As many of you know, Dave is the high school choir teacher at a local school around here. They are about to do the production, The Wizard of Oz. It is always such a stressful time for Dave as the play is so time consuming. To put more pressure on him he has to deal with some kids that only think about themselves. Now I know that that is nothing new, teenagers=selfishness, but the majority of the kids he works with are just delightful and great to be around. He does have a couple of kids that I want wring their necks!! And they are the ones that make life miserable for Dave.
Case in point, the Tin Man. This kid thinks he is Gods gift to the music program at Dave's school. He is a senior this year and is one of the last kids to come through from the previous choir director program (Dave replaced him). I don't think this boy ever gave Dave a chance because he would never compare with his beloved teacher. Last year this boy (let's call him B) had the main part for the production Pirates of
Pensance. Not until the day before the opening night did he have his lines down. Dave was a nervous wreck! So this year when he cast B as the Tin Man he did so with much trepidation.
B hasn't been the easiest kid to work with this year. He comes in and criticizes the other kids for not knowing their lines when he himself doesn't either. He has also had some issues with not showing up for rehearsal when others are counting on him to be there. A couple of weeks ago he came into Dave's office and said he wasn't going to be at practice that night because he wanted to go do something else. Dave knows that kids have a lot of activities that they are involved with but from the start he said if they needed to miss they'd have to clear it with him in advance, not the day of. Dave explained to B that they were working on his parts that night and he really needed to be there. Well guess who doesn't show up or call? B! Then his mom had the nerve to call and chew Dave out for being too hard on her kid. After that episode Dave made it clear that if B wanted to be a part of the play he had to commit to the show and show that he really wanted to be there.
A few days ago B came into Dave's office and said that there was a concert that he really wanted to go to. He ask if he could miss but Dave pointed out that it was a few days before opening night and he really couldn't miss since he had a main roll and a lady would be there to fit his costume. B said he didn't know
whether or not he would go to practice or not so Dave said, "You're going to to the right thing and come to play practice where the rest of the cast needs you to be." So you guessed it, B choose to go to the concert instead. That really put Dave in a
conundrum. It's three days till opening night...he told this kid if he missed he'd be cut and besides that, he was so sick and tired of B's disrespectful attitude, but at the same time who can learn the part in three days?!? He didn't know what to do. He thought, "I can't let this kid have this much control and put me in this position. But then why should I have to go through all this turmoil to either find a replacement or frantically learn all his lines!". I was so mad! I encouraged Dave to make the right
choice and cut him, he can't set a bad
precedence for the rest of the students. To make matter's worse, Dave found out that the next day at school the boy was bragging to his friends that, "Mr. Robertson doesn't have the nerve to cut me. It's only a few days before the play. He says he'll cut me but I know he won't do it!"
B doesn't know that the worst thing to do is give Mr. Robertson a challenge...he'll take it every time! I know!
So here we are, staying up too late running Dave's new lines every spare moment we have till opening night! I know he'll make a great Tin Man though! I was already so impressed at how well he did last night when we were practicing.
I guess I just have to use this as an example to teach my boys about comitting to something and that if you say you're going to be somewhere where people are counting on you, you have to be there no matter what other better thing comes up. I also will use this to teach my kids that they need to be respectful to their teachers even if they don't agree with them.
