Locked Out

Thursday. I was having a morning. I had gotten out of my house late, and by the time I got to school, I was feeling rushed. 

The good news was, I had covered Ms. L's co-teacher on Tuesday, so I had had a chance to talk to Ms. L and I knew what the lesson for the day was. I had volunteered that I knew how to work the classroom TV, so I had the copy of the slideshow for the day. Which meant (the bad news) that I needed a bit more time this morning to get set up (because while I know what to do in theory, without having set everything up on this TV, I couldn't be sure everything would work smoothly). 

I got to school later than I would have liked. The classroom was at the far end of campus, upstairs. But, I know the layout of the school, so I didn't get lost. I took out the key, twisted it in the lock, and the door would not open.

Deep sigh.

I know a few tricks. I can fiddle with the doorknob. Sometimes the key needs a little extra push. Perhaps I turned it the wrong way. Nope, nothing worked. It would just not twist that little extra bit to disengage the lock.

I didn't have time for this.

(Yes, it was the correct key. It clearly worked in the lock.)

Out of ideas, I decided I'd try to call security and see if they could brute force me into the room. I went to the classroom next door (Ms. K who I subbed for earlier this school year) as it was open and asked if I could use her phone.

Ms. K: "Are you subbing next door? There's a trick to the lock..."

Ms. K led me back to the door and demonstrated how to get the door open. It involved shoving her shoulder into the door while turning the key. 

Well, that's a new one.

(Ms. K's door has the same issue. They've put in a work order to get it fixed. They're still waiting.)

Now that I knew the trick, I was able to get back in the room later. (I don't leave the door open or unlocked when I leave to use the restroom.) 

That extra bit of time to get in the room did not help with me setting up the slideshow for the day. (Seventh grade English class. They were learning about writing an argumentative essay.) Because, of course that didn't go as smoothly as I would have liked.

But the day went fine, once things got going.

(It was an advanced seventh grade class, so keeping them busy writing notes was just the trick to keep the class mellow.) 

The Volunteers

It is ridiculously easy to get student volunteers to run errands for me during class. Like going to the office to get the classroom key.

(That's a long story having to do with keys locked up in a safe place and the ones who had access to the safe place were all coincidentally unavailable before school.)

Second period hadn't quite started when I asked for someone to go to the office. I got three volunteers (of the five that were in the room at the time). Who to choose?

Well, where I was going to send the volunteer took a bit of explaining. It wasn't like they needed to go to the health office, the attendance office, or another office with which just about every student is familiar. So, I began my explanation.

"Do you know where the office of [specific assistant principal] is?"

Girl: "Oh, that's the office next to Ms. M..."

Ding, ding, ding! We have a winner.

Because, it was to Ms. M that I needed the student to go. (She was the keeper of the keys.)

The boy protested. He really wanted to go. "I know where that is."

Me: "Who is Ms. M?"

Boy: "Um, she's a lady..."

Nah. I'd rather send the girl who seems to have a good rapport with the secretary than the boy who kind of vaguely knows the office to which I'd be sending him.

(For the record, students aren't supposed to have keys. But this was a special circumstance where several things had gone wrong. And the student actually retrieved a sealed envelope with my name on it. So, not ideal, but necessary at that moment in time.)