Grade 3 Teacher By Margaret Teljeur

It was my first year and I was lucky enough to be placed in a great school teaching grade 2/3. There was one little boy in grade 3 who was extremely shy and very reluctant to approach me. As the months passed he started to come out of his shell and he told me that he lost his mother the year before. It was heartbreaking for me to think of such a loss at such a  young age. From that point on, we had a connection and he began to blossom into an attentive and energetic student. I started to notice how developed his writing was. He had a  great voice in his stories and they were always so unique. I  would always tell him that he had a lot of talent and that with  some growth in other areas, he would be a great writer. He  would continually bring in stories to me that he had written at  home and sometimes we would go over his stories during recess.  He was like a sponge and he was absorbing as much as he could. 

Half way into the year, the student's council in our school  had a Career Day. The students were supposed to dress up  according to the career they wanted to have later in life.  There were the typical firefighters, doctors and nurses that  were abundant in every class. I lined my students up at the  front of the class and tried to guess what career they were  going to pursue. I came to this little boy and he had on  regular clothes, but was carrying a little notepad and a pen.  I knew immediately what he was trying to pose as. I said,  "Are you dressed up as an author?" He nodded sheepishly but  said nothing. I was beaming and delighted that this boy had  developed his confidence and had finally started to set goals  for himself. Later at lunch recess as the other children  were washing their hands, this boy came up to my desk as I  was trying to straighten the mess I had created. He handed  me another story, but this time it was written like a story  book. 

I said, "Do you want to talk about this later at silent  reading time?". He said "No, I just want you to read it."  I flipped through the book and the pages were empty. I was  a little puzzled. "Where's your story?" I asked. "There  isn't one yet. But I plan on writing one when I get older.  I just wanted you to read the dedication page." So I turned  to the first page and there it read: To the best teacher  ever, Miss Teljeur, for telling me that I could just like my  mom would have."