Today's openness about all sorts of disabilities is best for all. L'havidil, to differentiate, I remember my struggles to get suitable teaching for my sons, whose learning problems were of the much more mild varieties of dyscalculia and dysgraphia. At one point, I complained to the school principal:
"Why weren't his teachers notified in advance, so they wouldn't punish him for his lower than average reading skills?"
"That would stigmatize him."
"What stigmatizes him is the failure, not the MLD, mild learning disability!"
"You'd have to sign a waiver to open his files."
My fighting the system has made it easier for today's young parents, and I wasn't dealing with serious issues like retardation and autism. My sons' problems were serious enough for us, and I found them a great high school and got them the best help I could find at the time. The authorities' attitude was to "plaster over" the issues, hoping it would all just go away.
More serious problems were literally hidden away in institutions. My Aunt Betty was told to institutionalize my Cousin Mickey. Thank G-d she refused.
Revealing autism became more accepted after the movie Rainman. And this week I read two excellent articles about books on autism.
Vivian Eden, whose son is autistic reviewed two books from the perspective of one who knows autism up close. And the New York Times has an article about “The Horse Boy,” by Rupert Isaacson, which is about how a family took their autistic son on an adventure in Mongolia. Both articles are worth reading, and the books are tempting.
2 comments:
Even more hopefull is the inclusion movement. Inclusion, which is FINELY becoming a reality for some after gan (kindergarden) allows the child to learn from his environment (as well as special-ed staff), and allows the environment to learn from HIM (that everyone is human).
As much as Ricki has benefitted from inclusion, I think her classmates have gained even more.
Thanks for your input. I can see how important it is for Ricki to be just another type of regular kid. A friend with a Downs pre-schooler was fighting to keep her son in the regular system, because otherwise he'd just imitate "lower level" behavior. It's important to use their attempts to fit in.
Autism is more complicated, since even the very lightly afflicted have trouble reading people.
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