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Book Review: Out of My Mind by Sharon Draper

This is a juvenile fiction book about a young girl named Melody with severe cerebral palsy.  Her body doesn't allow her to feed herself, speak, or do much at all.  She's very intelligent with a photographic memory but she can't really communicate.  Finally, in 5th grade, she gets a "Medi-Talker" which is a computer that speaks what she types in.  Finally she has a voice.

This book explores what it is like to be severely physically disabled but not mentally disabled. It seems like one of the most frustrating of all scenarios.  She is completely aware of all the cruelty (subtle and otherwise) that her classmates inflict on her because they don't really want to include her in their activities.  One of the saddest moments in the book comes when she realizes that every one of her special ed classmates is kind, where the "normal" ones are not.  Who really has the worse disability?

The book was a quick read and fairly enjoyable.  What I enjoyed about the book was that it was thought-provoking for me.  As I read this book, I wondered what school will be like for my youngest daughter.  I recently attended a transition meeting where we decided to put my daughter in a regular kindergarten class.  She has been attending a special ed preschool for the last 2 1/2 years.  She qualified originally because of significant fine-motor and gross-motor delays.  She was also not cognitively where she needed to be.  Her disabilities don't even come close to the severity of Melody's but her gross-motor and fine-motor skills are definitely lagging behind other children her age.

The special ed preschool has been great for her.  She has made good progress and has loved going.  Can I tell you how great it is to have the school bus come for her every school day?  This year she has had a really great bus driver and assistants.  I completely trust them with my daughter.  I also really like her teacher who just loves Camille.  I think what I have loved the most is that she has made good friends and really learned to interact with the kids in her class.  This will help her with friends outside of class.  Recently her cousin informed her, "I don't want to play with you!"  So she calmly asked him, "Do you want to play in a separate area?" She sounded like a preschool teacher.

So now we've decided she's ready for regular kindergarten with some additional services coming from occupational therapy, adaptive PE, and resource. I think cognitively she will be fine.  But it will be hard for her to keep up with her more coordinated classmates.  I hope they're kind to her and patient with her slowness.  If they're not, it will not be the end of the world.  We will figure out how to deal with it and maybe she will learn how to be even more compassionate and empathetic as a result.  I would prefer that to having a child that is mean and unkind.  Because truly that is the worse disability.

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