“I am brokenness because my friend doesn’t like me anymore.”

Yes, the kid said he is brokenness. While this statement sounds like a serious claim that we needed to report to the counselor, it was actually hilarious in the moment.

To provide some context, we were wrapping up our weekly Friday spelling test. Every Friday, the students are tested over the spelling of 10 words that they are given at the beginning of the week. There are also five words, the challenge words, that are given as bonus words for extra credit.

Now keep in mind, these kids are only 8-years-old – I was in a second grade class this week. For being only eight, the challenge words that these kids had to spell were unusually abnormal compared to their regular words. These words were words like agriculture, brokenness, and aggregate. What second grader is going to use the word aggregate on the regular?

Anyways, my teacher and I were struggling to come up with an example sentence for the word brokenness because not even either of us use the word regularly. One of the kids raised his hand.

I went up to him to ask what he needed and he responded by saying he had a sentence to share. We told him he could share it with the class without asking what the sentence was first. That was a mistake.

When he then shared with the class that he was brokenness because his friend didn’t like him, we did not know whether to contact the counselor or to laugh. This sentence, coming from the sweetest kid in the class who wouldn’t hurt a fly, was definitely a surprise. You get a lot of surprises as a teacher sometimes, that’s just how it is.