Much of the time, being a teacher is probably awesome. You get to hang out with kids, teach them, and really feel like you’re making an impact on the future.
That said, every job has a downside (or several) and needing to keep control of your classroom means teachers have to play the heavy when the situation warrants.
Which is definitely did in these 15 situations, when teachers found themselves shaking their head at what they had to remove from a student’s possession.
15. I wonder if he was selling them.
Plastic Spoons. HUNDREDS OF THEM
I still don’t know why, but one grade 5 kid came to school with his backpack stuffed full. Nothing else was in his backpack, not even his lunch. He hung it on the back of the chair and pulled out a spoon and was fiddling around with it instead of doing work. So I took the spoon away. 10 minutes later he has another one. I took that. 10 more minutes a third. The teacher took it away. 10 minutes later another…..you can see the pattern here.
I finally opened his backpack when I saw him grab the 6th or 7th spoon, and the bag was FULL. Obviously the teacher had to call home since he had no lunch. Mom comes, looks at him with just….resignation….and goes “why?” as she hands him his lunch. He shrugged, grinned, and walked back to class. Mom is clearly used to it and has learned to go with the flow.
14. Someone at home is going to be disappointed.
A wine cooler that looked like a Capri Sun.
This was a 2nd grader and she was just getting ready to drink it.
13. I would have kept those, too.
Weirdest thing was a bag of turtles. Yep. Kid caught a bunch of the little salmonella filled red-eared sliders at a local pond on his way to school one day. We had a turtle black market at the school by noon and by the end of the day the principal had a dozen in a bowl in his office.
Kid got caught because a terrible smell was reported from his locker. Janitor opened it up and there was a bag of turtles. The rest of the day was spent tracking down the ones that had already been sold.
Edit: I’ve owned a few reptiles as pets. To my knowledge small (under 4 inches) Red Eared sliders have been illegal in the pet trade for quite some time due to a risk of salmonella in their skin. All turtles that were brought to school were under 4 inches.
Principal released turtles to pond that evening.
Middle School – kid was 7th grader
The best business venture we had at the school was when a kid (different kid) who walked to school would stop and buy 10-15 monster energy drinks from a convenience store in the morning and sell them at school. Kid banked. The operation was eventually shut down.
Wish I knew what hat kid was doing now.
12. You’ll never figure that one out.
A plastic statue of the Virgin Mary with the face melted off.
It was so bizarre, I kept it in my desk for many years.
11. More importantly, where was he keeping it hidden?
A giant head of lettuce that just suddenly appeared on his desk. Where did he get it?!
10. That is actually terrifying.
A real gun I thought was fake, luckily unloaded. More scary than weird but…
9. An actual letter?
Not a teacher but a friend of a teacher
A letter to his other friend about how he once mast*rbated in class.
They are extremely awkward now.
8. It’s basically Fun Dip.
my sisters teacher had to call my dad about a suspicious powder my sister was eating out of a bag at school.
She was dipping her finger in a bag of powdered jell-o and eating it and letting other kids do the same.
7. He was definitely selling those.
27 bottles of Axe and cologne from a 5th graders locker.
6. I would have had to ask.
a girl had about 50 plastic spoons in her pocket, she tripped and tey all fell out, we all found it hilarious but a high up teacher was walking by and made her pick them up (she was going to anyway) and put them all in the bin
he was probably very confused over the whole situation
5. They think we were just born yesterday.
Zip lock bags filled with water. That was a trend for a while at my school.
Kids would claim they needed it in case they got thirsty, but usually would just try to pop them in each other’s laps during class.
4. Just in case?
Chef’s knife stuffed in the waistband of his sweatpants (no underwear) during a snowstorm.
This student … mmm … I don’t remember his exact DSM diagnosis. I don’t think it was schizophrenic. I can’t recall. He was almost always really nice and a gentle soul, albeit he’d say weird things. On rare occasions he would show a little different side.
3. Bless his heart.
A flavored condom. From a kindergartner.
This little boy comes in to music class (at 1:00 pm or so, and he’s been at school since 9:00) and says to me, “Look! I have a candy!” And holds up a wrapped strawberry flavored condom. Trying to to cause a scene, I tell him, “remember, we’re not going to eat in music class because it’s hard to sing with candy in our mouths!” I pointed out the pocket on his Jean jacket with a snap button closure and tell him to put it in there, making a mental note to tell teacher later. I always try to avoid losing control of a room of 20 5/6 year olds.
Kid puts condom in his pocket, and I start music class. Later on, I see him putting something in his mouth. “Put that back in your pocket for after school” or something to that effect. Pretty sure food is scarce at home to taking it away would have been a huge scene. Teacher comes at the end of the half hour lesson and I discretely tell her what’s going on and she says she’ll handle it. Great.
After school, the middle-aged, male school counselor comes up to me and says “Thanks to you I’ve been walking around an elementary school all afternoon with a flavored condom in my pocket.” Sorry not sorry.
2. What a good snake!
One kid had a live snake in his desk. He grabbed it at recess apparently.
This was an hour later.
1. They didn’t see an issue. Ha!
A can of deodorant. You’re probably thinking « eh that’s not that weird », except that the 2 kids were using it by spraying it on the back of the other and then setting fire to the thing.
In the middle of the class.
They didn’t see any problem with it because « it only stays lit for a few seconds »
I will never get over the randomness of kids, y’all. It’s hilarious.
If you are (or know) a teacher with a story that fits on this list, share it with us in the comments!