While talking to a group of forty school children today, I asked them a basic question I often ask if they are quite young:
Have you seen a guide dog before and do you know what they do?
Today I got an answer I wasn’t expecting…
Guide dogs are for blind people to help them get around, if they have no money to buy glasses.
hmm.
🙂
Yesterday was O J’s sixth birthday. We spent the morning at a school, where the children had made him a card and gave him two carrots for a present. I allowed him to eat one in class and they were fascinated watching him. My nephew and I played with him outside even though I had intended taking him to the beach. After dinner I washed him, hoping it would remove lots of the dead hair he is shedding at the moment.
Oj’s birthday is always close to the weekend of the guide dogs church gate collection in our town. Family and friends are a great help every year, and this year was the same. We were very organised and counted the money just when we had finished. I lodged it today, and the total raised during the weekend was 1,852 euros!
Those puppydog eyes of his really must work!
I worked in a brilliant school today, and delivered disability awareness training to two classes of children, who probably taught me a lot more than I taught them. Often when I begin the first of the two week sessions, the kids don’t know what to expect and are very quiet and shy. They become more involved during the class, and the more we discuss different types of disabilities, the more they realise how many people they know who have one. Petting O J towards the end of the class is the icebreaker, and by the time I return the following week, they are usually talkative and full of questions. Its a lovely transformation to watch.
Today’s classes were different. The children were on the same level as me right from the beginning, eager to learn but just as eager to tell me about their own experiences. I’d much prefer them to talk more than me, and they always have lots to say.
The first group of children talked about different types of disabilities. Their teacher asked them if they knew people who had any, and they listed family members, friends, friends of families, neighbours, friends of neighbours, the neighbour’s dog, etc. He then reminded them that they forgot to look closer. Their own school has a few children with obvious disabilities. Clearly they see these people as friends first and its possible that they sometimes even forget that they have a disability. Of course people shouldn’t be encouraged to ignore their disability or act like it doesn’t exist, but the fact that it isn’t the most important part of a child’s personality is great. That’s proper integration if you ask me!
The second class I visited had first-hand experience of people with disabilities. The two special needs assistants sat at one side of the room while their students sat at the opposite side, working independently just like their classmates. One of the children had developed a physical disability through illness, and spoke openly about how it affected him. He is a great sportsman and seems to have a very positive attitude. The other child had a hearing impairment and used a cochlear implant. Hearing loss is something I always talk about but its something I don’t have much hands-on experience of, so it was fantastic to be able to learn more directly from a child. I wore a headset connected to the loop system so that he could hear me speaking. He described how it works, how himself and his parents, (who are both deaf) communicate, and even asked if I wanted to touch the piece connected to his ear.
Both children were able to confidently talk about their experience of disability. It was an important part of their lives but not the most important part of their class, and they weren’t treated any differently. This positive confident attitude doesn’t come from nowhere. It comes from their parents/guardians, families, teachers, classmates, friends and people in the community around them. These nine and ten year-old children make me feel more confident that the future for people with disabilities might be a great one. I left the school feeling like I had learned a lot just by being there. I’m really looking forward to returning next week. The positive feeling of integration in the classroom is brilliant to watch, and the teachers were just as enthusiastic as the children.
My good mood for the day continued when I got a phone call from a friend to say that A local restaurant had found “lost property” belonging to me. It turns out that it was a handbag with the harddrive that I lost last August and was sure I would never see again.
What a brilliant day 🙂
but my guide dog is not my best friend.
I’m just back from a nice walk in town with O.J. Sometimes the simplest walks on our own are the most enjoyable. While I was standing in the chemist waiting to get served a man asked me how I was, and how was my dog. He then asked me the most annoying question in history:
Is he your best friend?
When I politely (but sarcastically if you knew me well enough) told him that O J was just one of my friends, he asked me if I had two dogs.
Some people just don’t get it, do they?
Dogs are great. I love them and couldn’t live without one. I couldn’t manage without a guide dog and O.J is great company. But believe it or not, I have human friends who are much better company and more fun to talk to than he is, therefore not making him my best friend. He is a companion but not a friend.
Appologies to people who call their dog their best friend. I’m not saying your wrong. Some people might not honestly have real proper human friends, and their dog is the best and most loyal they’ve got. Nothing wrong with that, if that’s the way you think, but for me, my dog is a dog, not my best friend, so random members of the public, please don’t keep assuming he is.
And as for asking does he take good care of me, don’t even go there!!
🙂 🙂
Paws For Thought 