I was in the fourth grade today. The teacher had a death in the family and was attending the funeral.

And the kids blew me away with their compassion. I was reaching for a tissue at 8:05 AM.

As soon as they walked in (and before I even got a “good morning”) two kids were waving a huge piece of construction paper in my face.

“We’re working on a card! We have to get it done!”

I slowed them down long enough to determine that they had started working on a sympathy card for their teacher. These boys had come up with this idea on their own, and they were bent on getting it finished.

They got busy drawing enough lines inside the card so that every single fourth-grader in the school had a place to sign it–as well as the other fourth-grader teacher and me.

Checking the lesson plan, I figured out a good time for the boys to take the card around the classrooms for signatures.

Many of the students left encouraging messages on the other side of the card, in addition to signing their names.

My plan, before school, was to steal a few moments during religion class to have the students make cards for the teacher. I didn’t need to do that, because the kids took the initiative and had that giant card started first thing in the morning.

I’m sure their teacher felt all the prayers the children sent up today, and I know that when she returns to the classroom her heart will be touched by their very real, very spontaneous, very urgent compassion.

Image source: Wikipedia. Approved for reuse.