Misty

I've known Misty since she was in 4th grade. I remember distinctly the very moment that I met her. I was an ESL teacher and I worked in the classroom that Misty was in. I came in to the room and the classroom teacher was busy trying to redirect a student and I noticed that Misty was curled up into a ball, sitting underneath her desk. I approached her and asked if I could help in anyway.
"Yeah, you can. You can tell everyone ELSE to GO AWAY!"
Then she growled.
Literally, growled.
Since then, I've had Misty in 6th and 7th grade French. Last year she told me that I was teaching the wrong word for hello in French. Oh, and the word for brown that I was using was incorrect.
She also a) broke the leg off of a table when she tripped over it and b) stepped into a box of headphones and took a hard fall right onto the floor. Her head is always in a book and usually she has 4 or 5 books in a pile along with her. She never, ever has her folder or pencil for class and in the history of middle school has never been on time for class.
She is also one of my all time favorite students.
No matter where we are or what's going on, if she sees me she (yells) "Hi Mrs. Wopat!!!" She puts up a good fight when she doesn't want to do what you are asking. She can tell you millions of random facts.
So, this year when I looked at my 8th grade class lists (it's an elective in 8th grade) I have to say that I was still shocked to see her name! The past week she has been doing a great job-she's participating more than ever and I haven't had to tell her even once to look up from her book. A few days ago she mentioned to me that she was really glad to have taken French, and I told her the feeling was mutual.

Today, though, I felt like the luckiest teacher ever-the class was over and everyone had shuffled out. Misty came right up to my desk and looked right at me and said "You are the best teacher I've ever had in my life!" and then she turned right on her heel and marched out the door.

I was literally on the verge of tears, when on the way out, she took the corner too short and ran smack dab into the cart full of booklets and knocked the whole thing over! The booklets went smashing all over everywhere and my teary eyes turned straight to laughter.

Gotta love Misty :)