DEAR MISS MANNERS: As a instructor for the previous 30 years, I’ve been lucky to obtain considerate items of thanks and appreciation from my college students and their households throughout the vacation season and on the finish of the college 12 months. These items usually embrace mugs, candies, baked items or reward playing cards. (Between us, I’ll admit that my favourite items are notes of appreciation from college students and fogeys.) In return, I’ve all the time taken the time to write down cautious and private thank-you notes for every of those items. A part of my motivation has been to set an instance for my college students, demonstrating the significance of expressing gratitude via a handwritten be aware.
Nonetheless, this follow is time-consuming, notably throughout my breaks, when the sheer quantity of letters overwhelms me. At Christmas this 12 months, the time it took prompted me to pause and replicate: Is it really essential to write down a thank-you be aware for a thank-you reward? It feels a bit round.
I can’t think about not writing the notes, however I really feel compelled to ask: Would an easier acknowledgment suffice, or is that this a practice I ought to proceed?
GENTLE READER: Sure! Proceed! Allow us to not danger perpetuating that prevalent, however completely false, concept {that a} current given in thanks needn’t be acknowledged — that it might result in a loop through which the giver and recipient would spend the remainder of their lives thanking one another.
Nonsense. A letter of thanks doesn’t require a response; a gift, given for no matter purpose, does.
These youngsters have been in all probability considerably concerned in supplying you with these presents — they might even have chosen them. Do you wish to go away them questioning if you happen to even cared?
Kids nearly by no means obtain letters (nicely, neither do adults, nowadays), so these can be particular. You admire letters from them and their mother and father, so that you ought to grasp how a lot they’d admire letters from you.
And it will likely be an extra boon to the mother and father who’re requiring their youngsters to write down letters of thanks for his or her birthday and vacation presents.
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