My experience in growing as a special educator has shown me many different roads. My training taught me to appreciate following the child’s lead. My early experience in a school taught me to respect behaviorism, and whatever wisdom I had at that point taught me to respect both paths and find when they crossed.
The poem “Welcome to Holland” by Emily Perl Kingsley is often referred to in the world of special education, especially when working with students with developmental disabilities such as autism or Down Syndrome.
In essence, the poem is teaching families (and of course educators) to respect and acknowledge that a child with disabilities is not less, but different. With proper perspective, you see not the loss of the “typical” child, but all that you have gained and experienced because of the child you have. This perspective can be layered on so many other areas of our lives, particularly when we encounter some challenge. There is always something to learn, and more growth that we can experience in our lives.
For the general educator, this perspective might be lost. Yes, kids with disabilities exist within schools, and yes some of them are cute or some of them have tantrums in the hallway. For the general educator, this might not affect their day to day.
However, that day might come when a class is switched or a grade level is changed, and bam: you’re now in Holland. For the general educator, I implore you to keep growing and learning. Become a friend to the special educator, open your class to the child with a disability.
Gain some perspective while you have time within your school. You can change the life of the child, and in the process, change yourself too.
