Probably not.

I work hard, love my kids, share my extreme passion for all things science and do my best to teach and inspire them.

I also do and say various dumb things on any given occasion.

Yesterday was no exception. Read on for details of two great teacher fails of the day.

I forgot to go over scissor safety for a lab that didn’t require scissors.

These are 7th and 8th graders. I take full responsibility. My classroom, my scissors. But it really did not occur to me to specifically say that scissor twirling is not an acceptable form of scissor usage ON A DAY THAT WE DIDNT EVEN HAVE SCISSORS OUT. 

Oops. The student was okay. Just cut himself. It was kind of deep. And may require stitches.

After much blood, a trip to the nurse, and a phone call home we carried on (without scissors of course).

But that wasn’t even the best fail of the day.

I told a dumb joke. 

Why did the cat move her kittens?

She didn’t want to litter.

Bahahaha. Okay…it was bad. I know. 

Some kids laughed. Most rolled their eyes and I had the few token…I don’t get its. Which prompted me to over explain. A few more laughs and then the question from a student:

“Wait…does that mean kitty litter (that they poop in) is made from baby kittens?”

Confused, thoughtful faces stared backed at me. 

Oh shoot. What have I done? 

I adamantly answered, “no that’s a coincidence. Kitty litter is not made from baby kittens.”

Whew…narrowly escaped.

And then I looked directly into the eyes of a girl who had started to cry. 

I walked over to her as the other kids were working and asked if she was okay. Thinking she was thinking about little baby kitten kitty litter.

Way to go Kyle.

Nope. It was worse.

She said, “We have to put my cat down tonight and that reminded me.”

Ugh.

Teacher fail.

I did my best to comfort her.

I do learn from my mistakes though.

No more kitty jokes and a new set of explicit scissor safety rules in the future.

Feel free to share your fails to make me feel better 😜