See Also:
Beginning of a FAMOUS Hero: The Tony Robbins Story.
Life Lesson #59 – Be an Encourager.
Mr. Bradshaw’s class was studying from their social studies book about how people lived long ago during the early days of America. When he asked for a volunteer to read a certain paragraph, Caleb immediately volunteered. Caleb really enjoyed learning things from history, and he read clearly and accurately, but he had not yet developed his reading to the point of having a lot of expression. As soon as he finished, another boy from across the room started saying, “Blah, blah, blah, blah…” until Becky, realizing he was making fun of Caleb, quickly called out the other boy’s name and said, “No!” She was horrified that her classmate had been so rude.
Ordinarily, Mr. Bradshaw would have told Becky not to speak out in class like that, but he let it go for the moment. Later, when it was time to go outside for recess, the teacher asked Becky and the boy who had mocked his classmate to stay behind.
The boy had already had time to think about what he had done because of Becky’s reaction and was already feeling sorry and wanted to apologize to Caleb. Mr. Bradshaw congratulated Becky for taking up for Caleb, even though she might have gotten in trouble for speaking out like that in class. Then, the boy said, “I guess I was kind of acting like a jerk, and Becky was being a HERO. Mr. Bradshaw had to say, “Yes, that’s what it looked like for a few minutes there, but I’m sure that if you’ll run on outside and find Caleb, you can make everything alright.” And that’s exactly what he did.
– Jim Lord