Quinn has been in her school for 4 years. She went straight from Early Intervention services in our county (which included therapy at our home) to this school in our county. She’s thrived under their care.

They have preschool (she went to 3s and 4s), pre-k and k. The structure for this school is to combine typically developing kids from the neighborhood and special needs kids from the county. I think it is usually a 50% split. In her classroom they have a regular k teacher, a special education teacher and a paraprofessional.

The special education teacher’s responsibility to stay on top of her IEP and her goals. There isn’t one thing that she does in the classroom without Quinn’s goals in mind. The other people who work with her do it in and out of the classroom including speech, OT and motor play. For Quinn we have a vision consult available weekly to assist with adjustments to help Quinn learn in the best (visual) way possible as she grows.

One of the great things about having a combined class of special needs and typically developing kids is that they both benefit from the experience. The kids get to learn from each other. Quinn gets to be around kids who are on target for their (her) age so she can learn from them and kids who aren’t usually exposed to kids with differences (both physical and learning) get to learn tolerance and compassion first-hand.

Quinn has also learned compassion. Compassion for others and patience for herself. She also had the chance to see kids with skills ahead of hers and behind hers and she learned that it didn’t really matter in the big picture. She learned that there is beauty in doing your best.

The worst thing that can be done is lumping like-developed kids together in a class. I know this happens in schools. For educators who haven’t benefited from seeing how a school like Quinn’s works, can’t really know how great it can be for all the kids. To only have gifted kids together and to only have special needs kids together is a tragedy. Because, I have proof that kids with different abilities and learning needs work well together. And they can and do learn from each other.

I know some parents of gifted kids don’t want kids like mine mixed in with theirs in an educational setting. And that is wrong. There probably isn’t much that would stop a gifted child from learning and that includes being in the same class with special needs kids. There is, however, a lot they could learn from being exposed to kids who are different — in looks, in learning, in developement, in behavior. Some adults I know could learn a thing or two about special needs kids too. If only un-lumping were universal.