Ms. Quintana smiled to herself. Her class thought they were being sneaky, but years of experience in fifth grade gave her multiple eyes on the back of her head and she saw them, sitting on the carpet waiting for their lesson to start, quietly giggling and poking each other. She didn't know what they were doing, but it flowed from one side of the class to the other like the wave at a baseball game. The funny thing was, it had only started since they'd come back from specials that morning. And it wasn't just a few kids doing it either; the entire class was in on the joke. "What are you guys up to?" She asked, hoping someone would fess up, but it only elicited nervous giggles and silence from her normally chatty class. The teacher shrugged it off, knowing the secret would be revealed in time and went on with her lesson.
Five minutes later, she released her kids to start her math rotation and that's when she truly saw what they were doing. Evan passed by Laura's desk, holding up his hands and wiggling all his fingers to her, on his on his way to his center. Laura turned in her chair and passed the wiggle to Michael Hodgins who was on the floor with a clipboard. Michael, wisely, waited a few moments before passing it to Ellery next to him.
As kids began filling her back table, Ms. Quintana diverted her attention to them and ignored the still passing finger wiggle between her students. But while her small group was working on practice problems, she sent off a quick text message to the specials teacher they'd had that morning: music and technology. The technology teacher had no idea what she was talking about; Ms. Quintana kind of knew she wouldn't, she was all work and no play, especially in her classroom. But the music teacher. He sent back three rapid-fire texts, the first two full of laughing emojis and the third to a link accompanied by a message that simply said: just read it.
Ms. Q quickly opened the link and had only gotten through a few sentences before loudly laughing out loud.
"Now you understand!" Libby Thompson called to her from across the room, having watched her teacher through the whole process.
"That's amazing!" Ms. Quintana laughs, wiping tears from her eyes. "You dorks are the best."
By now, the rest of the class had been tipped off to the fact that their teacher knew and they didn't have to be so secretive anymore. The wiggles kept going the rest of math time and as she sent her kids out for lunch recess, Ms. Quintana gave each of them a spirited wiggle of her own fingers.
Later that day, the music teacher forwarded her a thread of emails he'd received from confused teachers of the classed he'd taught that day. All of them wondering why their kids were happily wiggling their fingers at each other.
"Best holiday ever," Ms. Quintana chuckled to herself, re-reading the thread again and adding the wacky holiday to her calendar for the rest of time.