Creativity
This Teacher Shares Why He Let His Students Sleep And A Full-Mark On TikTok, And It Goes Viral
All they need, sometimes, is just one moment for rest.
Does anyone still remember Brandon Holeman? Yeah, the teacher who got challenged by 8th graders on followers count. In TikTok we trust, and TikTok did not disappoint.
Brandon hit more than 6m views on that first video he made and now has over 1.2 million followers. Within 24 hours, he already had 50,000 people following, so he obviously won the bet.
@bcholeman Challenge accepted. Don’t let me down TikTok ##fyp ##fypage ##teacher ##school ##challenge
♬ original sound – bcholeman
But with popularity comes responsibility – Brandon decided to use this platform to share a story.
He has recently uploaded a TikTok video on how he let one of his students slept in on a test. “Sometimes the nicest thing a teacher can do for a student is to let them come in, lay their head down, and go to sleep,” Brandon began his video.
@bcholeman This is for all the teachers and students out there. Life can hit hard, and we all need some grace. ##teacher ##middleschool ##fyp ##foryou ##studyhacks
♬ original sound – visionwise
He starts by talking about a student who came in upset that morning. He tried not to make assumptions as he probably just hadn’t had his coffee, yet. But a friend of his came up to Brandon and said that his grandfather passed away last night.
His first thought was ‘why is he even here today’, but that’s not the point. ‘He’s here NOW, so what can I do?’
Brandon explained, “I shared this moment because people often times don’t understand that students, even in middle school, have personal things going on at home.”
“It teaches students about life and what it means to be a kind and loving person. As it was happening, I don’t think anyone in the class knew what had happened.”
He added, “I almost deleted the video as soon as I posted it because I didn’t want people to think I was trying to use a student’s loss for views or likes. However, I’m so thankful that people have received the message and meaning behind the video.”
Brandon’s viral video on his sleeping student has reached 19.9 million views and the reception has been mostly positive. He shows that it takes one moment to change someone’s life and it often is as simple as letting them slack off and take a breather.
