Man writes about elementary teacher in book-then she does the unexpected
When author Andrew Forrester gave a heartfelt shoutout to his elementary school teacher in the acknowledgments of his debut novel, he never imagined what would happen next.
A good teacher can have a huge impact on a student’s motivation and development.
In 2025, a systematic review published in the European Journal of Psychology of Education found that teacher-related factors rank among the strongest influences on academic motivation, with supportive relationships and positive encouragement helping students engage more effectively with learning.
Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement The impact those teachers have can linger long after students leave the classroom.
‘Wonderful, Committed Teachers’ A former English teacher himself, Forrester has been writing seriously for about a decade. However, his love of literature stretches back even further, nearly 30 years in fact, to his time at Ponderosa Elementary in Spring, Texas.
“I really loved my elementary school,” he told Newsweek . “It was full of wonderful, committed teachers. I have only positive memories from my years there.”
Chief among them was his fourth-grade teacher, Ms. Black. At the time, Forrester was reading books like Animorphs , Madeleine L’Engle’s Time Quintet , and The Chronicles of Narnia .
Advertisement Advertisement However, it was in Ms. Black’s classroom that he took his first tentative steps toward finding his own voice as a writer.
Andrew Forrester and his elementary school teacher Ms. Black.
“That was the first year that writing creatively felt like something people actually did in the world (for money!), and the first time I realized it could be done for fun,” he said.
“I remember the first piece of fiction I ever wrote in Ms. Black’s class was called Freezing , about a shipwreck off the coast of Antarctica. I think it was a page long, but it was enough to get me started.”
Forrester remembers Ms. Black as someone who encouraged every student to write.
“I remember knowing that she loved stories, and feeling like that reflected something in myself. Her whimsical enthusiasm for the books we were reading and her commitment to making them come alive felt familiar, and seeing how she embodied that passion gave me permission to do the same.”
Finding Ways to be Creative He said Ms. Black was always finding creative ways to weave writing into everyday lessons. It was something he drew inspiration from years later while working as a creative writing teacher. But it was about more than the assignments.
Advertisement Advertisement “What was most significant was her constant encouragement,” he said. “I found some graded work in my attic a few weeks ago, and even just her written notes were effusive and warm. I think it all came down to feeling safe and seen enough to do the vulnerable work of writing and creating.”
Forrester said he saw Ms. Black from time to time after leaving school and entering adulthood. During those encounters, she told him she continued to share his old writing as examples for her students.
While Forrester has written for several publications over the years, he has only just released his debut novel, How the Story Goes , about a widower trying to finish his late wife’s massively popular children’s fantasy series and the writer he enlists to help him.
When it came time to write the acknowledgments, his mind immediately returned to Ms. Black’s classroom.
Advertisement Advertisement “My parents had gotten divorced the year before. They have since remarried, so I don’t always think about how that period impacted me,” he said. “I realized it was more than her encouragement of me as a student that mattered. It was her giving me a space that felt peaceful and restful and fun when my life had just shifted dramatically.”
Forrester sent Ms. Black a copy of the book along with a note encouraging her to read the acknowledgments section. However, he never heard back from her.
Then, during a Q&A event in Houston, he noticed someone standing toward the back of the room.
It was Ms. Black.
Transported Back to Being a Student The pair were eventually reunited and photographed together while Forrester signed copies of How the Story Goes .
Advertisement Advertisement “I genuinely felt overcome,” Forrester said. “I felt like I was transported back to being a student in her classroom because she was exactly the same person. She’d kept my letter and taped it into the endpapers of the book, and she told me how much she loved the story and how much my letter had meant to her.”
Forrester believes many teachers go underappreciated. He hopes stories like his remind educators of the difference they make and encourage them to keep making children “feel seen and loved.”
More than anything, he hopes it inspires others to reach out and tell the important teachers in their own lives just how much they meant to them.
“Our teachers deserve that,” he said.
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