Teachers, what's the biggest red flag of any kind you've seen from a student?

I was giving a spelling test to my third graders, and one student calmly got out her glue

and poured it into her ear.

Oh, that sounds like a reasonable response to me.

I'm sure she just wanted to block out noise in order to focus on the test.

Oh, I had managed to push this other student out of my brain. So let's call him Brian.

Brian was a sixth grader. Brian was, on first glance, a classic case of look at me disease.

He constantly needed to be the center of attention. He needed to be liked, but he was also very

sensitive. He'd been in my class about two weeks when he first broke down crying

during a lesson. I pulled him aside to talk privately and asked him what was the matter. Mr. Bones,

these other kids just don't understand. I'm not trying to be annoying. I've had a hard life,

and everyone's just making fun of me without knowing what I've been through. He said all of this

through big, wet tears. I really felt for the

kid and tried to make him feel better. He continued, when I was in first grade, I saw my younger

sister get unalived by a drive-by. It happened right in front of me. It was so awful. And then just

full-body heaving sobs. This was literally in my first month of teaching. I wasn't prepared for this, but I tried

to do my best for the kid. I had someone from the office come and get him, and in my free period

following the class I called his mother. The way she responded with such nonchalance chilled

me to the bone. Mr. Bones, my son Brian lies like a rug. He's an only child and he's only ever been an only

child. So I'm thinking to myself, wait, what the frick? But what about these tears, I asked her.

She said, when my son was two years old, he'd sit in front of the mirror and make himself cry.

He'd practice it over and over and I'd tell him to stop it because he was scaring me.

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