Pencil Amnesty Day

"Do you remember what Monday is . . . ?" Mrs. D asked as we packed up the last of the Fall Festival fun.

I thought a moment . . . Hmm. Election Day is Tuesday . . . "Oh! Pencil Amnesty Day!"

If you are a teacher of young children (or maybe even older students), then you know: Pencils are a problem. After years of experimentation, I have finally come up with a solution. At the beginning of the year, I can be found skinning a sliver of paint from each of close to one-hundred pencils. (Honestly, it passes the time during some of those start-of-school in-services and makes me feel as if I'm doing something to prepare for The First Day of School.) Each child receives four pencils, with his or her name written with Sharpie in the bare-wood window. (At first, I tried writing directly on the pencil with Sharpie, but that too easily rubs off. Hence, my maniacal peeling of pencil paint.) Why, you ask, would you do such a thing?

Well, first there's the "I don't have a pencil!" and the "Hey, that was my pencil!" and the "_______ took my pencil!" and the "I don't want to use this one. It doesn't have any eraser left," and then the "Whose pencil is on the floor?"--"Not me!"

Sometimes you just need your very own tools. So everyone gets their own, and everyone is responsible for managing their pencils. If you break it, you are responsible for placing it in the "to be sharpened" cup. If you rub the eraser to a nub because you like the way those wormy little pink erasings look or you use your teeth to crimp the metal ring so that the eraser pops out whole, then you who must live with the inconvenience an eraser-less pencil. (Before you judge me as a queen of mean, know that each child also has his/her very own big pink eraser. I fully acknowledge that making mistakes and correcting them is an important part of learning.) If a pencil is left on the floor, it's easy to discover its owner. If an adult absentmindedly wanders off with a pencil, borrowed from a child's desk, they recognize it as ours and return it.

But here's the biggest benefit of not sharing pencils among children: Sometimes pencils get really gross. We're talking don-the-gloves, get-the-roadkill-bone-plucking-pliers, HazMat gross. Think of what this pencil's petri dish could culture! No one else wants to use a pencil that's all beaver-chewed and slobbered upon. So pencils are personal. If you want to gnaw on your pencil until it's rodentia-raided, destined-for-a-dam* disgusting, be my guest (though I do worry about the pencil paint that some children must be ingesting!). It's yours . . . and no one else has to touch it! (*a beaver dam--My own mother thought I had misspelled a word here!)

Though Mrs. D is willing to admit that I've successfully solved the pencil problem, she also thinks I'm pencil-petty--stingy, even. "They should be more responsible with their pencils. We gave them FOUR," I argue. But Mrs. D is a pencil pushover. "They NEED new pencils," she pleads. And thus, Pencil Amnesty Day was born. As part of my gift to Mrs. D, every year on her birthday, we celebrate Pencil Amnesty Day. Everyone (regardless of how responsible--or irresponsible--s/he was with the originals) gets brand new pencils!

Happy Pencil Amnesty Day! (Bet that's not on your Hallmark calendar . . . )