<p>After graduation, my son wrote letters thanking the teachers who wrote his college recommendations, and to his terrific guidance counselor. He also wrote one to his calculus teacher, because he really struggled with the subject last year, and she spent a lot of time providing extra help. The light never did go on,but he managed to pass the class. He mailed the letters to the school over the summer, so the teachers didn’t read them until now.</p>
<p>Yesterday, he received the sweetest email from the math teacher. She said that the note made her cry, and that it helped energize her, because it’s her 28th year of teaching, and it was a very short summer (due to Hurricane Sandy extending our school year). She knows that hers is a difficult subject, and I guess not many students thank her for her efforts, haha.She said that she is going to laminate the letter and keep it in her “Why I Do This” collection. </p>
<p>I thought I’d share this, because often at the end of the school year, parents wonder if they should buy a special teacher a gift. I often see teachers say that a heartfelt note means more to them, but I wasn’t sure that I believed them until now.</p>
<p>My son had a similar experience. He wrote a thank you letter to his 8th grade English teacher. The following Sept the teacher wrote back that my S’s letter made his day and he was saving it. I know these types of letters mean so much to the teachers and I encourage my kids to write them at the end of each year, although most years they don’t.</p>
<p>My husband is a teacher, and it is true! For one of ds2’s LOR writers, who also had ds1 and wrote letters for him as well, I also wrote a note – along with an excellent bottle of scotch! He wrote us the nicest thank-you note back. Almost made ds2 and I cry. And I know it was the note, not the scotch, that prompted his reaction.</p>
<p>I just attended an event last night where the speaker spoke about how in her 30 year career she very often wrote notes/letters to her classroom children and how SO many times over the course of the years, those notes/letters were clung to by students who had never had positive words about themselves in their hands. Words on paper, are very important to all of us, IMO.</p>
<p>There’s something about the permanence of a letter rather than an e-mail. I did photo albums for ds2 and his three bffs, and they all said how awesome it is to have pics to hold instead of just having them online on FB. My ds1, four years later, still displays the one I made for him before he went to college.</p>
<p>I second the idea of sending a copy to the principal, if you’re comfortable doing that.</p>
<p>Thanks for the suggestion, I think I will send a copy to the principal. He’d be just as happy to read it, I’m sure, and she deserves any credit she can get.</p>
<p>I think that his letter was a nice surprise, because he wasn’t exactly one of her star pupils. She said in the email that she was curious when she saw a letter from him in her pile of mail, so opened it first.</p>