My losers

I have an update on my ostrasized kids. It's not good though. The worst case, in 6th grade, has moved to another city which, sadly, I consider a relief especially since we are now splitting that class into groups they need to work with for the rest of the year and I knew fitting her in would be a problem.

I thought things were going well for our girl in 5th grade. The only incident was at the beginning when one kid wouldn't sit with her. This is a sad Valentine's day story. If you ever got to few Valentines in your brown bag at school listen up, that ain't nothin. The lesson on Valentine's Day included making cards. Since I couldn't have them make one for everyone I taught them about secret admirers with a bit of a platonic spin. They then drew names from a hat and made a card for that person. I gave them supplies and a list of generic V-day sayings- "I like you." You are special to me" "Be my friend." It worked great in 3rd grade and the only snafu in the first 5th grade class came when, after the cards had been delivered, on kid was teased about a girl loving him. My dear 5th grade outcast got her card, which I remember thinking would be okay because it was made by another girl and in the end was in a nice envelope. Stupid teacher, envelopes effectively hide mean things. The card said "You are ugly. You are not special to me." It's a shame that the only time they can manage to break from the linguistic mode is when they want to be cruel. Anyway, Vicky cried, I took her for a walk and couldn't think of anything good enough to say in my limited Chinese and I guess Roxanna and Ruby talked to the class. Roxanna told her after class that if she like other people they will more likely like her back. That's hard to do when you've been hated since 1st grade. I tend to agree that her best bet is to kill them with kindness, but where Roxanna seems to think she started the meaness, I'm pretty sure the other kids did. She has som physical problems and that is not something kids easily accept.
On another note, two new kids in my third grad class seem to have already found best friends and fallen seamlessly into the social groove. I'm I just blind? Is it possible? If it is, why can't I make friends that fast?