Out of the mouths of Babes (2)
January 30th, 2010 | 
Author Over my 15 years of teaching preschool children, I have only come across a few kids who are curious about my blindness, probably because it is not something we talk about on a regular basis due to the fact that there is so much music to be learned. On the few occasions that it was brought up though, their responses are very cute. One child thought that if I opened my eyes really really wide, I should be able to see things better. Another recommended I get glasses. Still others hold something they want you to look at about one centimeter from your face saying “Can you see it now?”. Some of my classes know I have a friend who drives me to and from the preschools. This fact sparked one of them to say “Why do you have a driver?”. I replied that I don’t have a car, to which he responded “Why not?”. I told him that I could not drive, to which he responded with incredulity “You’re old and you can’t drive?”
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I am curious. Do the children who don’t ask questions or say something about it just accept your blindness as another way that people are different? Or are they not aware of it because, as you say, there is so much music to be learned? Or are they shy?
At any rate, I’m glad for your pupils (I mean the children, LOL) that they have the opportunity to get to know you as someone who embodies a physical difference that they can try to imagine to by closing their eyes for a while. I am sure it opens them to accepting the whole variety of differences that humanity displays.
Hi Heather. I think it is a couple of things as you say; that the children just get used to you the way you are. If they are having fun with the music they don’t even think about it. When they realize that they need to put something in your hand because that’s the way you see it they do so as a matter of course, only forgetting occasionally. They adapt themselves to you. It seems to be second nature to them as they have not yet built up any of the “difference barriers” which can come later on in life. That is why I love the multicultural aspect of any music program as it teaches the children respect for another’s language and way of thinking. This inclusive type of education will invariably prevent these barriers from forming.
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