can he hold a piece of chart paper with his stomach?

During one of my teaching periods today, I noticed that one of my students was fascinated with a small pencil case I keep my dry erase markers and magnets in. They were within easy reach of him.

The magnets I use are the "high" power kind; the ones you have to purchase online.

I went to put up a piece of chart paper on the board, and noticed that one was missing. I concurrently noticed that my student had something in his mouth. I knew immediately what it was.

I must have caught him off guard when I yelled his name.

He swallowed the magnet. Yup. He sure did.

"Did you just swallow the magnet?"

"Oh my god, Mr. Benjamin! You scared me, yo! I swallowed it! I swallowed it!"

I ran over to my clipboard, wrote a slip to the nurse, and sent him to the medical office. Class ended soon after, and I immediately called his mom at work to explain. As I was going through the course of events that transpired, she asked me to hold for a moment. When she came back on the line, she asked me to repeat what happened. I did.

The next thing I knew I heard a crowd of people laughing. She evidently put me on speaker phone to allow her coworkers to hear me explain what happened. Honestly, I was rather mortified. Granted, the child is 11. But still, I felt terribly about what happened.

She was hysterically laughing. The nurse then called, and she once again put me on hold. She came back on the line and thanked me for calling her. At this point, she was almost in tears with laughter. She told me that she would immediately call his doctor, and not to worry.

Strange day. This was a first for me.