This is a feeling I am familiar with, that has carried with me from childhood. My name, Barbara even means "a foreigner, a stranger" in its Latin form and that is exactly how I've felt today. Like a foreigner-a stranger in my own life.
There is no need for alarm. The fact that I am aware of it and that it brings me to a deeper understanding of the children I teach is the hidden silver lining. The fact that I know I don't need to fit in and the fact that I know when I need to retreat and when I need to be with those who love, accept & understand me is the blessing in disguise.
Friendship, love & belonging are so vitally important to all of us, but especially children with cognitive & social challenges, and I am vividly reminded of this as I look back over the events of this day. Humans are social creatures & need other people to share whether it is friendship, love, affection or sense of belonging, from a single person or a group of people. We need to give & express love and to be loved by others. If this need is not satisfied, many can become anxious, lonely & depressed.
I first became aware of how it felt to be left out in the 4th grade. It was the first day of middle school and all of us were in the (noisy) cafeteria, listening for our names to be called to go with our new teachers to our new classrooms.
Every child was called except me and a boy who had just moved here from Peru. (His name was Pedro and he was terrified-he spoke very little English.) I was suddenly afraid & aware that I belonged nowhere. Of course it was just an oversight and the principal cleared it up and escorted me to my classroom. My teacher (an angel-wherever she is now) Miss Drew, was the one who first influenced me to become a teacher, through her compassion & kindness to me that first day of 4th grade. This has always stayed with me, however so has that feeling of "I don't fit in."
While I loved to play sports, I was shy and not very coordinated, so I didn't fit in with the "athletes". I was smart but not exceptionally so I did not fit in with the "smart kids", and I certainly did not fit in with those other kids-you know the ones. The ones that were always getting attention, clowning or getting into trouble. I had no idea where to look for friendship, because I did not fit the norm-was not in any of those categories. Even now, my diverse circle of friends illustrates my inability-or rather my refusal- to be defined.
This is my motivation to continue to educate children about how to build friendships & to create fun, inclusive enrichment activities and games where all children can be included and feel unique, accepted, cared for & successful.
A Robert Fulghum story came to me as I contemplated all of this & relaxed on my mat. I can think of no more appropriate story for a commentary on love, kindness, belonging & friendship than this one. It's from Fulghum's All I Really Needed to Know I Learned In Kindergarten book. The story has many messages: accepting oneself, being unique, wanting to fit in, etc.
I sincerely hope you enjoy it as much as I have.
~Barbara
"Giants, wizards and dwarfs was the game to play.
Being left in charge of about eighty children seven to ten years old, while their parents were off doing parenty things, I mustered my troops in the church social hall and explained the game. It's a large-scale version of Rock, Paper, Scissors, and involves some intellectual decision-making. But the real purpose of the game is to make a lot of noise and run around chasing people until nobody knows which side you are on or who won.
Organizing a roomful of wired-up gradeschoolers into two teams, explaining the rudiments of the game, achieving consensus or group identity-- this all is no mean accomplishment, but we did it with a right good will and were ready to go.
The excitement of the chase had reached a critical mass. I yelled out, "You have to decide now which you are--a GIANT, a WIZARD, or a DWARF!"
While groups huddled in frenzied, whispered consultation, a tug came at my pants leg. A small child stands there looking up, and asks in a small, concerned voice, "Where do the Mermaids stand?"
Where do the Mermaids stand?
A long pause. A very long pause. "Where do the Mermaids stand?" says I.
"Yes. You see, I am a Mermaid."
"There are no Mermaids."
"Oh, yes, I am one!"
She did not relate to being a Giant, a Wizard, or a Dwarf. She knew her category. Mermaid. And was not about to leave the game and go over and stand against the wall where a loser would stand. She intended to participate, wherever Mermaids fit into the scheme of things. Without giving up dignity or identity. She took it for granted there was a place for Mermaids and that I would know just where.
Well, where DO the Mermaids stand? All the "Mermaids"-- all those who are different, who do not fit the norm and who do not accept the available boxes and pigeonholes?
Answer that question and you can build a school, a nation, or a world on it.
What was my answer at the moment? Every once in a while I say the right thing.
"The Mermaids stand right here, by the King of the Sea!" says I. (Yes, right here by the King's Fool, I thought to myself.)
So we stood there hand in hand, reviewing the troops of Wizards and Giants and Dwarfs as they roiled by in wild disarray.
It is not true, by the way, that mermaids do not exist. I know at least one personally. I have held her hand."
*(From All I Really Needed to Know I Learned In Kindergarten by Robert Fulghum, Villard Books, New York, 1988, pp.83-85)
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