 |
||||||||
 |
||||||||
|
||||||||
|
Tears, cheers fill final day
By BABITA PERSAUD, Times Staff Writer TAMPA -- Mrs. Perotti peers over her purple, tortoise shell glasses and raises her left hand high in the air -- code for settle down immediately or spend a half-hour in detention.
Summer vacation means visiting theme parks back-to-back, says Blake Evans, 11. It means seeing cousins from Texas, says Patrick Morris, 11. And hanging out all day with Lucky, your beagle puppy, who runs mad circles in the living room and loves to eat pine bark mulch, says Kristina McGeorge, 11. Nearly 162,000 students in Hillsborough County broke free for summer Thursday, including the 30 in Mrs. Perotti's class at Bellamy Elementary School in Town 'N Country. Their day started like all others, with a quick roll call at 8 a.m. "Oh my. We are all here. What a surprise!" Mrs. Perotti says. But this is a special day, a half day that ends at 11:45 a.m. An award ceremony takes up most of the morning. Fifth-graders pile into the media center while pins and trophies are handed out at the podium for citizenship, attendance, patrol and reading goals. Then comes the "clap out," a proud tradition at Bellamy. Fifth-graders parade around the school while underclassmen -- kindergarten through fourth grade -- clap, cheer and watch in awe. The fifth-graders eat it up. "I can't help smiling," says Stephanie Adams, 10. "I do not want the day to end," says Bailey Ehrich, who has a heavily autographed cast on her right arm, the result of an injury from running into a dishwasher. "I had socks on and the floor was wet and I was running to get the phone," she says. Fifth grade is a wonderful year. Only fifth-graders get to be safety patrols. Only fifth-graders can play the faculty in the annual kickball game, which the teachers always win, but you never know. But this also was the year of Sept. 11, when a teacher's aide whispered into Mrs. Perotti's ear and, a half-hour later, whispered again. Mrs. Perotti, a former New Yorker, became very serious but went on explaining decimals on the overhead projector. Then parents began arriving in droves. Soon, half the class was gone. Mrs. Perotti gathered the remaining students around her and calmly said, "I don't feel you need to be fearful." Her students say they will always remember Martha Perotti-Busacca, who said at the beginning of the year, "she would discipline us, but she would never not like us," says Ronald Drew Shamblen, 11. Mrs. Perotti didn't give out gold stars; she gave little hearts, stuck on a bulletin board that read: "Jump into learning with all your heart!" She didn't count down to the last day, either. "I'm here to the last second," she says. "Are you?" For 12 years, Perotti has taught fifth grade at Bellamy, which she loves because she can teach the "whole student." She is their only teacher for an entire year. They are her only students. Everything is done together: worksheets, experiments, reading, which is done in small quiet voices, each of the 30 students taking a passage. Next year, it's off to middle school, with its multiple classrooms and lockers instead of cubbie holes. "I don't know anything about middle school," says Blake Evans, 11, who will be at Ben Hill Middle School next year. At 11:35 a.m. Mrs. Perotti hands out report cards. "I'm going to sixth grade. I'm going to sixth grade," sings Aundrea Green, 11. At 11:40 a.m., the principal comes on the intercom. "Have a good summer, Bobcats!" Her words are drowned by hoots and cheers. A group of girls, including Natacha Fernandez with the press-on silvery nails, start hugging each other and Mrs. Perotti. A few of the boys do, too. "Oh, I'm so sad," says Charles Anzalone, fake crying. Then he breaks out into a robotic dance. Mrs. Perotti had written in his annual: "I expect to see you on Saturday Night Live when you grow up." "Okay guys, I love you. Have a good summer," says Mrs. Perotti, who is crying. It is 11:45 a.m. The mass exodus of little people begins, through the blue metal doors, out into the sunshine and heat, to the long line of buses and cars. Mrs. Perotti spends a long time at the curb waving goodbye and giving a few more hugs before returning to her classroom of empty red chairs, empty cubbie holes and a big vastness that makes it seem now like the most quiet place on Earth.
 © 2006 • All Rights Reserved • St. Petersburg Times
490 First Avenue South • St. Petersburg, FL 33701 • 727-893-8111 
|
From the Times City Times - South Tampa North of Tampa Marlene Sokol Letters |
