Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments A Dear Teacher... thread

Dear Competent First Grade Teacher,

Thanks for taking my child into your class with almost no notice and taking the time needed to prepare for him out of your personal life. You have done much more for him than I would have ever expected a teacher to do. Thanks for taking the time to look through the records to learn more about his developmental history, and for giving him so many assessments to find out his academic level and the "gaps". We appreciate the special lessons you have planned for him to close those gaps, and for giving him material everyday that helps him to learn and grow. Thank you for sitting down with him and working with him on his atrocious writing. It was kind of you to make sure that he was feeling comfortable in his new school, and making friends. You showed concern about how he was doing even at recess, where you are not the one responsible. Thank you for constructing several slant boards for him when the "binder" proved to be inadequate, and making sure that he uses the slant boards, which the old teacher wouldn't do. Wish I could clone you for next year.

Dear Director of Tiny Private School,

After telling me all the reasons not to grade-skip a 4-year-old, thank you for turning on a dime when your co-director reported that my child is "brilliant." Thank you for creating an environment where the K/1st teacher has the freedom to skip my kid through material she already knows. Thank you for noticing my child's social needs, and confirming what I saw when she suddenly blossomed. Thank you for getting excited when my child brought in a model brain. Thank you for the music and the art and the school play. Thank you for the piano in the main room. Thank you for your goofy sense of humor when you help the little ones open their bananas.

Dear soul crushing teacher,

It's obvious you wouldn't choose more challenging work yourself simply for the love of learning, but threatening to keep my son after school if he makes mistakes on the difficult work he chooses is shocking. When you should have congratulated him on his drive to learn and instead left him afraid to try, I knew you were the kind of person my son needed to be kept away from.

I am thankful to you, though, because if you hadn't been so incredibly bad at teaching my son, I wouldn't have pulled him out of the "rigorous" high-stress school he was attending. Without your negative attitude, I wouldn't have seen his voracious appetite for knowledge finally satisfied at home with self-paced online classes and tutors we've hired whose goal is to take him where he wants to go, not keep him in line with other students his age.

So thank you for being so terrible. It was painful for a few months, but it was the best thing that could have happened to my son.

Dear Grade (x) Math Teacher,

Thank you for welcoming our son into your class when testing showed he needed to be there, despite not starting the year with you. Thank you for guiding your other students to accept and watch out for him, because of the age difference. We appreciate that you noticed his talent and encouraged him, telling us that he absolutely belonged in your class and was a pleasure to teach. Thank you for letting him be his own little fun self and appreciating him, for understanding that his age means he doesn't always remember his homework and for following up with us nicely when needed.

Dear Last Year's Teacher:

You seemed to have a kind heart, but lacked the will to stand up to that ogre of an administrator who refused to believe that our son was gifted, let alone as exceptionally gifted as testing later proved. I so wish that you had stood up to her and had let our son move on to the next grade, with the teacher who "got" him. You knew he was very bright, but couldn't seem to grasp that was the reason for his entertaining of the class at too many inappropriate times. I'm sure he frustrated you beyond measure and I do feel somewhat badly about that, but rest assured, he lost more privileges at home last year than he would have if we had known how absolutely unfit that classroom was for him.

I know you cared about him and wanted him to succeed, but am still so confused about how such an experienced teacher couldn't have realized you weren't meeting his needs at all. Thank you for finally agreeing to let him use the next year's math book in class so he could go through it mostly on his own and advance a year in a few month's time. That's something, at least.

While we've likely all had poor experiences with teachers, I feel it extremely important to take the time to recognize the few that go the extra mile and make a difference. In the case of my eldest DS there for four teachers I felt did that through his K-12 experience. I made sure to visit them personally, shake their hand, and look them in the eye and tell them, "YOU made a difference, YOU went above and beyond and it stood out, YOU were inspirational to my son, THANK YOU."

Three of those four teachers were visibly moved to hear that, they deserve to know that, they NEED to know that, teachers need to know when they've made a difference, that's why good teachers teach, it's a validation that they've been successful with the strong effort they're giving.

Yes. As a matter of our family policy, these folks get thank-you notes early and often, plus we send them Christmas cards ever after. They need to know they matter, because the effort the put in is much easier to maintain if they get that positive feedback.

I worked in a school last year tutoring reading, basically as a volunteer (I was hardly paid anything). I worked with kids one-on-one every day. Not a single parent sent in a note or a card saying "thank you." NO holiday cards, end of the year cards, or anything of the like. It was really depressing. By the end of it I was thinking "Figure out your kids' problems on your own." It's different with teachers because they are actually paid (and paid well in our district). But I imagine that the good ones don't get a lot of feedback. I have told DS's teacher multiple times already that I'm thankful for what she's doing.

Dear DD's Homeroom Teacher:

DD calls you "the vampire," because you suck the fun out of school. DW has seen this firsthand when she volunteered to help at parties. If you're constantly barking at the kids about how to sit during a party game, what are you like during instructional time? Chill out. Nobody likes a micromanager.

We have no idea why you felt it necessary to announce DD's age to the entire class during the first week of school. DD would have fit in just fine despite being skipped a grade, and did fit in by the end of the year, no thanks to you. Why would you deliberately try to make things difficult for her? How would you like it if we dropped into the teacher's lounge and started telling about your marriage difficulties, or your misbehaviors as a teenager? You're supposed to be the adult in the room, so please act like it.

We expected that there would be issues getting DD instruction in social studies because part of your instructional time overlaps with her gifted LA pull-out. We requested a copy of the book so we could supplement at home. However, we never saw any homework coming home except for Daily Geography, so we had no guide on how the class was progressing, and DD had reason to believe that nobody in the class was getting any social studies instruction, so she wasn't missing out on anything. We really didn't appreciate having to hothouse DD through a year's worth of cramming the week before state testing.

DD reports that you're moving to 5th grade next year, prompting her to say, "the vampire is stalking me!" We know that teachers can request certain students, and a child like our DD, who is so well-behaved, and so high achieving, is a great place to start a class. Please don't request her. DD doesn't like you, and she deserves a change. We understand that she's probably not going to learn much in homeroom anyway, but she still deserves to be in a place with a teacher who is introducing the necessary material and not barking all day.

Dear amazing K-1 teacher,

We can't believe how lucky we are that you moved to our school and took DD's class for its second year. Every child in that room is happier than they were last year and feels 'seen' and appreciated for who they are. Not only that, you are willing to create a math group where DD can consider math concepts at her own pace, and explain that OF COURSE 8 has a square root, it just isn't a whole number. I doubt that her sister's first grade teacher even knew that, much less had the courage to let her students play with these concepts. In my kids' combined 13 years of public school and nonselective preschool, you are the best teacher either has ever had.

Whether we eventually change schools because we know what a school year could be, or stay because we have learned enough about our child to ignore things that don't matter, your influence at the beginning of her school career will resonate throughout her life. Thank you.