This month, students from St. Francis Xavier School in LaGrange, IL took part in a school-wide focus on being of service to others. While each grade focused on a different area of need including visiting retirees, illiteracy, hunger, and respect for animals, the sixth graders spent a day bowling with adults with special needs.
Together, the children and adults celebrated spares and laughed through gutter balls. The interaction between the two groups proved to have the outcome that Anne Cosentino, coordinator of SEASPAR (South East Association for Special Parks and Recreation) had hoped for. She wants to help people overcome their fear of those with disabilities, and believes that working with young children can help create a better future.
Exposing people, especially children, to those who are different, teaches children that people with disabilities are people first. Children grow up with the knowledge that someone in a wheelchair is more than that, and they gain the benefits of increased compassion and understanding.
The children not only learned that those with special needs are just like them, but also spent a day at school learning about what it is like to have a disability. SEASPAR held an awareness day prior to the bowling event. Through simulated vision, hearing, physical and cognitive challenges, students had the chance to experience certain disabilities.
Anyone can hold similar events in their local community by contacting the human services groups in your area.