I've been a teacher for over 20 years and I love what I do. A few days ago I had something special happen because I took the time to get to know some of my students.
I teach a semester course in a middle school. That means I get a new group of students every semester. One hundred and sixty of them in six classes. I have had my current group for about six weeks. A couple of weeks ago I gave my students an assignment that didn't require a great deal of support form me for them to complete. Rather than just supervise my students, I thought it would be a good time to better connect with some of my students. In each class I purposely called up students whose names I didn't know who were doing well in my class and praised them for their work. I took maybe two minutes of each class with each kid. I was surprised how many of them there were. Teachers notice the kids that are having problems and we notice the kids who are competing with each other to answer all of our questions. The ones we miss are the quiet ones. The ones who come to class each day, do their work, and don't cause any problems. I have several students like this in each class.
A few days later, one of the students asked me for a letter of recommendation to help her get into advanced classes for next year. I checked her grades and found she was doing very well in all of her subjects. I wrote her the letter and gave it to her the next day she was in my class. I asked her why she asked me for the letter rather than teachers she had had all year. She responded " Because I feel you know me the best."
I felt great hearing that, but it also got me to thinking. I worry that there are students I've missed over the years. If I hadn't taken a couple of minutes to get to know this one, would she have passed through my class without any teachers connecting with her? All kids deserve to be noticed.