Composed on March 14th, 2020. Posted after we got the word we are out for the remainder of the year.
Last days are supposed to happen in June, not March and I wasn’t completely sure it was our last day together. But I was trying to prepare anyway. There were the ones that knew, the ones who had picked up on the whispering that had been happening by their parents and the news and their teachers. They had sussed out why I was making piles and piles of paper with their names on it.
“It’s because we might have to stay home. It’s work for home”
We might. I answered in my head, but because I didn’t really know anymore than they did, I came up with a lame reason as to why I had made 2,347 photocopies.
Others were very excited by the thought of worksheets.
“It looks like so much fun.”
“Can we do it now?”
“Is this what we are going to do on Monday?”
My brain paused from the ping-ponging it was doing from topic to topic. They are excited by worksheets? We never do worksheets!
The most important question though is, what did we do on our last afternoon together as a group?
Play. We played.
Earlier in the day, I listened to two students excitedly plan a playdate together and heard one explain that this would be their first official playdate. I turned away from the class so they wouldn’t see my tears as I wondered whether those two friends would be able to have that playdate. I made the decision that that is exactly what we were going to do the entire afternoon, play.
As I stacked and sorted papers trying to plan for the unplannable, I watched a group play school and recreate activities we did daily. Two eager boys came to me with strings of numbers on a wipe board, challenging me to solve their equations. I over exaggerated how much their problems made my brain hurt and I told them this was harder than high school math. Their smiles brightened our room on that rainy afternoon. I watched kids take out classroom materials and repurpose them in better ways than I ever planned to use them for.
They just spent time together, them hopefully not knowing and me wondering, was this our last afternoon in the same space for the foreseeable future?
It was.
And I hope that in twenty years when they think back on this weird time, they remember that we did some of our most important work all year together on our last afternoon.