...paperclips...

I have a student who is very talkative.  Not the uber-irritating kind of talkative though.  He is very congenial, and always has a smile plastered on his face.  But he just doesn't stop talking.

The last time I created a seating chart, I put him near my desk.  I guess my thinking was if he is going to be talkative, at least he will be near me so I can monitor it more closely.

Well, this may have backfired.  Now he just wants to talk to me ALL THE TIME.  He may even have a secret mission to try to be my new best friend.  (By the way, it isn't working.)

My classes were taking a test this week.  Afterwards they were supposed to be working on a packet that required the use of their books.  Of course Mr. Congenial didn't have his book with him.  Naturally, he tried to use his time after the test to engage in conversation with me.  As nice as it is to have a student interested in my life, it is disruptive while other students are still working on their assessment.

So, I needed to find a way to occupy his mind and keep him from talking.  Impulsively I handed him my jar of colored paperclips.

Here, please sort these by color.

This meaningless, tedious task was enthusiastically received.  He never even questioned why I would have him do such a thing.  (Of course, he doesn't know that I have 6 little jars in my desk drawer with thumbtacks, separated by color.)  He went right to work, making piles of red, blue, purple, and more.

Now, my desire was to give him some independent work.  Sorting paperclips should keep him busy and away from the temptation to socialize.  Well...it turns out that sorting paperclips seems like a pretty cool task...or maybe it was just because it was this particular student who was doing it.  Who knows.  Regardless of the reason for the attraction, over the next several minutes he unintentionally lured at least three other students to his desk who wanted to join the fun.

So much for keeping him from being a distraction.

Today I overheard him telling another student (who is not in any of my classes) about how I let him play with paperclips.  I guess you never know what it might take to win over a student.