Monday, August 3, 2009

Special Needs at VBS

I met a wonderful little girl last week when I helped out with Vacation Bible School at the church I attend.This little girl is 5 years old and has autism.I think because of Ruby I was drawn to this little girl who sat and rocked and sang to herself most of the time.One night I handed out a bag of crayons and pictures to color to each child and she started throwing her crayons in the floor ,so I went and sat next to her and said "Will you help me pick up the crayons?" She did help and then I started showing her the crayons and taking one and coloring, then she would take the color from me and color the page on her own smiling to herself.I then wrote her name for her at the top of the page and to my surprise she started smiling and pointing at each letter and spelling her name which she did several times rocking back and forth and smiling and spelling her name.I said, with a big smile,"You can spell your name!" She smiled even bigger and started humming to herself.
Next we worked on puzzles together and I mistakenly thought she would need my help.Let me just say she is excellent at putting puzzles together and was better at it than some of the typical children in the class.
She brightened my life and I will miss seeing her and hearing her sing to herself and the way she smiled to herself when I talked to her.She was a visitor to our church VBS so I don't know if I will ever see her again.I hope she has a wonderful life,I hope people will see her abilities.

I hope you'll take a minute and watch this video I found.





5 comments:

Lori said...

How neat! You both seemed to have gotten something very special out of the week. I am thankful she had a teacher so patient and understanding like you. I love it when Gess surprises her teachers with what she is able to do. Heck she still surprises me too! Thanks for sharing that beautiful story and that awesome video!

Lacey said...

I'm so grateful that Tanners autism is high functioning, and he doesn't rock. When he was younger he would hit himself in the head when he was upset.

Heidi said...

What a great story! I'm glad you were able to encourage her and that she brightened your day!

Karen said...

I love that you took the time to get to know her, and loved her for who she is. You're the kind of person that I hope Micah encounters everywhere he goes.

Beverly said...

Loved your story and loved that video, it was great! Thanks for sharingg it