animal fights

most of the time at school i am a complete b*tch. well, kind of. anyway - i am pretty strict and maintain my high standards from the start to the end of the lesson. but from time to time i get a bit silly - and have a good laugh with the kids. this usually happens with sixth form classes, but this year i have found my year 10s to be very receptive to my rather off-the-wall humour. at the end of a lesson we had a (less than serious) discussion about who would beat who in a fight in the animal world. y'know - badger versus squirrel kind of thing.

i wrote a list of 5 or 6 on the board and they had to write in their books who would win and why. one boy - alex - who is very reserved and quiet in class made me laugh out loud when i marked his book this morning. he had added little witty asides - e.g. one of the contests i had suggested was 'stingray versus aussie male' - and alex had gone into all this hilarious stuff about stereotypical aussie blokes. i had done loads of silly ones - beached whale versus wolf, silverback gorilla versus shark (in the water). elephant versus polar bear.

alex had also made me laugh a few weeks ago when i took in his book. i had asked them a (serious!) question about how you might control rabbit numbers on an island, and he had written a whole battle plan - including ground troops, air raids and - if all else failed - nuclear weapons.

so the boys keep me laughing.