Your Effort Is Worth TWO Pickle Stickers

I once taught a kid who had to wear a hockey helmet while he rode the little bus to school. He had physical damage and moved with much awkwardness but was pretty high functioning for someone who had sustained a serious head injury. He was never going to be able to do more than write his name and draw what he is thinking or feeling but he tried so hard to fit in without other kids without disabilities. Because of his courage and the way he had to charm you, Adam was a hero to me. He never had a bad attitude or put anyone down. I think somewhere deep down he knew he was different but was determined to never let it stop him from doing anything he could or from being kind to others in his life.

I remember once in gym class when I could see him get frustrated with playing dodgeball. He of course never got the ball thrown at him because he was too easy a target and no one wanted to hurt him with a hard throw. It would only be luck if he was able to get the ball and do enough damage with it to eliminate a player on the other team. Let's just say that such a rare even was always reason to cheer.

Adam didn't move gracefully and often fell down when he got over excited - his desire often didn't match what he was physically able to do. In the middle of one such spirited dodgeball matches I suddenly told everyone to stand still and count to ten. After the count of then you could run for a count of ten but then had to stop and repeat the who process over again. This in effect gave Adam a tremendous advantage. If he could get over to the person who couldn't move with the dodge ball, he could take people out easily. I also forget to mention that Adam could move at all times in the game and wasn't under the same restrictions of the other students.

Suddenly the game became all about ONE handicapped child with a hockey helmet to protect his soft head against and entire class of Grade Sixers that had to be on their toes lest they be caught before they could move again. It was so cool to see Adam knock out everyone because of how we stacked the game for him. He of course never realized the ruse and just thought he had defeated classmates who would always have more ability to co-ordinate their movies that Adam's injuries wouldn't ever allow him to do.

It was a magical moment and taught me everything I ever needed to know about dealing with people with disabilities - treat them like everyone else and make them a full part of the life of the classroom and you can change many many hearts and minds and eliminate the fears that kids can have about the mentally handicapped- especially one who was a classmate and peer.

My personal favorite Adam event was the weekly cleanig of the lockers. It was important for his therapy that Adam cleaned his locker each week. It was a self-esteem building exercise that I could alway make for rewards.

Adam wore a hockey helmet all day long to protech his already injured brain from further damage. It was also covered with an impressive collection of stickers that he carefully placed to decorate the helmet. He saw it as his way of showing the world his accomplishments.

He has stickers from his time in Scouts and from his afterschool clubs but he liked my sticker selection the best. I had access to many many superhero stickers and kept a whole pile of all of those combined with the  coolest stickers I could find at the dollar store.

I wanted to be sure that I had something fun for him when he finished the locker clean-up and came to me to negotiate how many stickers he could get for the weeks behavior and effort. I always resisted giving him more than a couple at time so that they stayed something that was rare, special and had to be earned. Of course that never stopped Adam from trying to negotiate a better deal for himself and his helmet sticker collection.