Smarty Pants, or why I sometimes enjoy my job

Every year I have a few delightful students who manage to wriggle their way into my heart despite their annoying characteristics. One of this year's candidates is Oscar - a leading member of my ADHD contingent. This means he is more often than not NOT paying attention - or at least not appearing to pay attention, playing with stuff in his desk, or thinking about/working on various other projects that are more mentally stimulating than whatever the current academic task may be. Another of my charming munchkins is Zaira, because she's so inherently nice. It's amazing and endearing.

Last week we were working on multiplying a three digit number by a one digit number (i.e. 346 x 5). Oscar, who despite his distractability is very intelligent and particularly good at math, was having difficulty getting down to work. (Surprise!) As he was singing a song of his own creation (and irritating most everyone around him), Zaira looked at me and said "Maestra, I think Oscar is very creative." (Do you see why I love this girl? That's certainly not how I would have phrased it, so she succeeded in inspiring me to be better.)

Once Oscar got down to work and blasted his way (100% correctly, I might add) through various math problems, I told him I was very proud of his hard work and all the effort he was putting in. He said "I'm a smarty RIPPING pants!!!" I must have made a confused (or amused) face, because he said "You know, smarty because I'm smart and ripping because I'm ripping." Um...okay. Zaira, seated nearby, said "See maestra? I told you he was creative!"

Today a similar situation unfolded. After checking Oscar's work I smilingly thanked him again for his effort and told him he was being a smarty ripping pants again. He gave me a very confused look, to which I responded, "You know, like you told me last week? You said you were a smarty ripping pants?" He said "Oh no. Now I'm a smarty PUTTING pants." (???)

Oscar, my little fauxhawk-haired friend, Zaira was right: you ARE creative. :-)