Hangman

Something I watched on television the other night reminded me of the day my students (all male) and I played a game of hangman towards the end on one of our classes. Now, I don’t make a habit of allowing my students to waste valuable time by participating in meaningless games but we did have about twenty minutes left and they had worked fairly well during class and so, being the “cool teacher” (by my standards and not my student’s!) that I was, I decided to give them a break. It was also an opportunity for me to play a prank on one of my students. The way I figure it… What’s the point of teaching if we can’t play jokes on our students from time to time?

Hangman… The object of this game is for the audience to figure out what word the person in charge (we shall call him the game master) is thinking about. A topic is generally chosen by the group and the game master gives everyone a clue by drawing a short line for every letter of the word. The audience chooses letters. The correct letters get placed on the word line and the incorrect letters result in drawing the man on the hanging apparatus. First the head, then the torso, then each arm and then each leg. If the man is completely drawn, the game is lost. The game is won by guessing the word before the poor guy hanging from the gallows is completed.

Well… the topic of the game that day in class was body parts. The students agreed that, since there were so many body parts, the game master would specify whether the chosen part was from a male or female. I had a student by the name of Jason. Now Jason was one of those guys who knew everything… at least that was what he wanted us to believe! It was Jason’s turn but he was having difficulty choosing a part to use for the game. Upon approaching me, he quietly asked me what the part was called where you would grab somebody on the back of their neck. Now I knew that the part of the body he was referring to was the scruff but I told him that is was the scrotum! He then asked me if it was a male or female part… I told him that it was both. Thanking me, he went to the front of the class with the biggest grin that his face could contain!

After telling the class that the part that was in his mind was a part found on both genders, the game began. Needless to say that none of the audience won…they didn’t even come close! The end of the round resulted in the class rolling on the floor in laughter as Jason stood there totally befuddled by their response. By the time he was clued in as to what a scrotum really was and that females did not have a scrotum, he did not look impressed. If looks could kill…

Ironically, it is not the experiences that most educators remember fondly that I think of the most with a smile… It is the experiences when we were rolling around laughing our fool heads off. As a matter of fact, it is similar experiences of my time in school that I think of the most when my high school buddies and I sit around and reminisce!

I will never forget Jason because of that hilarious experience and I am sure that every time he thinks of me, he will never forget how I crushed his faith in teachers… well not really.

So, tomorrow… hmmm…. What stunt can I pull next??