Touching the Soul of a Child

From the desk of Carol C. . .

My friend is a voracious reader.  She reads, remembers, and seems to understand everything in print she comes across.  Her vocabulary is amazing.  Reading is her passion.

Now go back 30 years and look at my friend.  She would have been in first grade.  It would be the beginning of second semester, and it would be the first day in her third of five schools that year.  Another new school.  Another chance to prove she couldn’t read.  But this first day in first grade in this third new school was going to change her life.

Just as in the previous two schools the teacher realized quickly my friend couldn’t read.  She was at the bottom of her class…well below her other students.  30 years ago the teacher didn’t begin the paperwork for testing.  She didn’t make my friend feel stupid.  Instead, she did something radical.

That night of the first day in first grade at the third new school there was a knock on the door of my friend’s house.  When someone answered the knock there stood my friend’s first grade teacher with pencils, paper, flashcards, and reading books in hand.  She was there to teach my friend to read.  And not just for one night.  Night after night she came until my friend learned to read.  This first grade teacher changed the course of her life.

One looks back with appreciation to the brilliant teachers, but with gratitude to those who touched our human feelings. The curriculum is so much necessary raw material, but warmth is the vital element for the growing plant and for the soul of the child.  Carl Jung