Megan Benham was keeping an eye on the at kids Dolby Elementary School in Lake Charles, Louisiana during their lunchtime when she spotted one six-year-old student acting peculiar

A quick-thinking teacher is being hailed as a hero after she noticed something seriously wrong with one of her six-year-old pupils as they were eating.

Megan Benham was overseeing lunchtime at Dolby Elementary School in Lake Charles, Louisiana in the US. At one point, she saw tears streaming down the cheeks of a boy sat at a table. At first, she thought he was just upset.

But as she approached the child, the teacher suddenly realised that he wasn't breathing. Panicked but composed, Benham quickly figured out that he was in fact choking on a piece of apple. Without hesitation, she sprang into action and remembered the life-saving technique her husband had used when their own child had faced a similar emergency.

She recalled: “He was kind of hunching forward, I guess you can say. I patted him on the back several times, but still nothing was happening. I went behind him, saying, ‘It’s okay, buddy, I got you.’ I can tell he was scared.

"So I just put my arms around him and reenacted what I saw my husband do when our son was choking. He started coughing. I know that a lot of the time food would fly out of mouths, it didn’t happen that way that day, I guess it dislodged enough to where he could swallow."

Thanks to her swift response, the youngster was soon able to breathe again, and his ordeal ended in relief. Once the apple had come out, she immediately called the boy's parents, reports local outlet KPLC.

The pupil's mum expressed her gratitude to the teacher for her life-saving actions. She said: "My world stopped. I couldn’t imagine anything happening to my babies. I spoke to him, and he was still processing everything because he really didn’t have anything to say, and at that time I called my husband, and we were on a three-way with him just making sure he was okay."

His dad, an ICU nurse, added: "I’m just thankful for Ms. Benham because if you sit back and think about it, it's a chance he wouldn’t be sitting here right now." He also said that teachers should receive training for when something like this happens in school.

“They’re with them all day; no one else is around. Having to call 911 for something I don’t want to say as simple as someone choking, having to call 911, that person might not have that much time, especially a child not breathing while they’re standing to wait for 911 to come. That’s crazy, that’s how our system is,” he said.

Following the incident, the boy was left shaken up for the rest of the day and didn't want to eat anything else. Thankfully, he was soon back to his happy self - but his parents now keep a constant eye on him while he's eating at home.

The youngster said the incident frightened him but that he felt much better now. He said: "I gave her a donut the next day,” and that, "I hope she stays as my teacher".

His siblings said they "love" Benham and were glad they still had their brother to hang out with. While his mum said: “It’s nice to know we have teachers out there to care for our children as we do."

Calcasieu Parish School Board Superintendent Jason VanMetre later said in a statement: “We are so thankful that Mrs. Benham acted quickly in this situation. Had she hesitated, it could have easily ended differently for this student.

"We are grateful for the dedication of all of our employees, but in a situation like this, their presence could have been a matter of life or death. I know that the parents of this student are grateful, and so are we.”