Ten Ways to Get Off-Task

After a two-week winter break and seven snow days in a row, it's Monday. A school day. And a two-hour delay day (which means an alternate schedule -- and let me tell you how much my kids with autism love schedule changes. They don't. At all).

In case you find yourself going back to elementary school for any reason (and I hope for your sake that you don't), allow me to pass on some wisdom I've picked up today from my students.


Ten Ways to Get Off-Task

1. Untie your shoe so you can ask your teacher to tie it for you. Do this at least six times per hour.

2. Untie your shoe and then trip over the laces. Fall. Fake a cry and say you "broke yourself" and you are "gonna dead."

3. Ask your teacher for a hug. Give your teacher a hug. Then tell your teacher you are made of Velcro and she is made of felt and you are stuck.

4. Choose an object from the "draw box" to inspire you at the writing center. Make sure it's something that rolls, like a miniature basketball. Roll it out of sight. Then tell your teacher you lost it and you need to find it so you can finish.

5. Place your pencil on the blue rug. Tell your teacher your pencil is at the bottom of the ocean. When she tells you to "swim over and get it, please" (read: when she gives you an inch), tell her you have to "dress appropriately" and then procede to suit yourself up in imaginary "flippy feet," "jar of breath," and "snorkel nose," one garment at a time (read: you take a mile).

6. Tell her you are "simply exhausted" and you must sleep. Then, when she directs you to your quiet space, stop at every desk on the way to tell each student to "keep your stupid voice down" because you need to rest.

7. Be six years old and imitate an extremely inappropriate scene from South Park.

8. Pick up the fake bird's nest from the phonemic awareness kit and burst into tears. Announce that your teacher is the meanest lady in the world for killing the baby birds and taking their home. Then repeat this to the principal when you pass her in the hallway.

9. When walking down the hallway, stop to hug every single teacher you see, especially the subs who don't know that this is your M.O. Then tell them you are made of Velcro and he or she is made of felt and you are stuck.

10. Read nineteen of the twenty words assigned. Then skid to a halt before the last word, which is your name, and tell the teacher that you never learned to read.