Things I Want My First Graders to Know

I love you!

I believe in you!

You are destined for great things!

After the first week of school and bringing homework home every night and thinking of my little students, I wrote this over the weekend. I wanted them to know how important they are. That you’re not too little to dream, to do great things and to be loved just for being themselves!

I posted it in my classroom and then went over it with them, so they could understand what I was trying to tell them. So they would know who they are and that they are important. So that they would know how I felt about them and that I wasn’t afraid to show it. Then, I read, “You Are Wonderfully and Beautifully Made”, my first authored book. The same words written in that book made a connection to the words I wrote on that poster. That book was written in 2014, three years later I’ve written different words with the same meaning to little ones who deserve to know how special they are.

On Sunday in church while I was worshipping my Heavenly Father,   He reminded me that the words I wrote for my students He wrote for me. I love you! I believe in you! You are destined for great things! And most recently, I’m so proud of you! He created me to be the very person you see today. He purposed me to love, teach and treasure little ones who need to know they are not mistakes or unwanted! They are worthy and highly thought of. They are also purposed to do great things that He created them to be. When they hear they this, their eyes get wide and their mouths open. They look at each other and have the biggest smiles on their faces. Then they know that they are wonderfully and beautifully made.

You are too! You were created on purpose, for a purpose. He knew you way before you were conceived! He wanted you, He needed you! He loves you! He believes in you! He destined you for great things! I know some of you don’t believe in God and that’s ok! It is a choice. But fortunately, you were created by the same Heavenly Father as I! And you too, are wonderfully and beautifully made!

1 You have searched me, Lord, and you know me. 2 You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. 3   You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. 4 Before a word is on my tongue, you, Lord, know it completely. 5 You hem me in behind and before, and you lay your hand upon me. 6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain. 7 Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?   8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. 9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea. 10 even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast. 11 If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,” 12   even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day,   for darkness is as light to you. 13 For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. 14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful I know that full well. 15 My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place,   when I was woven together in the depths of the earth. 16 Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. 17 How precious to me are your thoughts,[a] God How vast is the sum of them! 18 Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand— when I awake, I am still with you. Psalm 139:1-18