103- Glasses

Ashleigh has been driving me crazy all week. Apparently, her older brother was prescribed reading glasses and now Ashleigh insists that she needs glasses, too. The girl is one of the best readers in our class, but lately she has been feigning blindness.
Every day, during Language Arts, my class spends about fifteen minutes reading aloud from a story. One student will read for a couple of paragraphs and then call on a classmate to pick up where they’ve left off. This is normally Ashleigh’s chance to shine; she likes to show off her fluency skills. Ever since we have gotten back from Christmas break, Ashleigh has used our read aloud as an opportunity to pretend she is going blind. When her turn arises, the girl will pretend to struggle over simple words and insist that she can’t see the text.
This charade has been driving me crazy, so yesterday I called Ashleigh’s mother and informed her of the situation. Ashleigh’s mom is a reasonable lady who is not about to put up with any nonsense from her children. The woman promised that she would deal with Ashleigh and that the kid would return to school today with a whole new attitude.
Well, Ashleigh did return to school with a new attitude- and a new pair of glasses. Her mother’s way of “dealing with” the girl was to buy Ashleigh a fake pair of reading glasses; a pair of frames with nonprescription lenses. Ashleigh proudly entered my classroom sporting her new frames and proceeded to read me everything. The kid took any opportunity possible to read text aloud.
I was amused by Ashleigh’s newfound enthusiasm for reading and was not about to stop her. I figured as long as she was reading, she was learning, and that is the point of school.
Unfortunately, by the time we had started our read aloud, the genius of the new glasses plan had backfired. Ashleigh had become obsessed with her new frames and had been taking them on and off and touching them all day with her grubby fingers. By read aloud time, her lenses were so caked with grime and smudges, it was impossible for the girl to see through them.
“Ashleigh! It’s your turn to read.” Robbie said for the second time.
“I know, I know!” Ashleigh rebuffed. “I just have to clean off my glasses.”
I watched as the girl pulled the frames from her face and started to rub the lenses with her bare fingers. The smudges swirled around and around on the glass, making new patterns in the grim with each motion of Ashleigh’s finger tips.
She has got to be kidding me.
I glanced at the clock. We only had five minutes left to finish the chapter and I was feeling impatient. “Ashleigh,” I snapped, “You can read without them! Just read.”
Ashleigh’s face crumpled and I immediately felt bad. “No! No. I can’t read.” The girl whined. “I need to use my reading glasses.”
I felt irritated and insisted she begin reading, “You can read just fine without them. Start reading.”
“No! I can’t! I can’t!” Ashleigh’s eyes filled up with tears.
I didn’t feel sorry for her, I just felt exasperated. I expelled a defeated breath of air. “Fine. Gaby, you start reading. Ashleigh, give me your glasses.”
Teachers have to pick their battles, and I knew that finishing the story was more important that arguing with Ashleigh. I took Ashleigh’s glasses over to the classroom sink and washed them with soap and water. After towel-drying the small lenses, I returned the frames to the girl. I leaned in close, so that only she could hear and said, “Take care of your glasses, and if they disrupt my class again, I will take them away for the rest of the year.”
Ashleigh gasped and then muttered a small “Yes, ma’am.” When another student called on her to read two minutes later, Ashleigh read every word clearly and without hesitation.