One day,a teacher asked herstudents to list the names of the other students in the class on two sheet of paper,leavinga space between each name.
Then she told them to think of the nicest thing they could say about each of their classmates and write them down.
It took the reminder of the class period to finish their assignment, and as the students left the room,each one handed in the paper.
That Sunday the teacher wrote down the name of each student on a separate sheet of paper,and listed what everyone else had said about that individual.
On Monday she gave each student his or her list.Before long, the entire class was smiling."Really?"she heard whispers."I never knew I meant anything to anyone!" and,"I didn't know others liked me so much!" were most of the comments.
That group of students moved on .Several years later, one of the students ,was killed in Vietnam and the teacher attened the funeral of that special student.The church was packed with his friends.AFTER THE FUNERAL,Mark's parents met the teacher."We want to show you something." Mark's father said,taking a wallet out of his pocket."They found this on Mark when he was killed .We thought you might recognize it".
Opening the wallet, he carefully removed two worn pieces of notebook paper that had been folded and unfolded many times.
The teacher knew without looking that the paper were the ones on which she had listed all the good things each of Mark's classmates had said about him.
"Thank you so much for doing that."Mark's mother said,"As you can see,Mark treasured it". |
