Do I Have Favorites?

“...must be one of your favorites,” my wife said to me a few months ago.

“What do you mean?” I asked. 

She said I mentioned a particular student more than other students and suggested I had a favorite.

I have thought about that exchange for months. 

I’ve rolled it around in my head. “Do I have favorites?” I kept asking myself. 

My students delight me, they frustrate me, they make me smile and shake my head, and laugh all the time. 

I don’t know about favorite students, but I do have favorite moments. 

Like the time I told a student I couldn’t see her work on the board behind her big head; or the time another earned a 100 on a test and literally danced around school the rest of the day; or the normally quiet student who shocked her class by screaming at the top of her lungs just before a standard testing session; or watching a student who was stumped by something, suddenly “get it” and light up like a Christmas tree.

After months of deliberation, I have concluded I don’t have favorite students - they’re all my favorites. 

It just depends on what day you ask me.