Check In

 Mannie was promoted this past May. 

He's headed to middle school, a place where stronger spirits are forged and I hope we did all we could at Horace Mann to prepare him. It is a concern mirrored across the ages that I have taught, "Have we prepared this kid for the heightened realtiy that comes with the sixth grade?" 

Mannie certainly gave us every reason to believe that he would be capable of managing the transition, not simply because of what we had done for him at the elementary level. He has a very strong presence at home both as a son and as a big brother. He walked to school every day with them. Mom would make sure that both her boys were in their classrooms, ready to learn and would be there when the bell rang at the end of the day to make sure they got where they needed to be after school. This doesn't always denote success, but rather a parent who frets about the trajectory of their child's education. 

Mannie was not one of those. He is a good student, conscientious about his work and, lucky me, excelled in technology. As his computer teacher, this often led to him getting the added responsibility of helping his classmates get signed in, or navigating the interwebs to the assigned spot to begin the hour's work. His skills sometimes put us at odds, since he could find holes in the net I had prepared as a lesson. As a fifth grader, he found himself at times on the challenging end of the behavior spectrum, mostly because he was a fifth grader and needed to test some boundaries. 

But I never worried too much. Partly because we both knew that I would be seeing his mom sooner rather than later, but also because he had a quirky habit of finding those loose threads I have left in old lesson plans. Mannie would return to old Google links that I had used, as far back as first grade, to connect with his class during COVID distance learning. He would send "the class" messages, but after five years no one but he and I were reading them. 

Thus began our correspondence. Sometimes months would pass without a mention. Then I would receive the smallest update on his video game progress, or thoughts he had about some of his classmates. I would reply, often making a mental note to take down the ancient links to make room for new ones. But I didn't want Mannie to be cut off.

Over the summer, Mannie has reached out a couple of times. He wondered if he was the only one who was still connecting from his old first grade meta-classroom. I told him yes, he was the only one. Then he got a little wistful, wondering if he was feeling nostalgic for the "good old days." I suggested that he could now start referring to fifth grade as "the good old days." His reply: "I suppose so."

I went on to suggest that it was only a matter of time before he started to look back at middle school as "the good old days." His response was a very Mannie-like, "I guess."

I think I'll leave that cyber door open for just a little while longer. Just in case Mannie wants to check in with me one more time.