No more Miss Nice girl

Most people would say that I am a really nice girl. And I am. But the other day I made my first student cry.

Now I am no expert, but I've come to learn that in general, children respond to being disciplined differently. There are some students who need to be yelled at, while if you try to yell at certain kids, it will have the opposite effects. I think this distinction is even more important for "at risk youth"

Luckily, with my role in the school, I can pretty much avoid being the disciplinary. Though I've had to discipline kids for the recycling team and also for acting out on their mentor, I mostly see them outside the classroom so it's never really my place to scold them. However, the times I have had to, I really try to be gentle with the kids. I almost always give them the benefit of the doubt and try to treat them with respect, and find that effective because many of them aren't treated with respect outside of the school.

Anyway, so this marking period I have front hall duty. Basically the staff in the school who don't have classes are in charge of greeting the students in the morning when they first arrive. My job is to stand at the top of the stairs and make sure the kids are walking on the right side of the hallway. Usually I spend this still half asleep trying to drink coffee as fast as I can. There's another woman who does this at the bottom of the stairs who I call Chief because she is an Ex Military woman who still thinks she is a colonel and the kids are cadets. I've seen Chief make at least 10 kids cry because she will SCREAM at them to get on the right side of the hallway and pretty much berate them. It usually ends in them coming to me all teary eyed and me hugging them telling them it's ok.

So this is a pretty average morning. I'm standing on top of the stairs and while my back is turned, one of my favorite 2nd graders, Zapporiah, sneaks past me in the hallway. So I call her
Me- "Zapporiah, come back sweetie, you went up the wrong way"
- she keeps walking-
Me- "ZAPPORIAH, you have to come back and walk back down the stairs and go up the right way please"
-Nothing-
So I walk down the hallway and tell her she has to come back and do it the right way. At this point I really don't care that much but I feel like out of principle, she just has to do it.
Zapporiah- "SHUT UP, NO"
Now I have had my full cup of coffee yet. I'm cranky and I don't like to be yelled at.
Me- "Zapporiah, please don't yell at me, you know the rules. You have to go back and walk up the right way"
Zapporiah- WAILS, Then like a flood she is hysterically crying so hard, "Miss Erin, wah wah wah, Miss Erin wah I- wah wah- I just DON'T WANT TO, MISS ERIN I JUST DONT WANT TO"
Me- "Sweetie, calm down, it's really not that big of a deal"
Zapporiah-"IT IS A BIG DEAL, IT'S THE BIGGEST DEAL"

This was like a dagger to my heart. This poor little girl is so upset about something I'm making her do and I really don't care about. It took everything in me to not just tell her not to worry about it because it really was not worth her starting her day so upset. In the end, I knew I couldn't back down after that and we basically sat there for ten minutes before she got up the strength to walk down the right side of the stairs and back up the right side.

Maybe I'm not as big of a softie as I thought.