Disabilities

At first I wasn't sure how much I had been around kids with disabilities but after awhile quite a few came to mind. At first recollection I was thinking of my friends and thought there were none but then slowly they came back to me. First it was, "oh yeah, he had a prosthetic foot" but we still had races, rode bikes and played football... I guess he had a disability but I never thought of him like that. Another had epilepsy, another was in special ed classes for reading, another guy's left arm was "disabled" but he still could play catch one-handed even with a mit. He could slip it on and off very fast for catching then throwing. One after another came back to me but I never really thought of any of them as disabled. We would play pretty much all the same games. I guess I had quite a few friends that technically had disabilities while I was growing-up but I wouldn't have called them disabled.

I think maybe that is the lesson that will help me the most. People with disabilities are no more "different" then we all are. Some of us are better at some things then others but we all have our strengths and weaknesses. We help each other overcome our weaknesses and find our strengths. I understand some disabilities are very restrictive but I think we need to look for ways to help students use their strengths. If we focus on our strengths then our weaknesses won't seem so bad.