfortable, so I had them practice this a lot and become very comfortable with it before they performed.

Today was the presentation of their plays and I was walking around the classroom listening to them have one last practice time. I was glancing around and all of the sudden I heard Belinda's voice.....from all the way across the room. She was speaking her line and I could hear it!!!! I looked at her and almost cried. It was such an emotional moment. I know, I sound pathetic, but this was actually such a big deal! I instantly grinned from ear to ear and was so unbelievably proud of her!! I went over and made sure she knew how great I thought she was doing, and she responded with the biggest smile I have ever seen her smile. She is a girl of few emotions, so even getting a smile out of her is a big deal!

She performed in front of the class and said her lines aloud. They were not as loud as in practice, but I had seen all I needed to see. I am SO unbelievably proud of her, and was not expecting this when I woke up this morning. God is working in incredible ways in this classroom, and today was a clear sign of God's hand over this classroom of students. For me that's as close to a miracle as I have ever seen. I know it doesn't sound like much to most people. It may just sound like a shy girl coming out of her shell, but to those who know Belinda they know that this is crazy!!