One of the worst ways to show our kids what they are worth is with a grade on a report card. Please don't get me wrong, I want my kids to succeed. I want them to make good grades, have proficient study habits, and do their homework. Poor teachers stop there, I want more. There isn't enough room on a report card to fit all the things I want to teach my kids.

For example, one year my 6th graders studying current events became aware of a blood shortage in our area. There was a report of a 4-year old boy named Matthew who had used more than 200 transfusions before he was two months old. Matthew's picture was on a Blood Donor Poster; he still needed regular transfusions. My students were touched by his little face. They had a million questions about what was wrong with him and what they could do to help. They wanted to know all about Blood Drives and how they work. I didn't have all the answers so I selected some kids to form a committee, handed them a phone book and sent them to the office to call the blood bank and get all the information. They returned, shared all that they had learned, and calmly announced that they had scheduled our school for a blood drive and volunteered me to be in charge--little Dickens! I called back and somewhat reluctantly set up what I was told was the first blood drive ever sponsored by an elementary school.

You cannot believe how motivated children can be at the prospect of seeing their teachers bleed. I captured that enthusiasm and assigned an all out marketing and advertising campaign to every kid in the school. They were told of the importance of signing up parents and teachers for our blood drive that was coming to the Media Center. They went in committees from room to room with information about health risks, procedures for donating blood and how the blood would be used. They role played various methods of intimidation and begging techniques that could be used should their parents try to "just say no."

One teacher believed that he could get AIDS from giving blood. Another, who has the rarest blood type, had never given blood because she believed that since it is so rare, no one ever needed it. (She is now called every eight weeks and will never forgive us.) One little 2nd grader believed that like a heart or liver donor, a blood donor had to die before giving blood. She was a little worried about even taking a pledge from her mom or dad, however, she had no problem getting a promise from her older brother. Apparently he was someone she could spare in a pinch!

We had our blood drive in the Media Center. We all dressed up as Vampires and acted as escorts, receptionists, baby sitters and passed out refreshments. At the end of the day, 98 people had come in to donate. At 6 or 7 in the evening, some of the students had stayed behind to help me cleanup our room that had served as the child care center for parents facing the needle. One of my students--a young man known for being totally unremarkable, quite average and certainly nothing special--came up to me and changed my life and the way I assess the success of my kids. "Mrs. Eskelsen," he said, "how many lives do you think we saved today?"

I had to step out into the hall, because I knew I was going to cry. I was totally ashamed of myself, I had always judged this "average, nothing special kid with poor study habits" on his academic performance. He has a much higher, more correct estimation of his worth. He is someone who saves lives. He is someone important. I promised myself that I would never again short change one of my students in that way. It is a perk of my profession that teachers sometimes become better people because of the lessons we learn from our students, from our boys and girls.

If we are wise enough to learn the lessons, our children will show us what to teach them. Consider the little boy pestering his dad who only wanted to read the newspaper. The boy kept asking questions and bothering his father. Dad looked down at the coffee table and saw a National Geographic magazine opened to a map of the world. He ripped out the map and tore it into little pieces. "Let's play a game," he said to his son, "you take this puzzle and tape it back together, and you can't talk until it is all done."

The father settled back to enjoy his couple of hours of peace and quiet when, in a remarkably short time, the boy returned with the map restored perfectly. The astonished parent said, "How in the world did you get that done so fast?" The young man replied, "See, there is a picture of a kid on the back and if you put the kid together just right, the world just takes care of itself!"

Teach kids their power and their duty and we will raise a generation that understands and accepts that power and duty and yes, the world will take care of itself!

--Lily Eskelsen