remember

So, like I said earlier, today was my last day with the 6th graders. Because I have three more days of classes, for some reason it didn't even dawn on me that today was their last class.

Some preface, I think I've mentioned that in Korean and Japanese schools, the kids do all the cleaning. This can be both good and bad, as really, you certainly don't want to use a washroom that a middle school girl has cleaned. But one of the 6th grade classes is responsible for cleaning my class. This is also the class that is right next to my room, so they see and hear me all day, everyday. They are obnoxious (and the class that was responsible for the multiple wallet thefts) but I adore them.

So I'm just doing a quick review of the lesson and realize that we are REVIEWING the lesson, and that we wouldn't start a new one at the end of the semester. So while the kids are working, I walk over to my co-teacher and say, "Eun-hae, is this our last time with this class?" She says yes, and I dig out some US flag stickers and after we finish the activity, I told them that this was our last class, and that this summer vacation I would be moving back to the USA. I gave out stickers, and we got together to take a class picture. A bunch of the girls crowed in, wanting to be the ones that were the closest to me, and after the picture, one of the boys - one who tries hard but struggles, came up and grabbed my hand. "Teacher, please, do not forget me. Please. Remember." He had tears in his eyes and it just about broke my heart into bits.

I don't know the names of most of my students. That sounds horrible, but with more than 300 students with names that are hard to draw associations with, I struggled, and finally gave up (I took some comfort in the fact that the Korean teachers couldn't remember them, either). And yet I will remember these children. The boy who always answered "How are you?" with "HUNGRY!!" or the girls who would gather in my room at lunch. The tall, brilliant boy who was always SO over everyone and everything. The girl who was only a couple of inches shorter than me. The middle schooler last year who wanted me to call him Bingo. The future-goth who made a pencil case out of electrical tape that looked like a coffin. A little boy with tears in his eyes as he begged me to remember him.

Of course, the next class that came in couldn't care less that I was leaving. Brats.