Classroom Antics: Times When They Spooked Me Out
Kids say the darndest things. We are often documenting their adorable, hysterical, or confusing interjections, and then we share them with you on this blog. But it’s not so often that they, without a single bad intention, will share something that gives you the heebeegeebeez. Here are three stories where kids spooked me out:
Freddy is among us.
At a workshop series, one student, around the age of 6 or 7, talked incessantly about a particular video game. During our last class, he showed us the theme song for the video game, and we encouraged him to use it to create a musical story. (If a child is passionate about something, we always try to encourage it within the context of the class.) The story he made was certainly a little creepy, but so was the theme music, so I didn’t think much of it. It wasn’t until later when I finally had the thought to search for the video game and realized that it was Five Nights at Freddy’s, an absolutely terrifying horror game for ages 16+. And here we were encouraging this child to tell us more about it and share it with his friends! Ahhh! *Face palm*
“Among Us” is another game that kids (and adults alike) were consumed with. While teaching a stop motion animation workshop, a child wanted to create an animation inspired by the popular video game. “What a cool idea!” I told her. When I came to check on her later in the class, she was using dark red modeling clay to make a large pool of blood that had left the body of an Among Us character. How did the imposter get to this victim? It had used a knife made out of pipe cleaners to stab them. She was so proud of her work. I’ll never look at red clay the same.
Chucky & The Megalodon
This next story, in fact, happened outside the classroom, but it’s too funny (creepy) not to include. For some context: my husband’s family is Chilean and only speak Spanish. One 8-year-old cousin, Matti, had just gotten his first cell phone (my thoughts on this will be reserved for a latter blog post). He was glued to the phone all night, bumping into things because he wasn’t looking up from the screen. My ears perked up when I heard a voice speaking English in a video he was watching. Perhaps the video had subtitles in Spanish or the visuals were intriguing enough to keep his attention. Since no one in the family speaks English, I was the only one understanding that the narrator was talking about conspiracies so gruesome and deranged that I don’t even want to write them in this post!
Later that night, Matti came up to me and asked, “Do you think that Chucky (pronounced “Choooky” by Chileans, something I find very amusing and which helped ease the creepiness of his question) would be able to stab the megalodon to death while being attacked by Bigfoot? Oh! And have you ever met someone from the Illuminati?”
For the love of all things good, please someone take this child’s phone away.
The Color Green
Back to the classroom: I was talking about color theory and encouraging students to be bold with their color choices in their projects. As I was mentioning the color green, a student immediately jumped in. “Green isn’t a creative color,” she said and giggled. I was confused and wanted to understand what she meant. She continued by saying that she had watched a video on creativity, and it said that green isn’t a creative color. How curious! Perhaps this video was on some technical color analysis or maybe even green screens? She showed me the video. Well, I can only give you the warning that I didn’t have. Watch at your own risk…
Quick Links:
Get rid of the creeps with these funny classroom antics.
Check out how music can represent spooky sounds.
Go to our For Kids! page for an appropriate and educational resource to show your students (no mention of Chucky or the megalodon in sight).
More Blog Posts:
A creepy collection of classroom stories about video games, conspiracy videos, and the color green.