It seems that every day a new story pops up trying to explain the "6 7" phenomenon. Because I teach fourteen and fifteen year olds, I figured I should chime in.
Now I must admit, as a special education teacher, I think my annoyance tolerance may be higher than the average teacher. I am used to working with students on the autism spectrum or sever ADHD so I think I am pretty much used to random things being blurted out in class. As a result, I am not bothered at all by the "6 7" phenomenon.
For the uninitiated, students across the country are randomly saying the numbers "6 7" (usually during class). Whenever I hear something repeated so often, my teacher sense starts tingling and I immediately think it must be something inappropriate for school. But to my surprise, "6 7" is not a code for anything sexual, drug related or mean. It is code for... nothing. It literally has no meaning. It is just a very simple way for kids to indicate that they are "in the circle". They know the joke... which is that there is no joke. I am guessing they had a ton of fun confusing adults by saying something nonsensical. Adults like me, scoured the internet and asked around to see what it meant. But the joke is on us. it means nothing! And to tell you the truth, I find that pretty clever. I am actually happy teens found a way to bond over something so innocuous. No one has to be the butt of the joke. No one needs to be demeaned. No one has to worry that someone is going to say "6 7" to them in the hallway.
Is it annoying? Sure. Anything becomes annoying if you hear it too much (I'm looking at you Christmas music). But I'll trade a little annoyance for harmless bonding any day. In addition, laughing releases dopamine. Every time kids are laughing at something quick and safe like "6 7", they are getting dopamine from social interactions rather than their phones. So to me that is a huge win! For those teachers really annoyed, I hope they take a step back and realize that kids are interacting face to face and laughing WITH each other. Not at each other. As I write this, I find myself wishing it never dies down.
Perhaps my favorite thing about it is that because it is meaningless and innocuous, I can get in on the joke. every once in a while I can work it in to wake up my class and give them that quick dopamine boost. When I start a new topic, I often joke that we need to warm up their brains so they don't pull a brain muscle. I have now begun to add that "Pulling a brain muscle is serious. It can mess you up for like... 6 7 days." Some students groan, some smile, some laugh... but they all listen. That is another win.
In a world where telling students to turn to page 69 results in uncontrollable snickering and giving a problem whose answer is 420 leads to inappropriate hand gestures and more laughing, I'll take "6 7" every day of the week and 6 7 times on Sunday.
Anybody have a scouting report on what the next "6 7" will be? I'd like to be one step ahead of my students.
There's a 14yo in eldest's group at gymnastics that loves to bust than one out quite regularly. One of my boys (aged 8) started up recently when the groups were close to each other (different levels so we move into different areas but are occasionally adjacent) and both of them started up and eldest yelled out I'LL THROW HIM AT YOU or maybe it was I'LL THROW YOU AT HIM, basically he was threatening to throw the older one at the younger one XD)
The fun I had was telling the older one that I would add that much time to his vault run if he ran chanting "6 7" again XD (context in case it wasn't clear, one of the vault exercises I do is timing how fast they run from the number 16 on the vault run to a two foot jump on the beatboard).
And one of my other boys told me that if anyone said "6 7" in his class at school the teacher made them multiply it.
One of eldest's friends is training to be a teacher and showed us how many 6 7s he could cram into a short conversation, the guy is pretty witty so it was both unsurprising and what the hell XD He likes to try to keep on top of things as well as with the more annoying things he says he wins either way as when he gets in on it, he becomes cool or it becomes lame and the kids stop doing it XD
ps just for funsies I set the vote value to 0.067, which was sadly just off 67% for me XP
We have been talking about this all weekend as my wife, sister in law, brother in law, and I all work in education. I know you knew that my wife and I do. My wife actually had a couple of kids get in a fist fight over 6 7, but that likely would have happened anyway. I don't know for sure. As I said though, we road together from Ohio down to Virginia this weekend and more than once we have discussed this very phenomenon.
This 6 7 incident is actually a different example. It is a place where children and teenagers are able to bond with each other without resorting to any negative behavior, which is really amazing. This is at a time when most are confined to the virtual world, but these little children are bonding like this. I think it is really admirable as a teacher to understand and accept such innocent fun, besides it makes the learning environment more lively.
Wow I never heard of this... Indeed it's better to randomly say 67 than bully or troll or insult in any ways... It's a harmless and respectful joke, must be a US thing though
As you say, it is a way in which young people communicate with each other, perhaps avoiding that the older people (their parents, teachers or some other close adult) know about the conversation they are having. In addition to confusing me, I imagine that this is a bit of the excitement of believing that you are talking without meaning.
I hadn't heard of that "6 7" let's say it's like a kind of language among teenagers and well, because of your work it's good to know it, so surely more could join in the next months or days. Your profession is excellent, my friend. In addition, I imagine the patience that must be had with children and adolescents with some special condition and as you say in some paragraph of your publication, it's better that they spend that time on their cell phones.
It is absolutely true that a teacher should have a good attitude towards children, there should be love and laughter and only then will we see that children will learn quickly and the nature of each child is different because even in our house, small children come to study, so everyone's way of remembering and their nature is different, so the teacher knows everything