Visa debit cards, Justin Bieber and "Owned Dissigens"

Here's the prompt:

If you could be one age for a week, what age would you be? Why? What would you do?

These are some of the gems I received today:

K. (of this lovely and this lovely) said: "If I were a age I want to be 18 so I can join the army. I would go to the gym and get a Visa debit card."

L. (featured here): "I would turn 13 or 14 then I would try to go out with Justin Bieber. These are my two reasons. 1. because he's totally cute. 2. It would seen fun to be as old as my brother and I would only be that old for a week."

and J. (our newest overheard at school contestant!): "I would like to be 18 cuz then you would be able to do your owned dissigens (decisions if you don't read 6th grader) and I would start working to by my own stuff and not ask my parents for anything. Then I could move and get my own place and even if this doesn't happen, I plan to be responsible for what I do and not blame any1 for my actions. But first I plan to live my childhood I don't wanna grown that fast but then agen (again for those of you who can't keep up) it's just one week."

Man. I love their thinking!

*All spelling mistakes are what the 6th grader actually wrote, I wanted this to be authentic...please take off your judging pants before you call me on it.

Odd Family Dynamics

My student L. (I just realized that I have a bunch of kids with the same initial...this is not the same L. as here and here.) and all her friends began playing this family game. It's really quite dumb they just call each other brother, sister, cousin, mom, dad, etc. A few days ago, they told me of the game.

"Miss J.! You should be in our family! You can be grandma!"

Cue my exaggerated frowny face. "Ouch, L. That hurts. How about I'm your super awesome aunt?"

"Yep, that will work."

Today, during recess, L. comes up to me and says, "Miss J. We need to get you a husband so we can have a super awesome uncle. How about Mr. L?" (the only single male teacher at our school.)

All other girls, "No! He's mean to us. He yells a lot." (BTW, he is not mean but he does "yell," that is just the kind of person he is, I personally want to begin teaching like him because when he talks, his students listen, which mine have forgotten how to do lately.)

L. chimes in with, "Miss J. I have a better idea. You can date my cousin."

My only thought was "Please don't be talking about a 'cousin' at school. That's just creepy." Trying to figure out if it truly is a cousin, I ask, "Ummm...how old is your cousin?"

"Like 20."

"No, L. That won't work."

"Awwww. But Miss J. It would be so cool if we were related."

Ummmm...Probably not.