Somedays..... somedays it seems everything falls into place at school. Others it seems you can't win for losing. Today was a cell phone battle. A girl texting while I was reading aloud to the class. A nice girl. A girl I like a lot. A girl who had engaged in battle with me before but we always manage to find our middle happy ground. A girl who needs to listen to the story being read aloud, not one who can successfully multi-task.

She was texting, smiling, obviously disengaged with the storyline and engrossed with her private conversation. I quietly got her attention and mouthed. "put your phone away"... which she did for about 30 seconds. I was almost done reading the selection so I ignored her. When I finished, I walked over to her and again told her to put the phone away. She immediately started to argue and shoved the phone down into her bra.

Now... I had to make a decision to let it go, or force the issue. No right answer unfortunately. Had I walked away, she'd have pulled it immediately back out, back to her conversation. I told her to come with me, and took her to office to get phone with another adult present considering the location of the phone. She was angry and upset, but I reminded her school policy says no phones/texting. I also pointed out if she'd just have put it away to begin with, we wouldn't be in this situation. School policy says the phone stays in office until end of day - about 10 more minutes. You'd have thought I asked her to leave her leg in the office 10 minutes!

Back in the day... we didn't have to fight the cell phone battle. I'm pro-technology but I see so many students distracted by the constant barage of communication they are unable to disengage themselves from the social channels, to join the rest of the school community in learning. Some students CAN multi-task, Skyping with a friend and working at the same time. Others simply are not able to do that, but think they can.

So the day ended on a sour note, for her and for me. Some days you just can't win.....