Ch. 3 – Zackary Richardson
“Hi,” he mumbled quietly eyeing me. I quickly scanned his small but tidy room. It seemed as though Zackary sure liked collecting things. There were lots of books on a shelf, a chest filled with trucks, a large container filled with die cast cars by the hundreds, a jar full of rocks, and a big bucket of every kind of zoo and jungle animal imaginable. There was a car shaped bed with Disney characters bed sheets and a matching blue study table in the corner of the room with all his school supplies neatly organized on top of it.
“Can you show me some of your favorite things here, Zackary?” I asked. He just nodded and picked up a red toy truck and handed it to me. Next he brought out a book off the shelf. It was titled ‘The First Day of School.’ I asked if I could sit and read it with him. Again he nodded shyly. The book was about a boy younger than Zackary. The character of the story was nervous about leaving his parents for the first time and being around big kids. I knew that Zachary was entering into the third grade, but would be doing fourth grade level courses. I made sure to read the story with extra inflection in my voice to really make it sound interesting.
After we were finished reading, I looked at Zackary and asked, “Can you tell me why this is your favorite book?” His voice was barely above a whisper when he replied, “I really like the boy in it… I went to school once too, you know.” I asked, “How did you like it there?” With much more force this time, he said “I didn’t like it and I won’t go back there!” Gently, I asked, “What didn’t you like about it?” He replied slightly angrily, “There were all these loud kids and the teachers always told you what to do all the time.”
“Well honey, I didn’t always like going to school either when I was a little girl. But you’re lucky that you get to be in an online school from now on and learn from home. Are you excited about that?” I inquired. I saw a tiny spark light up his big brown eyes. He nodded slowly saying, “It’ll be better than going to school everyday, that’s for sure.”
“Okay Zachary, if you let me, I’ll make every single day of our learning fun and exciting for you. You’ll get to decide which subjects to do first. Doesn’t that sound good?” I reassured him. He nodded and finally cracked a smile. Relief washed over me.
As we came downstairs and started saying our good-byes, Zackary surprised everyone by throwing his little arms around me just as I was walking out the door. “Remember, next time you come, everyone calls me Zack,” he said shyly. “Okay Zack, everyone calls me Jessie!” I replied cheerfully. That got a brighter smile out of Zack.
As I drove away, I couldn’t help but feel a pang of joy to be able to work with this delightful, if not reserved little boy.