In an interview last week, Smith, 53, said noise, even the rustling of papers, irritated him after he suffered a mild concussion - the legacy of a March 1 assault by students in his eighth-grade class at Julia de Burgos School in Fairhill.

In addition to the concussion, Smith said, he suffered a swollen eye and has difficulty with balance, requiring him to use a cane.

After visiting his physician Friday, Smith said he did not know when he would be cleared to return to work. The doctor referred him to a neurologist and prescribed Percocet for pain.

"I have tingling in my arms and jaw. I have migraines. I'm in a lot of pain," Smith said, squinting and holding his head a week after the attack as he sat in a darkened living room behind drawn shades.

Smith said he had been struck in the face with a telephone, hit in the back of the head with a dictionary, and pummeled by two girls and a boy in his classroom.

The assault happened about 2:50 p.m. as his class of 33 students was returning to his homeroom for advisory period.

One of them, a 14-year-old girl, picked up the classroom's blue princess phone as though to make a call, Smith said.

"I asked her to put the phone down," said Smith, who is about 5-foot-5 and 154 pounds. "She said, 'F- you, Mr. Smith.'

"She just blew up. She hit me with the phone, then she grabbed my tie and began to choke me. I pushed her off of me, and she grabbed a big dictionary and hurled it to the back of my head."

Another girl and a boy joined the scuffle "and began to struggle with me," Smith said.

As he pushed the students off him, he said, the girl who started the attack picked up an aluminum pole used to raise and lower windows and tried to strike him.

The girl then tried to kick Smith's laptop computer and printer, he said.

Two other teachers then came into the class, grabbed the students who were attacking him, and escorted them from the room, Smith said.

He made a police report about 45 minutes later. The girl who hit Smith with the phone was arrested later, police said.

Fernando Gallard, a school district spokesman, said the student had been suspended while the district worked to transfer her to a disciplinary school. The district report did not mention other students in the attack.

Smith said that he had been assaulted three times at Julia de Burgos, a school for kindergarten through eighth grade, but that the attack this month had been the worst. Smith filed an incident report after he was shoved backward at the school Nov. 8, Gallard said.

"I've seen other teachers assaulted," Smith said. "A lot of [teachers] are afraid of the kids."

Nonetheless, Smith, who has been at Julia de Burgos since November, teaching history and science, said he was pleased with the "beautiful progress" of his students.

"They were buckling down. And I was joyful."

Smith said he had much in common with his students. He grew up within walking distance of the school and graduated from Dobbins Tech High School, where a guidance counselor encouraged him to become a teacher. He attended Millersville State University, earning a bachelor's degree in industrial education in 1979.

Asked about his outlook on returning to work at Julia de Burgos, Smith said: "I'm afraid of going back. I'm trying to get myself together, but I am afraid."

Smith also expressed concern for his students.

"They need teachers," Smith said, "and I know how to do it well."

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