Beautiful new shoes

Today I heard a beautiful story about students showing pure kindness towards a peer with disabilities and I believe that sharing it will bring as much joy to you as it did to me.

There was a student at a high school level who was not only having a rough home life but also had autism. Despite his hardships, he came to school every day with a huge smile on his face and did his best to try to impress his teachers.

One day he came to school beaming about a brand new pair of shoes that he had gotten! It was his first new pair in years and years. He showed multiple of the teachers he knew and a couple of students as well. About a week later, he came to the teacher who told me this story and started crying in front of her class of upperclassmen. She encouraged him to step out in the hallway so that he could have privacy and not be embarrassed in front of all of the other students. He then showed her his brand new white shoes and she found that they were covered in black scoffs. Other students had been bullying him all day and intentionally scoffing his beautiful new shoes. The teacher calmed him down outside the classroom and sent him back to class. As soon as she walked in she had realized that her class had been listening and was angered by the incident. One student piped up and started the conversation by saying “I see him on my way into school, I can walk him to his first period”, another student in the classroom offered to walk with him in between second and third period. Finally, the last student was the most popular senior in the school and he said “I have been sharing my lunch with him every day, I don’t think he eats at home. From today on, he will sit with me every day at lunch so he will never be alone with the people who did this to him.”

Listening to this story made me cry instantly and I have never met a single one of these kids. Never underestimate the students in your classroom, the kindness will always shine through. As teachers, we always need to keep in mind that we have no idea the things that are going on at home or in other parts of the school sometimes. It is our job to make every student feel safe and loved with us! – Teaching Excitement

The above poster is available as a resource for teachers HERE.