Meditation

In a way, I expected a post like this one to come earlier in my teaching career, but better late than never. The names of my students and coworkers have been changed. 


A couple of weeks back, I was in one of my 6th grade classes while the students worked in that productive disarray that characterizes middle school group work. As I walked past one of the groups, a sound caught my ear. It was annoying, so I followed it to its source: one of my 11 year old boys was making a loud humming sound.
"Hmmmmmmmm"
"Albert, please stop that. It is distracting." I said
He looked up, laughed, and explained as if he were letting me in on the joke."I'm masturbating!" he announced.
"Albert!" I exclaimed indignant, "That is extremely inappropriate! I don't want to hear those kinds of jokes in class!"
But instead of the usual reaction of disgruntled shame that follows a reprimand, Albert just looked confused and hurt. "Why is it inappropriate?" he said, looking up with honest interest.
Now it was my turn to be confused. Was he really not sure why a joke about masturbation would be considered off-color in a mixed class of 10-11 year olds? For a second I wondered what his health education class had taught him. Was masturbation so normalized in modern society that a child would not feel that it was taboo to pretend to pleasure himself in class? No. That couldn't be it. Sexuality, despite its normalization, is an extremely touchy subject in school.
Or, wait... did he honestly not know what masturbation really was? I certainly wasn't going to be the English teacher that explained it to him. I could already see the newspaper headlines...
I decided to figure out why he was confused.
"Albert..." I asked tentatively, "What do you think that word means?"
The boy stared at me as if I were stupid, "Masturbation. You know? Like in India?" He closed his eyes and began to hum again, but this time placing his hands upwards on his knees, index fingers touching thumbs... and it dawned on me....
"Meditation, Albert! Meditation. A very different word"
"Oh, ok.
He never bothered asking what the other word meant. I never bothered explaining.

Comments

Jenn said…
Haha! That is a perfect story!
16/10/11 18:18
Anonymous said…
I really, really like this.
17/10/11 08:56
Anonymous said…
Hilarious! I´m guessing you´re going to have some similar issues in the future. As long as it makes for a funny story...worth the nerves, no?

eva
19/10/11 01:26
Anonymous said…
So. good. Btw... I def know who you are Sand I've been reading your blog for a while :) Guess that isn't any more or less creepy than you reading mine.
Also, this is an epic post - I showed it to several of my friends.
20/10/11 03:51
Kenny said…
Hilarious. I shouldn't read this blog at work, I have a hard time not laughing out loud.
20/10/11 15:00
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