'Today, class, I'm going to give you a very different sort of assignment,' Miss Winifred said with a smile.

Nigella raised her head from where it'd spent the last hour pillowed on her arms. And she leaned forwards in her seat, ignoring the press of her desk against her ribs.

'What kind of assignment, miss?' Lilly, a blonde girl with huge doe-eyes asked. Nigella's eyes bored into the back of the other girl's skull as she imagined the bright white buds of jasmine flowers sprouting from those tight ringlets.

'A very unique assignment,' Miss Winifred smiled wider, 'one that will encourage you to delve deep into your imagination.'

Nigella caught her snort just in time. Trust Miss Winifred to drag a five second explanation into a five hour lecture.

'I want you to paint yourselves!' Their teacher clapped her hands together like this was the most exciting thing to ever happen and not the worst day of Nigella's life.

'Painting?' Nigella muttered, earning a glare from her neighbour. 'That's got no practical or scientific application.'

But the girls all around her tittered like birds delighted by a magnificent worm.

Nigella plopped her head back against her arms, vowing to sleep through this hellish activity, when a compact set of brushes and paints slid right under her nose.

'I rather thought you'd like to paint my flowers, Nigella,' Miss Winifred smiled softly.

'Narcissus,' Nigella said automatically. 'The latin classification for daffodil, miss,' she added when Miss Winifred blinked at her blankly.

'Of course,' Miss Winifred's smile reaffirmed itself, 'we'll make a florist of you yet.'

'Don't want to be a stupid florist,' Nigella scoffed once her teacher had retreated, 'I'm going to be a scientist.'

Alya Nikai twirled her pen around between her fingers, not bothering to watch her hand as she listened to the eager discussion between the trio sat in front of her. They seemed to be having fun, even though she wasn’t entirely sure what they were talking about.

Where was the teacher? They should have been here almost ten minutes ago… were they alright?

She bit back a sigh, trying to avoid any signs of discomfort at the noise around her. Nobody in this godforsaken class knew how to shut their mouth, after all. Nobody except her, apparently.

Then the door opened with a ridiculous amount of force, revealing a youngish woman who her classmates appeared to recognise — someone behind her cheered. Literally.

“Today, class, I’ll be giving you a very different sort of assignment,” she said almost before the door had closed. “No, James, Mr Hearst isn’t ill, he’s in a meeting.”

Alya had worked out that James rather disliked Me Hearst already, but why that was was anybody’s guess. She dropped her pen onto the desk as the supply began explaining the work she wanted them to do.

“Look up our families?” James asked. “That’s it?”

“Mhm. And tell me what you find…” She didn’t finish her sentence.

Alya found herself unable to move.

Another horrible date. Hi, I’m June and I just got back from yet another horrible date. Every guy I meet is bad, some are cheating on their partners, others are cat fishers. Sometimes I feel like love is just some big joke. Anyway, tomorrow I’ve got class. I go to UCR. I major in writing and minor in botany so I spend most of my time writing in my journal in the gardens. A few days ago at class the professor started with “Today, class, I’m going to give you a different sort of assignment,” I stare at him in confusion and he begins again “Over the next two weeks you will write about what love means to you,” I slump in my chair and give him a look like what the heck. Luckily, I like to sit at the back of the class so he didn’t see me. The next day, I was thinking how I was supposed to go about this seeing as I have never had a good date. Except for maybe the one where I met my best friend, Jada. Dating just doesn’t seem in the cards for me. Everyone else I know seems to have a partner, someone who loves them. I’m currently sitting in the gardens writing about what love means to me. Well, for me love means someone who cares for you, someone who will be there for you, someone who will let you do the same for them, but that’s just from my observations. I don’t think I’ll ever know what love is really like. So that is my view on love, but maybe, hopefully, someday, I will get to see it for myself, but not today. Soon though, soon.

Our civics teacher also led interesting classes. Today was no different. “Today, class, I’m going to give you a very different sort of assignment,” Mr Lloyd announced After a lecture on the constitution of the US. “We’re going to protest the unconstitutional acts of the government.” I was completely floored. I would guess that our teacher must have some grievances of his own to encourage, or rather, require this kind of action. Turns out, he had chartered a bus to Washington,DC. He had planned this outing for months- even printed out permission slips for our parents to sign. Of course, they were vague and misleading. Not even the school principal knew the details. Our teacher was going off the reservation, so to speak. We didn’t even know what the protest would entail. Chanting? Signs? I could do that. My parents signed the slip without reading it. I think they were glad for a weekend to themselves. I packed a go bag for the trip, making sure I had some masks. I didn’t want to be recognized by security. I stuck some cash in my shoe for emergencies. I brought a charger for my cellphone so I could film the experience. The bus ride was boring. I was glad when we all Got out of the vehicle.Mr Lloyd led us in a huddle And gave us our signs. “This is a peaceful assembly,” Mr Lloyd said. “ We’re going to march down the boulevard and not block traffic. “ So we began our solemn walk with signs that said a variety of messages Mr Lloyd designed. I didn’t read my sign; I just held it and matched like a robot. Why not? Got us out in the real world.

SEPTEMBER 26,2021 PROMPT: teacher gives class a different type of assignment

LEARN TO LIVE WITH A CONSTANT IN CHANGE.

“class, today we have a little something different planned“ Mrs. Marvel said as we walked into the room. I could see that our papers weren’t on our desks for us to do or do you know today, I could also see that we had no pencils and nothing was wiped down, hence there was really no evidence that class was prepared for us to stay. “Theodore could you be a doll and make sure that everybody does not take a seat they all just line up in the front of the classroom?“ That’s weird we never do that. Ha? I wonder why this is Happening. All the kids are going crazy they’re all being insane because this isn’t our normal routine which makes us excited because going to school is boring for us little kids it’s hard to sit through and it’s hard to be there and do the same thing every single day. So I guess we’re just having a little fun with it. “No this is a change isn’t it? This is hard for you or may be exciting? Or maybe it’s stressful may be overwhelming? No, kids this is what we call change. Some people in life have a very very hard time with it, some people in life love it can’t get enough of it. Now I am one of those people who don’t like it too much but it’s important that we learn how to deal with change and adapt to it. It’s important that we don’t let the stress get the better of us that we stay a good person stay at constant, keep our respective behavior, and keep ourselves together through it all. Change is very hard at times or very exciting at other times. It’s a giving, throughout life you’re going to go through change. You’re going to go through hard change, you’re going to go through easy change, and you’re going to go through some impossible changes. Now in the situations you need someone to talk to, and you need a constant in your life. So raise your hand if you’re stressed.“ One kid raised their hand. Then as others saw that kid raise their hand they raise their‘s to so now there was about 12 out of 15 kids raising their hands. “See, more people stress than excited, that is very conmen. Could you all name some hobbies like art or sports or even just doodling, or thinking of your pets or baking or just anything that calms you down or that you like to do that you’ve always done. Maybe breathing exercises.“ We went around the circle naming things that we liked to do that didn’t require too much time. “OK so now I want you all to write on the piece of paper that you have in front of you in this circle, that thing that you said whether it be breathing exercises or art or really anything that you liked to do. So what you’re going to do is every year on this date I’m gonna send these cards to you or an email or text saying what that card says on it and I want you to make sure that you’re always doing this thing through your entire life throughout all the change and all the hard and all that happy you have this constant you have this to resort to.

Cracks of gunfire barged through the hollow halls of Charnock Hall Primary School. My class of 9-10 year olds varied from a state of stationary shock to an irate panic. The bangs & screams were seemingly closing in on our classroom, where we laid our bed with no hope of escape. The door was locked from the inside whereas the fire exit had been blocked from the outside - whoever was doing this wanted no survivors.

My students were screaming. Pleading. Crying. Their frenzied voices were unrecognisable due to the overlapping roars & my own lack of concentration. One child’s query seemed to leak through to me:

“Miss, what are we gonna do?”

Gunfire continued.

I had no answer to my students query. Our only escape was locked & our entrance would soon be met with a harsh challenge.

It was my duty to protect the children. Those untainted by terror in order for them to retain their innocence.

“Today, class, I’m going to give you a very different sort of assignment.”

to be continued…

The End.

Becca concentrated on her breathing, in through her nose, then a long controlled exhale. She hugged the wall as she speed-walked the hallway. Her sea foam green eyes were cast down, giving her a view of her once-white Chuck Taylors. She had thrown a shapeless dress over her slight frame that morning, pushing aside her disappointment as she faced her reflection in the mirror. She would never fit in with her sharp features, her shapeless figure, and her awkward mannerisms. Her only hope was to pass through her teen-age years as a ghost, invisible to peers. It was better to be ignored than ridiculed.

She made it to her 5th period class and slid into a chair. She ran a hand over her head, trying to smooth her dark, frizzy hair. Bobby rushed in as the bell rang, jostling Becca’s desk as he slid down the aisle.

“Way to go Bobby. You made it!” Of course, Mr. Simms would frame Bobby’s near miss as a success. From Becca’s perspective, it seemed the cool crowd could do no wrong. Any faults were forgiven, overlooked. What she wouldn’t give for that kind of absolution. Bobby waved off Mr. Simms’s comment. As if he needed a teacher’s approval.

Mr. Simms began the day’s lesson and Becca fought to concentrate on his voice. She felt her classmates eyes on her, heard the whispers. She forced her face into a neutral expression, hiding her emotions. She prepared herself for an hour of boredom, was surprised when she heard Mr Simms say, “Today, class, I’m going to give you a very different sort of assignment.”

“I’ve decided to mix things up a bit,” said Mr Simms. “I know you guys are bored. Hell, even I’m bored. So…. Today we’re going to have an impromptu variety show!”

The students all sat up straighter, looks of horror on their faces. Becca felt bile in her throat.

“I know you haven’t time to prepare, but you’re all good at something. Entertain me!” Mr Simms exclaimed.

What followed was an hour-long ham session. Becca was not surprised to see her classmates confidently recite poems, perform dances, dribble basketballs, deliver makeup tutorials. They came from happy homes. Their feelings were validated. They wouldn’t understand her life, her father long gone and her mother an exhausted shell.

She sat quietly, tried to hide her disappointment in Mr Simms. This seemed like a betrayal of sorts, the easy way out. He indulged his students desire to be seen and admired and bought himself a day off. The only thing she would take from her time in high school was knowledge. She was a good student and she would be a successful, productive adult. It was her only way out of an untenable situation.

As the minutes diminished from sixty to forty to twenty, as student after student demonstrated their talents, Becca calmed. There would not be time for everyone to perform. Becca felt vindicated. After all, she was good at being invisible.

“Today, class, I’m going to give you a very different sort of assignment.”

This is Mr. Fuller, my middle school science teacher, he has alopecia, amongst other issues, though those seem to be existential in nature. If I knew the word at the time, I would have said he was neurotic, but because I was a 7th grade grade-A asshat at the time, I probably thought neurosis was when you wanted to romance a corpse. I was acerbic, maybe, but sharp, not quite yet. But on this day, some twenty years ago, I would begin a journey that would prove life affirming in ways I couldn’t have imagined at the time.

So when Mr. Fuller, whose head shone like a river rock, instructed us to do nothing, everyone in class couldn’t quite grasp the concept. Like most teachers, maybe like most professionals, most adults, Mr. Fuller was coasting through his daily routine, which by this point, had become so ingrained, he no doubt wondered if there was any other way for life to be. But on this day, Mr. Fuller didn’t seem like himself, which is not a bad thing, in his case. He wasn’t exuding stress, uptightness, he wasn’t staring daggers at the various kids clowning around in class, and he wasn’t muttering sweet death under his breath. No, on this day, he seemed, I don’t know, at peace with the way things were. Winter break, of which we were just returning from, had seemed to have treated him well, maybe he received what he asked for.

Again, many of my interpretations today were not even in the back of my mind at the time. I wouldn’t say I was a dolt, but the lights weren’t always on. Maybe too much weed. Maybe not enough. Who’s to say now? Either way, if we are being generous, I was the class clown, and if we’re not, then I was a burnout with a dim future on what could barely be considered the horizon of my future. Mr. Fuller, though uptight in the eyes of fourteen year olds, had his heart in the right place, I’m sure of that now. But teens, by definition, lack perspective, and nothing but time can provide that. So beat your shining skull against a wall all you want, but it ain’t gunna get through us any faster than a wish can extinguish a drought. Only time, and nothing else, has the ultimate say.

Which brings me to a cold day in January where I was first introduced to the concept of meditation, or mindfulness, or paying attention, or, as I said then, doing nothing. “So, let me get this right, Mr. Fuller, you want us to do nothing, and then you want us, again, to do nothing for homework?” Me, proverbially scratching my head, I was skeptical, almost flummoxed by the unsettling of the natural order of student and teacher. They are supposed to assign homework, we, as students, were supposed to protest. But here, ostensibly, we were given the keys to the kingdom of everlasting freedom from the close confines of our education system, and we didn’t know what to do with them. “Yes, class, I would like for you, just for two minutes, here, and for two minutes later this evening, to sit and pay attention to your breath. See what happens, witness your thoughts, but always turn attention to you breath and just see how it is, that’s all I am asking.”

We had arrived, or so we thought. Sitting, breathing, doing nothing? These were things we could accomplish in spades, right? Well, as it turned out, we ended up learning quite a bit doing nothing from January to May, and those lessons have maintained as a powerful force ever since.

So, I’ll say this, I think Mr. Fuller, in all his mirrored domed glory, saved my life, and maybe a few others that day when he introduced a concept so radical, so antithetical to what I thought life was about, that it would eventually turn me inside out in ways that otherwise wouldn’t have been possible.

Thank you.

The classes dispersed after the bell rang. Sally thought, school is sooo boring, why can’t we do more real life learning instead of computer worksheets or book work. She arrived at biology and sat down at her desk.

“Today,class, I’m going to give you a very different sort of assignment,” said Mrs. Templeton while walking across the front of the room.

Ooh….thought Sally this could be exciting! She listened carefully.

“We will go outside and look for living organisms around the school yard then identify them,” said Mrs. Templeton holding up a mushroom. “I will number you in twos and you must stay with your buddy while searching for the organisms.”

Mrs. Templeton handed out lined paper numbered 1-20 each with two blanks and a plastic bag for each group. “On these papers please write the name of the organism then whether it’s a producer or a heterotroph. Place your organism in a plastic bag. I’ll set a timer for 30 minutes to complete this activity,”said Mrs. Templeton.

I counted one and found my buddy Aerial with a number two. “This should be fun,” said Sally.

“I agree,” said Aerial skipping. “Where should we go first?”

“Let’s go by the river,” said Sally walking in that direction.

“Stay where I can see you!” said Mrs. Templeton holding a clip board.

The twenty students searched near the parking lots, the playground, and the river.

“Here is a frog,” said Sally getting ready to pick it up. “It’s a heterotroph.

“We can take a picture, because we can’t put the frog in a bag,” said Aerial as she focused her phone. “Here is a clover.” She picked it and put it in the bag. “This is a producer.”

Throughout the thirty minutes Sally and Aerial along with the rest of the classmates found their twenty items.

“I’ve had a lot of fun,” said Sally skipping back to class with Aerial.

“Me too, said Aerial.

“Thank you for this lesson Mrs. Templeton,” said Sally. “I loved going outside and getting my hands dirty while learning.”

“Your welcome,” said Mrs. Templeton with a smile.

I’d signed up for this ridiculous class on a whim. It was all due to my roommate, Mary.

“Let’s sign up for this!” She had turned to some page in the course catalog and was thrusting it in my face. “It’s called Living With Indecision. It says it will be a process of learning how to make good decisions or not. It should be an easy ‘A’ and counts toward a required Psych course.”

“You have got to be kidding. I have so many hard courses this year! And you do, too. This Physics Major is beating me up and you want me to take some frilly course on how to make decisions? “

“Hey, girl! We’re Seniors and this whole year will be one big decision making nightmare before we walk across that stage. Maybe this will help?”

She had a point. I was already stressing about whether to get a job, go to grad school, go home, go somewhere far away for a year. The whole big ‘Now What?’ kept me awake in the middle of the night.

So here we were, sitting in this classroom with twelve other students, all of us trying to figure out what the heck we were supposed to be getting for our tuition money. Professor Harding was older than God and talked like him. He rambled and lectured and then threw exercises at us that we had to work on in groups. So far we had tackled:

What if we wanted a dog but ended up with a cat? Could we live with a smoker or should we leave? Is it harder to fry eggs or boil them and which would be better?

I kid you not. This is the stuff we sit around discussing. Dr. Harding says these are meant to strengthen our critical,thinking skills and help us make better decisions. So far I have learned I could never get a cat (too independent. I would leave a smoker (asthma clinches that). Boiled eggs are tricky and you have to time them just right (and who cares since boiled eggs are disgusting).

“So class. Today I am giving you a totally different assignment. I will not be here next week for class so you will have two weeks to work on it, and you will do it individually. No groupthink this time. I don’t want you to discuss it among yourselves. There are fourteen slips of paper in this basket. Come take one and I will see you next week.”

We all dutifully arose and headed up to his desk, and Mary rolled her eyes at me. I had a pretty good idea she was not so enamored about her choice of this class and this assignment was just another dimwitted Harding idea. But as she said, so far it had been pretty easy and since he didn’t believe in tests we were simply being graded on showing up and being good participants in our groups. We both were nailing that A.

I plucked out my slip of paper and opened it. It said, “You have to end a relationship with someone you deeply care about without telling them it is for this class and you don’t mean it.”

Good God. Was he kidding? I looked at him and he had a small smirk on his face. Nope. This was for real. I saw what he was doing; he was actually creating a potentially life altering situation that would force us to take an action, make a decision, that could be possibly catastrophic.

I hung back and after the others had all left I approached him. “If we do this, can we then tell the other person it was for a class assignment after we do our report in two weeks?”

“Well now. That will be entirely up to you, Miss Litchfield. Let’s see where life takes you, eh?”

Mary tried to talk to me about the assignment that night but I had decided to go through with it as requested; no discussion. She shut down and left in a huff, but that was her issue, not mine. I had decided that I would do mine around my boyfriend, Jeff. We had been together since our Sophomore year, and were really close. If I just told him, out of the blue, that I was dumping him, he probably would think I was having some kind of life crisis and give me space; then in two weeks I could explain it all and we’d just go on as always.

It didn’t go that way.

Jeff and I always made it a point to eat dinner off campus on Friday nights, and so it was over the spaghetti and meatballs at Bistro Italiano that I told him I thought we needed to break it off. He stared at me like I was nuts, and laid down his fork.

“You’re serious? I mean, where did this come from?” I was shocked to see there were tears in his eyes. “I thought we had something really good together, Annie. Is it something I’ve done?”

“No, no. Just….well….I just need some space, you know? I can’t really explain it. Just something I have to do.”

Which was actually the truth, just not all of it.

What was totally unexpected was Jeff’s reaction. He got up, threw his napkin at me and screamed, “You bitch!” He was incredibly angry. “I thought you were different than all the others, Annie. But you’re not. I’m leaving and I never want to see you again. What a shitty thing to pull.”

And he stomped out.

This was a disaster. I didn’t know whether to go after him but it struck me that this was a side of Jeff I had never seen. Oh, we’d had a couple of spats but that was must normal relationship stuff. I would apologize and we’d go on. But this was waaay over the line. I just sat there and then decided I would see how it played out for the next two weeks.

Jeff was incandescent in his rage. He began to leave me hateful notes. He texted me at odd hours and they were all hate emojis interjected between swear words. He stalked me around campus, glaring at me and giving me the finger if I looked at him.

This went on for the two weeks of my assignment. I wrote up my report for Dr. Harding and left it on his desk and then went back to the dorm. I had not said much of what had been going on Jeff with Mary, but when I walked in she was at her desk crying.

“I am so sorry, Annie.”

“What? Why? Sorry for what?”

“I have to tell you, now that the assignment is over. This craziness with Jeff? It was my fault. My assignment was to get someone to upset a mutual friend. When you said you had broken up with Jeff, I had a gut feeling that this had to with that dumb assignment. I found Jeff and he was so upset and angry and I….well….I egged him on.”

All I could do was stare at here. Now here was a real life decision dilemma. I had found out my boyfriend had huge unresolved anger issues and that my roommate and best friend could use me simply for a good grade.

That assignment had cost me a lot and I didn’t much like myself, either. I had also found out I would stoop to hurting people I cared about just because I was given an assignment in a dumb class that I thought could boost my grade point average.

I dropped the class, Mary and I worked it out and apologized to each other, but I decided what I had seen in Jeff was a deal breaker and there was no chance of “living with indecision” in this case. I was done with him.