What started out as a quick encouraging note to her own children, turned into a project of inspiration that spread into the lunch room where she has been working for the past nine years.

Stacey Truman is the cafeteria manager at Kingston Elementary School in Virginia Beach, Virginia. She says she started the project to provide the dose of motivation to the school students like she does her own children at home.

She started writing little notes of encouragement on the bananas that are served for lunch. The kids now lovingly refer to them as her “talking bananas” and they’re almost always gone when lunchtime is over.

But it isn’t just the students that have enjoyed the “talking bananas.” School principal Sharon Shrewbridge thinks the gesture is amazing, so much so that she shared it on social media.

Shrewbridge says the words have been encouraging for the kids and helps them to realize that they are good enough. She says she hopes that other schools see that it is any easy way to get good-hearted messages to the students.

Truman is a bit embarrassed about all the attention, but Shrewbridge says the gesture is simple yet has had a huge impact on the students that she felt compelled to share it.

Check out the video below to learn more about Truman’s project and be sure to share it with your family and friends. What an incredible idea!