A Teacher’s Kindness Changed my Daughter’s Life
Acts of Kindness Last Forever
“They may forget what you said but they will never forget how you made them feel.” — Carol Buchner
My daughter wanted a bike.
She was nine years old and was in Grade 4 at school in Queensland, Australia.
Her friends all had bikes they rode to school.
She walked.
I had recently separated from her father and was trying to make ends meet as a single mother with four children to support. It was not easy.
The kids had learned not to ask me for extra money to pay for school excursions or activities, as the answer was always no, and I would then get upset as I could not find the money for them.
So they lived always desiring, but not asking, and not getting.
Her 4th-grade teacher had informed the class that the Department of Transport was going to be conducting a 4-week road safety program for kids at their school. It was about bike safety on the roads. All the kids were excited and had signed up to join.
My daughter went to sign up, and in doing so, she said to the teacher, “I want to do this, but I have no bike. Am I still able to do the course with everyone else?”
Her teacher had seen the hope, excitement, and anticipation in her eyes, and had told her, “Yes, you can sign up. It will be okay.”
When she came home and told me I had said to her, “But how can you learn road safety with bikes when you don’t have a bike to take to school to ride around the obstacle course?” She had gone back to her teacher and told him what her mum had said. He said to her, “Don’t worry about it. I will sort it out. You can still do the course.” So, that is what she came home and told me.
I put it out my mind and forgot about it.
The day the bike safety course was due to commence arrived.
All the kids were asked to wait outside of the school hall with their bikes. There was great excitement. Finally, the door was open, and all the children were let in.
They all crowded on through the door and went into the room pushing their bikes. Everyone was talking and laughing.
Within a few seconds, their teacher entered the hall wheeling a bike.
A red and white bike. A red and white newly painted bike with a bell and a BOW tied around the handlebars.
He gestured with his hand, and all the kids fell quiet.
He said how he knew everyone was excited to do the course and how happy he was at their enthusiasm. He said that some of the kids also knew Jessica had signed up to do the class even though she did not have a bike.
He said that he had not been able to buy her a new bike. He did not have the money.
But he had found an older bike and done it all up “all-new,” and he was giving it to her so she would have a bike to keep not just for the course but to keep and take home as her own. Her very own bike.
“Never get tired of doing little things for others. For sometimes, those little things occupy the biggest part of their heart.” ~ Ida Azhuri
My daughter clapped and jumped up and down and was ecstatically happy as was all her classmates. They all cheered. They all gathered around, touching it, ringing its bell, and admiring the bike. Jessica could not believe it. She was so grateful. The teacher looked embarrassed but happy.
She went on to complete and graduate the bike safety course with her whole class.
But, she never forgot the kindness of that teacher.
It was the first time anyone outside of the family had done an act of kindness and love toward her completely unasked for and unexpected, that made her day, and her year.
That kindness changed her life. She never forgot it.
As soon as she joined the Navy at 17 years old, within a few months, she had paid for flights, a luxury resort for two nights, dinner and a boat ride around Sydney harbor for myself and her three siblings.
She has over the years sponsored gifts for children and for families who can’t afford Christmas.
That act of kindness has been paid forward by her as an adult many times now.
“We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give.” ~ Winston Churchill
That act of kindness continues to pop up in her heart when life gets in the way, or she gets weighed down with others unkindness, and she remembers that there are people in the world who make a difference.
She remembers that teacher and how he went out of his way to be kind to her.
His example has lived on and grown and multiplied more times than he will ever realize.
I am forever grateful as a parent for his kindness toward my young daughter and the impact his actions had on her life even over 20 years later.
“Education…is painful, continual and difficult work to be done in kindness, by watching, by warning,… by praise, but above all — by example.” — John Ruskin
