The following day, Ms. Bryce walks to her mailbox and finds a letter inside. Mr. Wolcott reads it with her, as they are having tea and reciting their favorite lines from Othello, which is one of Shakespeare’s famous plays.

This is what the letter says:

Dear Ms. Bryce,

We wanted to thank you for being our teacher. We know we were sometimes difficult, sometimes by accident and other times on purpose, but we never realized how much work it is to be a teacher. We do now.

We’re sorry that you quit. We hope you stop by and visit sometime.

The entire fifth-grade class signed the letter.

That didn’t keep Ms. Bryce from assigning lots of homework that next week. Although maybe she assigned a little less homework than she had planned.