They tap. They make random noises. They whistle. They try to push your buttons, mostly because they don’t understand the material. In this time of crazed test-mania, we have progressively more of those kids, I believe, because we are required to teach to a test that may be years above the operating level of some students.

It’s important to remember that those kids mostly want attention. They want not to feel lost and expelled from the academic loop. They want to be heard. They want that teacher from earlier years who seemed to be in their corner.

Eduhonesty: There’s no fix for the crazed test-mania right now — short of the zombie apocalypse — but we can find a few minutes to talk to the lost kids, even maybe convince them to try some after school tutoring. We can let them know we care. That stops some of the random tapping and noise.

Here is the challenge for American education: How will we reengage these students who we effectively expelled from the learning process when we handed them the book they could not read to get ready for the test they could not pass?

Noneducators may be sitting out there thinking, “Why would anyone do such a thing to a kid?” They need to understand the teachers did not have any choice — even though many initially went to administration to express their concerns. I’ll add more on this later.

If my study hall has nothing to do, I make them get a book. While you can’t make a kid read, I have observed that a certain number once stuck with the book will open the cover and keep going. A certain number of kids will also complete an assignment once they are forced to begin.

Eduhonesty: This one’s for the moms and dads. Sometimes the best move may be to say, “Let’s just start it together.”

For the student: You can’t grow crystals on your screw overnight.

For the teacher: You can’t let them do their project at home and you should not take their word when they say, “yes, the crystals are growing.”

I suspect it was a bit humiliating to display that plain screw in a jar of brownish liquid in the gym, there for all the world to see. We are told our students must never be humiliated. But I am betting “Elliot” learned something from  having to display his screw. Next time, he may be more honest and he may try harder. I wasn’t mean about it. I just looked at the screw, then looked at the boy, who had the decency to blush.