Chapter 15

Torey decides to talk to Claudia about her plans for the baby. She ends up overstepping her boundaries and asking what Claudia is going to do with it, and if she had considered putting the baby up for adoption. This makes Claudia upset with Torey and she wonders how Torey could even suggest something like that. She thinks that everything will be okay and that someone will always have time to help with the baby. Claudia also said that the baby was going to fix everything. Then asks Torey why she even cares, because nobody else does, and that everyone in Torey's classroom are just "somebody else's kids", which is where I assume the title of this book came from. This was an interesting conversation because Torey knew she had overstepped and made Claudia feel bad, but she also wanted Claudia to realize how things would really be if she kept the baby, and that the chance of her dropping out of school was becoming higher and higher.

I think this is a tough call as far as talking to students and giving them input on certain topics. This is probably something I would talk with them about, but I doubt I would give them any input on what to do in certain situations. For my safety and to not hurt their feelings it is not really my place to put my opinion in their lives. Although there are times where input might be helpful, this would probably be one of those times that a student-teacher relationship isn't really close enough to put my own ideas towards.

Lori brought Torey a drawing she made, and had a beautiful quote. She was talking about how it didn't come out perfect like she was thinking, and Torey told her not to say that and that it was better than any old photograph. That's when Lori said, "What I was thinking about was: It is perfect. Not the part you see but what's inside you. In my head, I could see this bird perfect. And that's sort of enough for me to like this picture even though it isn't really very perfect. Because...well, because I kind of know it could be..." (pg. 155). Then she said "Things never really are perfect, but inside you, you can always see them perfect, if you try. That makes things beautiful to me".

It is amazing the profound things children can say, not even knowing how big of an impact their innocent words can mean to those around them.