3 A Teachable Moment

3 A Teachable Moment Before she was our principal, Mrs. Stoker was a stand-up comedian.* She's always cracking jokes. But not this time. When we got to the all-porpoise room, she was standing on the stage with a serious look on her face. Everybody was buzzing. But not like bees. That would be weird. I knew what Mrs. Stoker

was going to tell us. She was going to say that pulling pranks can be dangerous. Somebody could get hurt. Stuff like that. Grown-ups hate it when kids pull pranks. "We might get suspended," said Neil. "She's going to hang us upside down?" I asked. "No, dumbhead!" said Neil. "We might get kicked out of school." Oh. I knew that. Mrs. Stoker held up her hand and made a peace sign, which means shut up. "Simmer down," she said. We simmered down. "It has come to my attention..." she began. Uh-oh. Anytime a grown-up says something has come to their attention, you know you did something wrong. That's the first rule of being a kid. "It has come to my attention that the fourth graders like to pull pranks on their teacher." "Here it comes," whispered Alexia. "We're going to jail." "And I want to tell you," continued Mrs. Stoker, "that I think that's great!"

WHAT?! "You liked our prank?" I shouted. "Yes!" replied Mrs. Stoker. "You kids thought about your prank. You planned it out. You worked

together as a group. You used critical thinking skills and blah blah blah blah. This as a teachable moment!" Ugh. Grown-ups love teachable moments. "You kids have given me an idea," continued Mrs. Stoker. "April Fools' Day is next Friday. To celebrate, we're going to have a weeklong contest between the students and the teachers at Ella Mentry School to see who can pull the best pranks. We'll call it... The Prank War!" Everybody started buzzing again. Having a prank war sounded like a great idea. I started thinking about all the pranks we could pull on Miss Banks. This was going to be fun! But then I remembered something. Teachable moments are never fun. They're just another way for grown-ups to trick us into learning stuff. What a scam! "What's in it for us?" I shouted. "Well," said Mrs. Stoker, "if you students win The Prank War, we'll have a big candy party! What do you say to that?" "YAY!" we all shouted, which is YAY backward.

"And if the teachers win The Prank War," said Mrs. Stoker, "they'll get a hot tub for the teachers' lounge." "WOW!" all the teachers shouted, which is MOM upside down. "And to get everybody into the spirit of The Prank War," said Mrs. Stoker, "on April Fools' Day, I will wear a fake nose and glasses." A fake nose and glasses? That sounded kind of lame to me. "That's all you're gonna do?" somebody shouted. "Yes," said Mrs. Stoker. "It will be funny." Not to me. Our old principal, Mr. Klutz, used to do cool stuff to get us into the spirit of things. "You should paint your head orange," shouted Michael. "Mr. Klutz did that one time." "Remember when he climbed up the flagpole?" asked Neil. "He hung there upside down dressed like Uncle Sam." "That was hilarious," said Ryan. "Remember when he kissed a pig on the lips?" Mr. Klutz was nuts. One time he married a turkey. That was before he retired.

"He was so funny," whispered Andrea. "Mrs. Stoker could never fill his shoes." HUH? That's also HUH backward. Why would you want to fill somebody's shoes? What would you fill them with, anyway? Everybody was buzzing, until Mrs. Stoker told us to simmer down. "I'm sorry," she said, "but I'm not Mr. Klutz. And I'm not doing any of those things." "BOOOOOOOOOO!" Everybody started booing.