How Many Questions?

“Any last questions before we start the test?” I ask, standing before a group of 8th graders. We’re about to do our first test in Pre-algebra. Up to this point we’ve done classwork, homework and quizzes but this is the first actual test. 

“How many questions on the test?” a young scholar asks from the back of the room.

“Three hundred and fifty-six,” I reply completely deadpan.

The room explodes in chaos - voices talking over voices, complaints blending into complaints, a frenzy of emotion all focused on this ridiculously long test.

“We can’t do three hundred questions in an hour!”

“I’m not takin’it.”

“Shhhhhsh, we need all the time we can get.”

“Are they all true and false?”

“Twelve,” I say to the din, with a large smile on my face. 

“Twelve, problems,” I repeat, grinning. 

Slowly, my intrepid scholars calm…they’ve been had. I was kidding. The fell for it hook, line and sinker. 

This is a routine I will repeat every time they ask how many questions on a test or quiz. 

Six months later, as we near the end of the school year, we go through this song and dance again for, probably, the fifteenth time. 

“Any last questions before we start the test?” I ask.

“How many questions on the test?” a student asks.

“One hundred and seventeen,” I reply, completely deadpan, as usual.

By this time, most of my students know I always answer that question with a stupidly large number, but a few, and thankfully only a few, still haven’t caught on. 

“We can’t do a hundred questions in an hour!”

“Is this a take-home test?”

“Can we use our notes?”

“You know he’s kidding, right?”

“He always does this.”

“How many questions are there really?”

“Eight, there are eight questions. Please show your work. You can begin when I hand you the test.” 

Maybe it’s mean, but it amuses me so much to do this over and over again. 

It just never gets old for me.

What My Neighbors Must Think

I try not to think about what people think about me. I’m pretty confident about myself now, but I wasn’t always that way. In middle school, I was painfully shy. I tried to blend into the background in class or in the cafeteria. I was always worried about what people were thinking of me. It took a long time, but I almost never worry about that now. 

Except recently. 

A few months ago, when the 7th grade was about to start building their milkweed bug habitats, I was sitting in my favorite chair watching TV about 9pm. With a start, I remembered I needed to bring in sticks for the habitats! I had planned on finding sticks right after I got home and forgot.

I leapt from my chair, threw on my shoes and dashed outside…into the dark. Oops, gonna need a flashlight, so back inside I went to get one.

I spent the next 20 minutes looking for sticks in the dark with my flashlight. And not just any old sticks, they had to be strong enough to support the food supply, but not too thick. They needed to have a fork in them for the simulated milkweeds and they had to fit in the bags we would be using to build the habitats. 

Pick up a stick - inspect it under the flashlight - keep or drop to the ground. I tried to do this in a systematic way so I didn’t waste time picking up and inspecting the same sticks over and over again.

“My neighbors must think I’m crazy,” I said to myself. I figured if any of them were watching, they must think I’m doing yard work in the dark at nine o'clock at night. That’s crazy. 

And, you know what?

I didn’t care. I had my own reason to be wandering around my yard picking up and dropping sticks with my little flashlight. I didn’t care if they did think I was crazy. 

The same kind of thing happened to me this morning. On Monday, I’m teaching a first grade class why leaves change color. So, there I was wandering up and down my street inspecting leaves and putting some in a bag while rejecting others. I went into my neighbors yards and even pulled leaves off their trees.

I probably looked crazy again, but who cares. I had something I needed to do and was getting it done. 

It doesn’t matter what other people think, it matters what you think of yourself.