The first words I speak to my students at the start of each semester are: “Each of you is a miracle beyond my comprehension, and my hope is that by the end of this course you will better see yourself for the wonder that you already are, and know that, in this adventure of life, your best teacher always has been and always will be — you.”
It is to remind them of education’s larger purpose of education: exploration, growth, and awareness of life.
As our society pushes blindly to move faster, I find that students have lost touch with the wonder of learning, largely because school has lost connection with allowing time and space for wonder.
The emphasis placed on ranking and comparing based on the numerical results of multiple-choice tests has reduced learning and, therefore, living down to an empty number of mere external importance.
When I reflect on what I do that leads to student success, I can perhaps more truly say that it’s what I don’t do that allows my students to discover confidence again.
I don’t race through prescribed pacing guides. I don’t bombard them with facts to memorize. I don’t assign benchmark tests.
I don’t even grade students based on what they do but instead grade them based on their engagement in how they’re doing it.
Our class time involves as much free time for “chilling,” taking walks, and even playing pick-up sporting games. I emphasize that education is not about having answers at all but rather daring to ask questions.
There was a student I had who barely spoke, barely wrote, and rarely read. Then came the poetry assignment.
I shared with students “Moment of Truth” by my friend Vivian Ayers, an acclaimed poet honored by NASA for her visionary expression of space exploration. Vivian, in the same hometown as us, went outside and simply looked up at the sky to help her ascend beyond external limitations.
Rather than give a quiz on poetry or drill them with mere vocabulary terms, I want the students to experience poetry and life directly.
I therefore reserve time to take classes into the woods so they can have time and space to look up and experience the poetry of the sky in nature.
The student who rarely talked found a place far away to sit and stare for almost an entire class period before taking pen to paper. The next day, he raised his hand and then let flow the most mesmerizing poetic prose.
I suspect it’s because of my seeming disregard for testing data that my students ironically have among the best state end-of-course test scores in our area.
I really look at my career in teaching as the “practice of teaching,” an ongoing exploration, since I have certainly learned my best lessons from my biggest failures.
In a rural community, the needs of others are visible and real.
And here’s one of the quiet truths about human beings: we come alive when we use our skills to help someone else with their needs.
I’ve watched students organize food drives, build fundraisers, create events, and generate real change.
One student, far from a straight-A honoree, organized a community basketball tournament to feed families.
Another, who spent years in foster care, kept returning to help with projects long after finishing my class. He later reached out to say “thank you” for believing in him.
Today, he runs a multimillion-dollar business built on service and generosity.
Each human life is already a miracle beyond comprehension, so for our schools to be transformed into places of wonder and joy rather than conformity and compliance, perhaps all the system needs to do is trustfully allow students and teachers to — in the words of poet Vivian Ayers — “Be True, Be Beautiful, Be Free.”
Pete Stone is a proud graduate of Chester High School, and Clemson University. He now teaches in the Chester County School District, makes educational advocacy videos for the South Carolina Education Association, and serves on the Brainerd Institute Heritage board of directors to help continue the educational vision of NASA celebrated poet Vivian Ayers. He was recently named a National 2026 Horace Mann Awardee for Teaching Excellence by the NEA Foundation.
