Piñata

"Kids, this is seriously the best or worst idea you've ever had. I haven't yet decided which one."

Spoiler alert: I end up deciding "best," even though by the end my floor gets totally messed up and my electrical socket ends up broken. That's how much fun it was.

My students had worked very hard to fill their vocabulary jar. Every time they use a vocabulary word correctly in a sentence, they get to put a marble in a large jar in my classroom. They can use the words in other classes or even at home as long as they get a note that they used them (teacher tip: this is a great way to get students to bring vocabulary words into their everyday vocabularies).

Finally, for the first time all school year, the students filled the jar. They were very excited for their party. We took votes on what type of party they wanted to have, and they decided they wanted a "pizza and candy" party (so original, I know). One of the girls said, "Can we bring in a piñata for the candy?" A rousing chorus of "Oooooooo! Yeah! A piñata!" echoed around the room. I told them I wasn't sure about that idea; that I would think about it and get back to them later (our party wasn't scheduled until Friday). It was one of those things where I hoped they would forget about it and let it go.

They didn't.

They kept asking if I'd made up my mind about the piñata until finally on Thursday I had to give an answer. I said, "Here's the thing. I don't have time to go buy a piñata. If one of you would like to buy or make a piñata by tomorrow, then we will use it at our party." Because no one would have time to buy or make a piñata in one night, right?

Clearly I underestimate my junior high students.

The next morning, one of my girls walked in with a makeshift piñata made out of a sturdy cardboard diaper box and a ridiculous amount of duct tape. It was like an Alcatraz for candy. There was no way we were going to be able to break that. I looked at the yardstick by my whiteboard. "I don't think my yardstick is going to work on that piñata," I said doubtfully. As if on cue, the girl's friend walked in the room, "I FOUND IT!" she cheered triumphantly while holding up a METAL BASEBALL BAT.

"Whoa whoa whoa..." I stood up out of my chair and tried to diffuse the situation. "We can't go smashing things with bats. That's dangerous. We said we would use the yardstick, remember?"
"But Mrs. Webb," said my little piñata creator, "the yardstick will never break open this box." She was right. We all knew she was right. And she'd worked so hard on the box...
"Okay," I finally said. "Fill it up with candy, and I'll figure out a plan."

I don't know what kind of plan I thought I was going to figure out. Like I was going to go to the storage room and find some specialty piñata crusher that was safe for children but deadly on duct-tape diaper boxes. It wasn't going to happen.

I was faced with the dilemma of going back on my promise for the sake of 100% safety or living on the edge a little and hoping for the best. Everyone who's ever taught junior high knows that sometimes you have to live on the edge a little. It should really be in the job description.
Once the diaper box was filled with candy, it was HEAVY. Twelve students brought in bags of candy, and some brought in two. The box probably weighed twenty pounds. We had to figure out where to hang it, which is when I thought, Ah ha! No place to hang it! Now their plan will unravel and I didn't even have to foil it! Peeerrrfect.

They wanted to hang it from the basketball hoop, but there was a gym class going on during the same period as our party. They wanted to hang it from a tree outside, but the wind chill was hovering near zero. They finally decided to hang it from the ceiling in my room. This made me nervous, but I thought I would check out the possibility. If I'm being totally honest here, the teacher part of me was saying "this is a horrible idea" but the super immature (and increasingly winning over the mature) part of me was saying, "I haven't played with a piñata in two decades...this is gonna be SWEET."
I stood on my table and pulled up a ceiling tile. I hung on to the metal bar between the ceiling tiles and put a little bit of weight on it. Then I put a little more weight on it. It was surprisingly strong. I could almost swing all of my 125 pounds from that bar...

...I mean 130...

...I mean FINE, 135ish, but WHO REALLY CARES ABOUT THAT? BACK TO THE POINT HERE! CANDY!

After deciding that most of my weight could be supported by the bar, I figured it could probably hold a twenty pound box being smashed by twiggy preteens. Just to be on the safe side, though, I told them to hit the box from the side and not from the top. I didn't even blindfold them just to be sure they could aim correctly.

Yarn wouldn't hold the box because yarn was too weak, so a few of my girls quickly hand-crocheted a six-cord rope of yarn. Yes, they zippy-quick HAND-CROCHETED. Now there's a useful skill that way more people should have.

We finally (finally!) got the box to hang from the ceiling, and we were ready to go. I had the students back waaaaaaaay up, hopefully out of the range of a swinging metal bat. I believe it was at about this point that I said, "Kids, this is seriously the best or worst idea you've ever had. I haven't yet decided which one." The students were completely amped. We'd been working out kinks in this piñata situation for about a half hour. They'd used that entire half hour to get more and more and more and more excited about this idea. The excitement was contagious, I'm not going to lie. I sat on my desk and had to keep myself from bouncing with anticipation like all of my kids were doing.

Each student got a chance to smash the box with the bat. I told you earlier - that was a very sturdy box. They had to swing hard. One student didn't hit the box straight on, and on her follow through she smashed our brick wall. (EEEEEK! See why I didn't let students stand there?!). She hit the socket plate on on an electrical socket, and the plastic broke. All of the students gasped and looked at me for my reaction. I probably should have acted very stern, but instead I started cracking up and exclaimed, "Way to go - you BROKE THE SCHOOL!" Socket plates are only like $2, right? I haven't actually replaced it yet. Hmmm... Everyone started laughing, and I made them all back up even further.

When we had gone around the circle three times smashing our piñata, someone made a dent in the side that allowed a bunch of powdery something to leak out of the bottom corner. "What's that?" the kids asked. I laughed and answered, "It's sugar. You've completely pulverized your candy!" It was true. When the box FINALLY broke open, a bunch of the candy was smashed to a pixie-stick level dust. It made my floor very messy. Watching the kids rush the box with pure glee, however, made all of the clean-up worth it. I think somewhere in the encyclopedia, the definition of "happiness" should be a picture of kids rushing a broken piñata.

After the excitement, everyone retreated back to their desks with fistfuls and shirtfuls and skirtfuls of candy. I couldn't believe how much candy each student got. It was a lot of fun, and a few students said it was their favorite party ever. There was a lot of sugar involved - I feel kind of bad for whichever teacher got them after me. Let's just hope it was gym class.