True Irony

Every month my students are to read for 30 minutes each night including weekends, and record it on the monthly reading log. They get a log each month, and are to turn it in at the end of the month. I would only get a handful of reading logs turned in, which I found disappointing. So for the month of March, I told the kids that whoever read the most pages, read and recorded their reading every night, and had the reading log filled out correctly and turned in on time, that I would buy them a milkshake. And not just any milkshake, like the junk from McDs. I'm talking good stuff. From Baskin and Robbins. Any flavor they wanted.

Every day when we would fill out our planners with homework, I would remind them of this challenge. It got to be sort of a group chant, as I would repeat some of the same descriptive phrases about this reading challenge. Anyway, Addie won, and got a mint chocolate chip milkshake. She was the envy of all.

New month, and I decided once again to do the challenge. Today was the first day this month, and I told the students that it was a new challenge, a new chance to win a milkshake. I went through almost the same routine as always, and the class would recite some of the same things ("...not just any milkshake, but a BASKIN AND ROBBINS MILKSHAKE! YUM!"). The I told them how lucky they were to have me for a teacher.

"Yeah," said Chuck. "You give milkshakes to the top readers!"

"Yes, I do," I replied. "Perhaps now you will finally actually do some reading, record it on the log, and turn it in!"

How funny that he was so excited about this, but not ever turned in a reading log all year. I told him he was a prime example of irony.